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Earlier today, a Reuters report added more fuel to a particularly nitpicky fire — according to its typically unnamed sources, Apple’s new iPhone indeed sports a smaller, 19 pin dock connector instead of the 30 pin relic the company’s iDevices have clung to for years.

The news itself isn’t particularly shocking — our own John Biggs locked down the 19-pin number last month — but now a new report from iMore points to an even less surprising development. The Cupertino company is allegedly working on a dock connector adapter to keep those iDevice accessories from becoming completely obsolete, or so the story from iMore’s supply chain sources go.

Yeah, There’s literally no way that Apple would risk pissing off longtime iDevice owners by making their scores of old accessories useless in one fell swoop. Sadly, that’s all iMore was able to confirm. At this point, there’s still no word on whether or not such an adapter will find its way inside the new iPhone’s box, nor how much it will cost customers to purchase it separately.

While Apple hasn’t officially confirmed any of this (and don’t expect them to until September at the earliest), there’s more than enough smoke to signal a fire here. What’s more, the incessant clatter of the rumor mill points to plenty of big hardware additions — a larger screen, an LTE radio, NFC, and more — so it’s not much of a stretch to imagine Apple grappling with the prospect of squeezing everything into a slim new chassis.

Like it or not, this sort of move isn’t anything new for Apple. Most recently, the company launched the new MacBook Air and retina MacBook Pro with smaller MagSafe connectors because of their slimmer frames, but Apple has attempted to ease the pain by selling an adapter for $9.99.

Nokia heeft een, zelfgemaakte, video online gepost waarin de fabrikant wil aantonen dat navigeren met Nokia Drive (Rijden) op de Lumia 800 sneller is (het opstarten, zoeken van een bestemming en berekenen van de route) dan de standaard Maps app……

It’s very interesting just how things happen in the marketing world. Actually they are not much different than the world in general.

Here’s how things generally take place. A core or fundamental practice is neglected for a shiny object that is the next hot thing. After struggling with that hot thing the fundamental activity is returned to with a new enthusiasm because it is finally understood that the practice is actually an important part of everything. That’s why it’s fundamental. Duh.

Well if a steady done by Awareness and reported by eMarketer is accurate then marketers are set to return to something that is fundamental (and apparently under utilized) in any true online marketing effort: blogging.

While it’s great to go out and “engage” with customers and prospects through social media channels like Twitter and Facebook, it can almost be pointless if you don’t have some form of content to point these to in these interactions. Being nice can only take you so far. For people to ultimately do business with you they are going to need to trust that you may have a real clue about what you are claiming you do. Blogs are one of the best, if not the best, way to exhibit that knowledge and understanding.

The world is moving fast. The business world moves just as fast. That doesn’t mean you hop in the fast lane without doing the basics.

How is your blogging as compared to your other social media efforts? Is it neglected or going strong? Can any social media effort be truly as strong as possible if there is not a well executed blogging component?

Marketing Pilgrim’s Social Channel is proudly sponsored by Full Sail University, where you can earn your Masters of Science Degree in Internet Marketing in less than 2 years. Visit FullSail.edu for more information.

I’m not a dude (duh) but as I understand it, getting kicked in the nads sucks… really freakin’ bad. But apparently it doesn’t suck as much as shopping at Gamestop? Um, somehow I doubt the dude in this video for Glyde.com, a site that lets you buy and sell video games, really thinks that.

Basically he agreed to let people repeatedly kick him in his special place while driving home the fact that it’s still not as bad as trading your games at GameStop. I hope he got paid well for this.

KA-BAR knives knows it’s consumer (and target consumer), which is evident by their latest campaign “Hardcore Lives. Hardcore Knives.” that is aimed at men who are into hunting, fishing, the great outdoors, and who are in the military.

To illustrate this, they have 3 videos on their new website that depict real stories from consumers, through animated what? That’s right – through animated tattoos.

Cause if you don’t have a KA-BAR knife and a tattoo, you’re not hardcore. Duh.

In a charming interview with Forbes Magazine, Microsoft’s Craig Mundie discussed future products at Microsot, including the success and plans for the Kinect as well as their mesa para computación, the Surface.

Most important to certain folks who like computers by Apple were his comments on Siri. Basically, he said Windows Phone has had voice control – namely simple commands like “text Mom” and Bing searches – for a year now. Duh!

He said:

People are infatuated with Apple announcing it. It’s good marketing, but at least as the technological capability you could argue that Microsoft has had a similar capability in Windows Phones for more than a year, since Windows Phone 7 was introduced.

Now does that say that Microsoft can’t market product? Sure. Does it also say that people don’t care about Windows Phone? Why not. Does it say that Microsoft has a huge gap to close? Absolutely.

Will they close it? Eventually, but it won’t be easy.

via 9to5mac

Anyone who publishes anything on the web is part of Google. Well, anyone who lets Google crawl their content, anyway. Which is just about everyone.

I told ya so

Lots of bloggers are saying that Google’s a publisher. To which I can only say, “Well, DUH!” I’ve been writing about Google-as-aggregator for a few years now.

Since Adwords became their cash cow, Google’s been a publisher. They build up impressions and clicks. They sell those impressions and clicks. They need more impressions because those impressions become clicks. So they do more and more to aggregate content and keep you on Google for an optimal amount of time.

I don’t know what that optimal time period is, but somewhere in the twisted tunnels of the Googleplex, someone’s doing the math: For every popular search, they know the number of pageviews the average Google visitor has to make before they’ll click one of those lovely Adwords ads, thereby depositing money in Google’s bulging bank accounts.

Until you hit that number of pageviews, Google’s going to cling to you like an octopus clings to its favorite rock. Er. Or something.

We are all Google

To make this happen, Google pulls more and more of our content onto their pages, with page previews (Bing’s idea, originally), local search, and fun stuff like their new credit card search tool:

Google's credit card comparison

Search for ‘Berlin flights’ and you’ll see another example:

When you publish content on the web, you’re providing content for the world’s biggest publication: Google.

A lost opportunity

I don’t blame Google. They provide an invaluable service by letting folks find more stuff more quickly. I watched my son do a middle-school research essay on Bolivia last night: In a few minutes, he learned their history, political figures and critical current events.

But this is all a lost opportunity for us. Even with Google’s aggregation, the search engine drives a lot of business for us all. If there were a decent competitor to Google, we’d all be part of two Googles.

Two major search players would have to compete more for users. And users might sometimes prefer to leave the search engine sooner, rather than later. That would mean more traffic driven to our web sites, and more opportunities.

For now, though, I want to point out that I for one have always welcomed our Google overlords. Please don’t eat me.

Sometimes I cannot believe the threads I read in the official Google Webmaster Help forums.

Last week we had a duh SEO moment but this week, it goes way beyond that.

A company named scrappingexpert.com, is actually complaining that their web site was removed from Google. The owner asked, “The website scrappingexpert.com has gone missing from google.com, please tell us what could be the reason?”

Um, really? The site offers, an I quote, “Manually Copying and Pasting Web Data? Save time and money with scrappingexpert.com extraction solutions! Scrappingexpert.com Service are able to deliver data exactly according to your requirements with accuracy.” Heck, they even have a sub product named “Google Data Extractor!”

And why would you want this software? As the site describes:

Search Engine and SEO : Get the Most out of your chosen Search Engine & SEO Websites like Google, Alexa, Yahoo etc.

So now you are asking why the site is no longer showing up in Google? Really? Seriously?

If you are looking for some fun, check out the Google Webmaster Help thread with all the webmaster responses?

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.

Image credit: Adam Gerard on Flickr.

The big search news this week was that Yahoo abruptly fired their 3 year old CEO, Carol Bartz. I released our monthly Google Webmaster report. Google’s subdomain change in Google Webmaster Tools does not impact rankings. Bing renewed their deal with Twitter. Bing finds social factors to be more important than link factors. Google fixed the webmaster tools reporting delay. Google AdWords shares their new ad sitelinks forms. Google tests hiding the vertical search icons on the left bar. Google will speed up their DMCA process. Google buys Zagat. Google sends top contributors to California for a meet up. We had a funny “duh” SEO moment. Finally, it was Labor Day and Freddie Mercury’s logo on Google and others. That was this past week at the Search Engine Roundtable.

Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:

For the original iTunes version, click here.

Search Topics of Discussion:

• Yahoo Fires Yet Another CEO, Sorry Bartz
• September 2011 Google Webmaster Report
• Google: Subdomain Change Not For Algorithms or Rankings
• Bing Renews Deal With Twitter Over Twitter
• Bing: Social Factors More Important Than Linking Factors
• Google Webmaster Tools To Fix Reporting Delays
• Google Increases AdWords Sitelinks Options
• Google Tests Hiding Search Icons From Left Menu
• Google Faster DMCA Request Take Downs & Autocomplete Piracy
• Google Buys Zagat For Local Reviews & More
• Google Says Thank You To Top Forum Posters By Holding A Summit
• Duh! Removing My Site From Google Wasn’t a Good Idea!
• Labor Day & Freddie Mercury (Queen) Logo On Google

Please do subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don’t forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!

Are you ready for a laugh at someone else’s expense?

A Webmaster complained that his “Site not showing in google search result at all and it should!” So what happened?

As Googler Pierre Far explained in a Google Webmaster Help thread, the webmaster used the remove site feature to successful submit a site removal request and it worked. The site went poof, and was no longer found in Google.

Why would this webmaster then complain that his site is no longer in Google? Ready for this? And I quote:

Yes I removed entire site, because the google content was outdated. But I thought new content would come back by submitting site to google. Obviously I was wrong.

I feel bad, but once in a while we need a good laugh at someone else’s expense.

In any event, the site has some good content and they deserve a link. Check out the Best For Chef web site and here is hoping to a full and quick Google recovery!

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.