Over at Boing Boing they posted a story of a reader who was concerned that the new Google Map Street View allowed the world to see her home and even her cat sitting in the apartment on the couch.

While the first reaction is “whoa cool!” I think a second one is “Oooh this is gonna be bad.”

It is amazing to think about the ability to find a map to a meeting place and not only be able to see the shapes of the buildings on the map… but to be able to literally zoom in to the street view and look around the area to recognize it later. But I wonder what sort of liabilities this new technology is opening up….

What if your cat was being stalked?

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UPDATE: The full, horrendous video is available here.

Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, sweating bullets. Wearing flip-flops on stage, then presenting like you’re reading a brochure aloud. Pick an edge and stick with it next time Mark.

(Video link)

FreelanceSwitch is a great site not just for the content but for the story behind it. The creative company behind FreelanceSwitch is Eden.cc and behind the company are some good friends of mine. They are a great inspiration story for other internet entrepreneurs out there.

I originally “met” Collis of Eden.cc when he was still Collis of Good Creative, a top Australian Design Firm. It wasn’t all that long ago that they launched their first internet project FlashDen.net, but they’ve now closed the doors on their Design Firm and are now only producing their own sites.

FreelanceSwitch has done amazingly well since it’s launch only a few weeks ago. In just a short time they’ve built their feed count up to almost 8,000 readers! This quick rise to success can be attributed to the team of people at Eden who definitely understand what a good looking site is and know how to create useful and engaging content.

So I’m recommending this blog to you as not only a place for useful information, but also for people to watch.

Disclosure: This is an unpaid endorsement of FreelanceSwitch & Eden.cc. I have done partnerships with Eden.cc and am a sometimes guest blogger.

As an internet entrepreneur I am stuck using the mainstream methods to try and compare my site to other sites. In order to get advertisers, sponsors and or generate buzz I have to be able to explain how my site ranks… unfortunately Alexa.com is still one of the widely used measurement tools for this.

Alexa’s Extremely Biased Rankings

My biggest beef is that Alexa is often billed as an overall ranking for sites, but people don’t often understand who it is Alexa is counting traffic from and how that screws over the creative class of sites.

Who Loves Clunky Toolbars?

Alexa gathers usage ONLY from people with the Alexa toolbar installed in their browsers.
“Alexa’s traffic rankings are based on the usage patterns of Alexa Toolbar users over a rolling 3 month period.”
- Alexa FAQ

Most savvy internet users don’t want more space taken up in their browsers. Why would I install the Alexa toolbar just to see site rankings when I can install the SearchStatus FireFox Extension that not only shows me Alexa Rankings, but also Google PageRank & Compete Rankings… AND tucks it nicely into the bottom corner of my browser?
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Each Saturday we want to give you some light weekend reading and share with you some interesting Entreprenews that popped up in the last week. Below you’ll find a dozen or so interesting links and our thoughts on each news item.

Facebook Video Launches: YouTube Beware!
“While Myspace is overrun with spammers, scammers and horrible banner ads… Facebook continues to make smart decisions and grow as a quality mega-social networking site. I think this new video feature for them could give them another leg up.”

Publisher to Let the Public Have a Vote on Book Projects
“Why don’t we have our own ‘choose your won adventure’ style television show yet? Where each week we all go online to cast our vote for what direction the show should go next week. We might not be all that far off, as more and more mediums are being set-up to allow the global community to cast their vote on what makes it and what doesn’t.”

An Introduction to Social Media Strategy and Socially Driven Content
“A good article by Wendy about social media, what it is, how you can use it, and how to learn ever more about it. If you have business on the web… it is worth a read.”

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