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A tool in our quiver? 
11.15.2005, 2:17 PM
Link: BusinessWeek: Analyzing Google's Analytics Strategy.
It's almost as if Google saw us coming. I'm not sure exactly how this would work, but the exact same sorts of markers/tags and automatically generated lists for credibility, expertise, and quality that we were discussing last Friday could be facilitated with the free use of this Google/Urchin analytics tool. It would involve writing a bit of code, perhaps a custom Movable Type Plugin, but given Google's penchant for allowing access to search results and APIs for code applications, I'd say it looks very do-able.
Here's some bits from the article above that I found that may pertain to our goals:
NOVEMBER 15, 2005News Analysis
By Sarah LacyAnalyzing Google's Analytics Strategy
The online giant's decision to make its Urchin Web Analytics software free could spell disaster for search-engine optimization companies
[...]
Pretty soon, they may be blaming Google for taking it away. Google became a competitor when it bought a small analytics company, called Urchin Web Analytics, back in March. It upped the ante when it slashed the price of Urchin's software to about $200 from about $400. But the final nail may have come when Google announced on Nov. 14 that the software is now free.
RAPID-FIRE LAUNCHES. "When they first announced Urchin, I speculated about a couple of possible outcomes," says Eric Peterson of Jupiter Research. "The most frightening for Web analytics companies was that they would do tag-based analytics, freely available and supported by the global Google brand, and that's exactly what they've done."
[...]
"BETTER WEB EXPERIENCE." Google says the free-software move is not about going after former partners or competitors: It's about making the Web the best it can be. Google is betting the technology will be used not only by its advertisers but by all Web publishers, who can use the software to determine what parts of their Web sites resonate most with viewers.
"Our objective is to take what are extremely powerful tools and make sure all advertisers have access to them to make a better Web experience," says Richard Holden, director of product management at Google.
[...]
The BusinessWeek article focuses on the impact the move could have on existing business, businesses that exist around Google like the little bird around the hippopotamus (did I get my species right PZ?), like I really care about their fate. That's for stock watchers. What I'm trying to figure out is what it will do for people who use Google APIs, like Technorati et al.
And further, for our purposes, it could be a way to use the analytic data to go beyond the more "traditional" blogosphere ecosystem measures of link authority, link counts, even most popular or most emailed. I think this could take tags to another level, but for us, it would allow us to create alternative measures of credibility and authority, based on expertise or whatever, and incorporate it into custom tables of contents or even self-organizing site structures.
Am I full of blather, or what? I'm punting the Urchin code up on my sites now, just to see what it does. It still could be a trojan horse for big brother, as if Google isn't that already.
Chris
Posted by christine boese at November 15, 2005 2:17 PM
Comments
I basically use social media because it’s simple. I recommend or use it primarily because I think this certain kind of challenge and creative opportunity to be enjoyable. It always was even way back when in the 90s, prior to it being called it “social media”. And now it’s much simpler to be effective when you’re having fun doing what you do.
Posted by: Harley Leitzke at April 20, 2010 6:36 PM