This post originally appeared at Marketing Magazine in July 2009:

The digitisation of media has led to a power shift in the producer/publisher relationship.

Marshall McLuhan famously pointed out in 1964 that the medium is the message, and 45 years later it’s possible to say that the message is the medium, or that it’s the package not the platform.

Prior to the easy digitisation of media it was the publishers, television and radio networks, and record companies who were in control. They owned the medium and decided what to publish, how much to charge and how much to pay the producers of their content. The media definitely called the shots.

Today we have a situation where the costs of publication are much lower and the lines are blurring between various media – now it’s all about the package rather than the platform.

Musicians can record their music in home studios and release it independently, bypassing record companies and maximising their profits from sales. A wine retailer, like Gary Vaynerchuk, can start a video blog site and use his exuberant personality to build a considerable national, and international audience. A budding writer, like Tim Ferriss of the 4-Hour Work Week, can start a blog, build an audience, transfer that to a book launch, public speaking tours, media appearances and international fame.

Comedy duo Hamish and Andy are prime examples of a package that traverses media platforms. The TODAY Network Drive time team can be seen and heard on radio, online, on various television shows from Rove to Spicks and Specks to Thank God You’re Here. They’re a multi-media package.

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We have just posted Need marketing ideas? 6 steps to an effective internet marketing strategy over at GetSticky.  It discusses how very few companies seem to have a proper internet marketing strategy despite investing in a website.

We’ve included 6 basic steps to follow in order to start building your own powerful internet marketing strategy. Feel free to use our Web ANLYZR to gauge how effective your website is. We’ll get a report back to you shortly.

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Over at GetSticky we have been exploring Bing, the new search engine from Microsoft and conducting search engine optimisation, SEO, tests on it.

Check out our first thoughts on Bing and see how our sites have performed with SEO thus far. Its certainly different to Google and could trip a few web developer up.

By the way: did you know that BING stands for But Its Not Google?

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Over at GetSticky I have just posted 5 more internet marketing tips. These specifically address the question: What do you really want from your website?

If you like the post please Digg it for us.

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GetSticky - Internet Marketing System

The team and I at Sticky Advertising have spent the last few years immersing ourselves in online marketing, social media and search engine optimisation and web design. We have been deliberately steering the agency in a new direction as we experimented with online technologies and developed sites and strategies for our clients that have been enormously successful.

The result of our efforts, trials and tribulations is an entire Internet Marketing System designed for small businesses and marketers called GetSticky.

GetSticky systemises and explains the whole Inbound Marketing approach in an easy-to-follow manner, whilst providing businesses with the site and tools to revolutionise their marketing. Its not just hot air, its a system that has been working extremely well for one customer after another.

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The Twitterverse, and mainstream media, have been in a frenzy this week with the Ashton Kutcher / CNN race to one million followers. It culminated with one of the biggest names in showbiz, Oprah Winfrey, publicly joining Twitter and making her first Tweet on Friday’s program.

While the general public became enthralled by the whole proceedings, the original Twitter community debated the virtues of celebrity Tweeters and the false victory of huge follower numbers.

Now, as the dust settles, the conspiracy theories are beginning to emerge.

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Tim O’Reilly, co-founder of the Web 2.0 Expo and the person who coined the term Web 2.0, entered the stage to a rock star-like welcome for the first Keynote presentation of the event.

Tim wanted to talk about Web 2.0 five years on. He said that the term Web 2.0 was meant to explain what happened after the original dotcom crash; the second life of the Internet. It was never meant to signify new stages, like Web 3.0 and so on.

So what’s next for the web?

Tim O'Reilly

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Soren Stamer twitter.com/heartnsoul

Soren is a German entrepreneur who has applied the theory of Darwinism to business and the Internet. Darwinism is based on life without a creator and so life must continually evolve.

Soren believes that MASSIVE networking, such as what we are now seeing online, drives CHANGE. Our world is massively connected on global level leading to these consequences:
1. Increasing dynamics – life cycles are shorter. 6000 days of web life has changed world incredibly
2. Rising complexity – makes it impossible to predict, so better to stay AGILE
3. Increasing transparency – we know more and more about everything.
4. Global synchronisation – this is first globally synchronised recession. It creates opportunities too.
5. Collectively we are smarter
6. Abundance of options – declining GDP & explosion of services. Scarcity of attention.

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Web technology continues to encroach on traditional media at a rapid pace. While many US newspapers give way to online, television is also being transformed by new technology.

Here are some examples coming out of the US:

TiVo, the ad-skipping, time shifting digital television recording device, is now delivering web video to televisions. Rather than download and watch longer format video on small screens, TiVo allows video to be viewed easily through your television.

TiVo have begun working with YouTube, Amazon, Netflix and over 50 other sources to deliver web video to television. So far TiVo have had over 30 million downloads by 60% of their broadband-connected customers.

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I am currently in the middle of a month long trip around North America. Its a mix of work and play and it has cost a lot less than you would expect. Why? Because I have used a few clever strategies and a whole lot of web services and technology so that I can work and play and save money.

This post sets out how its possible to work and play overseas for a month or more without neglecting your business or spending too much.

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