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Online advertising breaks through £4bn barrier

value of online advertising grew by 12.8% in 2010, breaking through the £4bn barrier.

A study by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and the accountants PwC found that online advertising spending grew three times as rapidly as in 2009

Google was recently slapped with two fines

They provide false assurances that, in the normal course of things, our privacy is not being invaded on the Internet, that our personal data is safe, and that we are anonymous in our online—and offline—activities.

not a single incident, but a slow, unstoppable process of profiling who we are and what we do, to be sold to advertisers and marketing companies

Adults must impose the necessary checks and balances to keep children safe online, says the children's commissioner for Wales.

"All children and young people don't seem much of a distinction between their online and offline lives,"

Mr Towler told BBC Radio Wales. "It's all just one thing and they get really excited by the opportunities the internet affords and sometimes parents get a little scared about that and worried about what their children are accessing." 'Crossing the road' Continue reading the main story “Start Quote They're all running around with handheld computers these days, they're not just on phones ” End Quote Keith Towler Children's commissioner Mr Towler said he talks to children in lots of different settings and they "still enjoy playing outside as much as they ever did". He said we need to recognise that the internet provides fantastic opportunities for education and learning and its making sure that children access that safely. He said that was a real challenge for parents and carers. "It's a bit like crossing the road, you try to teach your children the best way of crossing the road well. We need to teach our children the best way of using this fantastic resource. "I think too many parents are very very scared of the internet and because they're so scared they will say 'Oh I don't understand it'". Handheld computers The commissioner also praised Hwb, the virtual learning environment, which he said provides protection for children using the web in schools. Mr Towler said: "We've got to get parents and carers to recognise that children do operate in the digital world. They're all running around with handheld computers these days, they're not just on phones. "They can access whatever they want whenever they want and parents need to engage on that. " "We need to remember that children and young people are much more savvy than sometimes we think they are, and they are much more responsible than sometimes adults think they are so its not all doom and gloom. "What we need to do is put the right checks and balances in place and what children always want from parents and carers is to understand what the boundaries are, and that's our job to do that." Sangeet Bhullar, executive director of Wise Kids, added that the digital landscape was "evolving rapidly" and up-to-date data was needed on how children and young people in Wales related to it. More on This Story .related-links-list li { position: relative; } .related-links-list .gvl3-icon { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; } Related Stories Web safety lessons urged for infants 05 FEBRUARY 2013, EDUCATION &amp; FAMILY Online chat 'should be monitored' 22 JANUARY 2013, TECHNOLOGY Body to promote digital teaching 22 JUNE 2012, WALES $render("page-see-also","ID"); $render("page-newstracker","ID"); Related Internet links Children's Commissioner for Wales The BBC is not responsible for the content of external Internet sites $render("page-related-items","ID"); Share this pageShare this pageShareFacebookTwitter Email Print In association with $render("advert","advert-sponsor-module","page-bookmark-links"); $render("advert-post-script-load"); $render("advert-post-script-load"); More Wales stories RSS Army base shuts in defence shake-up An Army base in Pembrokeshire is to close with 600 troops transferred to St Athan in the Vale of Glamorgan. Soldiers' conman jailed three years Wales recall Warburton and Jones <!--

Since there's no evidence these investors are interested in anything but profit, it's up to progressive organizations to become players in the global m

edia game.

generate huge revenues

Only about 5% of retailers currently have the interest or the ability to market to specific customers based on their location, according to Ingle. Most of what brands are interested in is more generalized information about their customers. But in a rapidly evolving and increasingly mobile marketplace, the brands that arrive late to the location-based targeted advertising game may be left out in the cold.

Your smartphone holds a treasure trove of information about you, and cell phone companies are looking for ways to turn that into profit.

"An interesting transformation is happening in wireless, in which consumers are no longer customers -- they're the product," said Dan Hays, principal in PricewaterhouseCooper's communications and technology practice. "The trick is for operators to find out how to make money without violating their relationships and trust with their users."

I would like my browsing and Google searches to be private. I don't want targeted advertising and I don't want to feel that anonymous companies are harvesting my clicks to learn all about me.

When the web was young, and a lot less shiny, web pages were fixed (static) and – barring browser quirks – everybody saw much the same thing. Today, much of the web is dynamic, which means that what you see has been adapted or possibly constructed on the fly just for you.

From your point of view, the advantage is that the websites you visit will be personalised to suit your needs and tastes. From the website's point of view, the advantage is that it can also personalise its prices and advertising to try to suit your needs and tastes, and increase your propensity to click and buy.

Google cookies 'bypassed Safari privacy protection'

The Wall Street Journal said Google and other companies had worked around privacy settings designed to restrict cookies

Cookies are small text files stored by browsers which can record information about online activity, and help some online services work

With 72 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute, almost every moment of modern history is a cult waiting to happen. And it is becoming big business.

The billion dollar question is how: how to make your video “go viral”, spreading your particular slice of contemporary culture across the planet like a contagion.

Silliness is more important – but not vital, given that both the Kony documentary and the jump from space are entirely serious.

The outrage over Instagram's announcement that it is changing its terms and conditions has turned the spotlight on the relationship between websites and users who upload content, whether it is photos, video, blogs or even games.

A survey of UK consumers suggested just 7% read online terms and conditions before they signed up for products and services, and other research has put it even lower.

Twitter: You retain your rights to any content you post on Twitter, but you grant the website a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence (with the right to sublicense) "to use, copy, reproduce, process, adapt, modify, publish, transmit, display and distribute" your content.

irst, research shows that social-networking sites are a serious risk when accessed at work.

Facebook at work". It may sound ridiculous, but the purpose is to ensure that employees are not putting their personal and corporate data out to tender.

The second reason is that once uploaded, personal details can become public possession - and not just for now but, effectively, forever. News Corp bought MySpace to exploit what previously had been unthinkable to advertisers: customers telling you what they want without you even asking.

YouTube is the closest thing we have to a traditional TV model in online video.

YouTube is nothing like television, and everything like the internet.

too many videos on YouTube, and not enough ad dollars chasing them

"There are now signs that television news is increasingly vulnerable

But the larger story is the rise of the Web, which has surpassed newspapers and radio to become the second most popular source of news for Americans, after TV

TV channels get affiliate fees

Some time later this month we are expecting the European commission to decide how it will proceed with its investigation of the search giant Google, following the latter's submission of proposed remedies at the end of January over allegations that it has engaged in a range of anticompetitive practices.

Google is a global company and its activities will require a global solution.

Google's global revenues were £23.5bn in 2011. Those are its revenues before tax, although Google's approach to tax is another and equally interesting story. Those vast revenues do not come from those who search, but from those who bid to place advertisements alongside the search results. This means that Google has a clear interest to arrange the rankings in a way that maximises its profits and faces a stark conflict of interests when it does so. It has every incentive to demote other companies, who might actually be offering answers or services that are more relevant to the user queries, and to advance its own services.

They may not be paying for the services directly, but customers still have a lot of power -- and companies know that they need to listen.

"We can't just sit back and allow the industry to just continue to ignore a core component of the user experience online," said Alex Fowler, Mozilla's global privacy and public policy leader.

The more devices that connect to the Internet, from smart cars to home thermostats, the more data there are about a person to collect.

Google told to fix privacy policy by EU data regulators

consolidate 60 separate privacy policies into a single agreement.

Google has been told it should give clearer information about what data is being collected and for what purpose. It has also been told to give users more control over how the information is combined.

At the moment, the four leading monsters are Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon. Yet 18 years ago, Apple was weeks away from extinction, Amazon had just launched, Google was still three years away from incorporation and Facebook lay nine years into the future.

We understand pretty well the factors that determine the fortunes of companies that make things people buy – which is why, for example, one can predict thatApple won't be able indefinitely to sustain its huge profit margins on its iDevices.

This leaves Facebook, a company that has one billion products (called users) and earns its living by selling information about them to advertisers.