This from Berkman Center For Internet & Society New Media analyst, Hal Roberts. Fascinating blog post on using Google's new Insights For Search tool to extract, well… insights.
Digital Cameras v. Nigeria
One of my guiding theories of the modern media / advertising landscape is that the extensive real time surveillance of consumers by online advertisers and content providers encourages the growth of content about digital cameras (the content about which is easily monetized) at the expense of hard news, especially international news about developing countries like Nigeria.
The following google insights chart of digital camera v. Nigeria searches over time strikes a blow against that theory:
Read the rest of the post here
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See also!!!
Who Wants What? Google Insight on Spam, Pirated Software and Other Fun Stuff
From WorldChanging's Ethan Zuckerman
I'm wondering what other pockets of "undesirable" behavior are mappable via this technique. For instance, searches for "keygen", a popular site that offers serial numbers and software keys to enable pirated software shows a heavy concentration the former Warsaw Pact nations, with some strength in Southeast Asia as well.
See Also!!!
Early adopters vs the Mainstream: Google Insights points out websites only used by Silicon Valley nerds.
From Andrew Chen's blog.
Netvibes is California only – perhaps this is a good candidate for an early-adopter-only crowd?
Here's a couple of my own.
American Idol (red) vs. Global Warming (blue).
Batman (red) vs. Darfur (blue).
