Travel Itinerary

I’ll be globe trotting for the next 10 days, here is my schedule, if I’m going to be near you and you’d like to meet up, let me know.

November 30th – Johannesburg
December 1st, 2nd & 3rd – London
December 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th & 7th – Chicago, attending Search Engine Strategies
December 7th & 8th – San Francisco/San Jose (Silicon Valley)
December 9th – London
December 10th – Cape Town!!!!

Fantastic Article on Google

Here is a one of the most definitive short story’s on Google ever written to date. It’s really worth the read, and I would like to advise everyone to take the time to read through this article.

incuBeta Xmas Party…and a bit of plagiarism!

Here are some acts of plagiarism:

Try searching for “Unlike other bid management” on Google and you will find many companies, claiming the same thing.

The common thread seems to be the everyone is using the iProspect copy

Like how about this one? Or this one.

BidMonarch (BlueLithium) seems to be the main culprit – shame on you!

And here are some pics of the incuBeta Xmas Party.

Random incuBetans on stage:

Me and my lovely wife, Charlene:

Some guys – Mike, Vinny & Andrew:

And a handful of girls (yes, including Daniel :-) )

Ingenio Pay Per Call Patent Information

While reviewing my blog logs this week, I noticed a surge in Google traffic on the keyword phrase “Ingenio Patent“, where this blog is ranked at #1. I also saw some lower traffic from the phrase “Pay Per Call”.

I realised then that there is obvious a lot concern by the general market on how Google is going to take their Pay Per Call product (see post on Pay Per Call on Revenews & the breaking news post I made on Chicago Newspaper Google Ads)

Anyways, I’ve done some research, and here are the patents that Ingenio has secured, according to the USPTO.Gov site.

PAT. NO. Title

6,865,540 Method and apparatus for providing group calls via the internet

6,801,899 Assistance method and apparatus

6,704,403 Apparatus and method for ensuring a real-time connection between users and selected service provider using voice mail

6,636,590 Apparatus and method for specifying and obtaining services through voice commands

Hope that helps any of you searching for this information.

Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2005

I’ll be attending SES Chicago 2005 next week. If you’re going to be at the conference, please drop me a mail and let’s try to meet up. My email is vlingham@gmail.com.

I’ll be attending the sessions, so stay tuned for up-to-the-minute reports of what’s happening at the conference.