Central Perk

vineri, 13 iulie 2012

Damn Cool Pics

How to Survive the Zombie Apocalypse
The Gotye Effect [Video]
Spotlight on Men’s Health [Infographic]

How to Survive the Zombie Apocalypse

Posted: 12 Jul 2012 09:25 PM PDT

Good luck!

The Gotye Effect [Video]

Posted: 12 Jul 2012 09:16 PM PDT

Yeah it's the worst. I'm going to play it right now just so I can turn it off...when it's over.

Spotlight on Men’s Health [Infographic]

Posted: 12 Jul 2012 08:59 PM PDT

Increasing awareness of preventable health problems and encouraging early detection and treatment of disease among men and boys is an important topic year-round. Following up on Men's Health Month, we wish to highlight that by raising awareness, advancing health education, and recognizing culturally influenced behaviors, each of us can help improve men's health.

The statistics are staggering: seven million American men have not attended a physician's appointment in more than 10 years. Two-thirds of men would not seek a health care professional if they were experiencing chest pain or shortness of breath, two early warning signs of a heart attack.

The most astounding finding? More than half of all premature deaths among men are preventable.

The infographic below lays out additional statistics about the state of men's health in America, and offers suggestions for improving men's health – including when and how often they should be tested for certain health issues. This content is for informational purposes only, and is not meant as personal health guidance.

Click to Enlarge.

West Wing Week: "Lets Agree To Do What We Agree On"

Your Daily Snapshot for
Friday, July 13, 2012

West Wing Week: "Lets Agree To Do What We Agree On"

This week the President signed the MAP-21 Act to extend funding for transportation infrastructure projects and stopped student loan interest rates from doubling. He also urged Congress to cut taxes for the middle class while the White House announced the 2012 Save Award initiative and played host to a Google+ Hangout.

Check out West Wing Week on WhiteHouse.gov:

In Case You Missed It

Here are some of the top stories from the White House blog:

Hanging Out and Talking Mortgage Refinance with HUD Secretary Donovan and Zillow
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan joined four homeowners from around the country for a Google+ Hangout moderated by real estate marketplace, Zillow, Inc. to discuss home mortgage refinancing.

Open Data for College Affordability and Better Student Outcomes
The Obama Administration recently launched the Education Data Initiative to help students and their families benefit from innovation enabled by open data from the US government and other sources.

Ten Ways Immigrants Help Build and Strengthen Our Economy
Our American journey and our success would simply not be possible without the generations of immigrants who have come to our shores from every corner of the globe.

Today's Schedule

All times are Eastern Daylight Time (EDT).

9:40 AM: The President departs the White House en route Joint Base Andrews

9:55 AM: The President departs Joint Base Andrews en route Virginia Beach, Virginia

10:40 AM: The President arrives Norfolk, Virginia

12:55 PM: The President delivers remarks at a campaign event

2:40 PM: The President departs Norfolk, Virginia en route Hampton, Virginia

3:05 PM: The President arrives Hampton, Virginia

4:25 PM: The President delivers remarks at a campaign event

5:30 PM: The President departs Hampton, Virginia en route Roanoke, Virginia

6:20 PM: The President arrives Roanoke, Virginia

7:25 PM: The President delivers remarks at a campaign event

8:50 PM: The President departs Roanoke, Virginia en route Joint Base Andrews

9:40 PM: The President arrives Joint Base Andrews

9:55 PM: The President arrives the White House

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What is “?gclid=” & Why is The Analytics Cookie (Not Set)?

Posted: 12 Jul 2012 04:51 AM PDT

Recently we were a little stumped with gclid and the Google Analytics cookie that's placed on user's computers. We were asked:

"I went to my website through an ad, and the Analytics cookie set on my computer says: utmgclid=StrangeGibberishHere456|utmccn=(not%20set)|utmcmd=(not%20set) )|utmctr=my%20search%20term – why are the medium and campaign not set?"

So we did a little digging around to figure out why 'utmccn' was 'not set' and thought it was appropriate that we share it with all of you too. So here's the low down on what we've learnt:

When an AdWords account is linked to an Analytics account, and you enable automatic tagging, AdWords uses the gclid to hide all the information it needs to pass to Analytics.

If the link between Analytics and AdWords is set up properly, you shouldn't see "?gclid=" in Analytics – it should recognise the tag as being from AdWords and decode all the data from it.

See the Analytics Help page on auto-tagging.

Going back to the initial query:

"I went to my website through an ad, and the Analytics cookie set on my computer says utmgclid=StrangeGibberishHere456|utmccn=(not%20set)|utmcmd=(not%20set) )|utmctr=my%20search%20term – why are the medium and campaign not set?"

The medium and campaign are set – it's just that they're hidden in the gclid. The 'gclid= StrangeGibberishHere123' contains all the information Analytics needs to assign 'campaign', 'ad group', 'placement' etc., so having 'utmccn' and 'utmcmd' set on top of that would just confuse things.

Also, having information hidden in a 'gclid' and not in 'utmcmd' means competitors can't just look at the cookies set on their computers to determine your AdWords account structure.

Another question we were asked was:

"When I look at Analytics Real Time, I see active pages tagged with things like /landingpage.html?gclid=blahblahblah – what's going on?"

When someone clicks on an ad, they'll actually go to the URL /landingpage.html?gclid=blahblahblah. Usually Analytics would strip away the gclid parameter and show just /landingpage.html as the page – but the gclid still shows up in Analytics Real Time, presumably because Real Time is only in beta.

But what are your thoughts? Have you had similar queries thrown at you and have you got any insights to share? Please feel free to add to the discussion within the comments below.

Seth's Blog : Monetizing digital attention

Monetizing digital attention

The most effective way to make a living from attention paid online is to earn trust, connect a tribe and then sell something that isn't online. The Ironman triathalon, say, or Louis CK's concert tickets. Attention is precious and trust even more so.

Many folks, though, would like to be able to deliver a digital 'product', an ebook or video or some other online good that they can produce at low cost and sell in volume. There's a long history of brilliant writers and directors finding markets for their work using movies, books and other media that used to be new, and it would be gratifying if it could work here.

Unfortunately, most people do it wrong. They use a long sales pitch letter with highlighted boxes and fake testimonials. They make grandiose promises of secret riches or long-hidden techniques. And most disappointing to those that would build trust, they enlist a legion of affiliate salespeople, linking to one another and gaming search results or buying fake search ads.

There's a better way. Consider two counter-examples: Paul Wolfe's site about how to learn the bass, and Susan Piver's Open Heart project on meditation. I'm lucky enough to know both Susan and Paul, and I've seen how they've used the power of digital media to build successful businesses.

In both cases, the model is the same: it's free to get started. So free, in fact, that most people who engage discover that all they need is the free stuff. Since the marginal cost of sharing these samples is free, it costs them nothing to add one more person to the ever-growing list of those that trust, that pay attention and that gladly give permission to their teacher.

The magic comes in because of the inevitable movement of the most motivated students from free to paid. Not because the teacher has to hold anything back to sell out of panic or greed, but because the committed student is happy and eager to pay.

It's almost impossible to hold information hostage online. People are unlikely to sit still as you dangle something valuable but not share what's inside the box. The approach that Paul and Susan take is to eagerly share, and then to clearly delineate between what's free and what's not.