Google reported that its quarterly profit soared on the back of its thriving Internet advertising service and that its display and mobile ad businesses are taking wing.A 32 percent leap in net profit to 2.17 billion dollars and a 23 percent surge in revenue to 7.29 billion dollars trumped Wall Street expectations for the California firm in the quarter that ended September 30.Google shares were up 8.98 percent to 589.50 dollars in after-hours trading."Google had an excellent quarter," said the ...

A friend remarked with surprise while watching the Chilean Mine rescue that the people-carrier transporting the miners to the surface didn’t appear to have a Cell C ad on it. I imagine that after spending R160-million in six months, finding new places to advertise must be increasingly difficult.Cell C has embarked on a massive re-branding strategy, which began with an "embedded" YouTube video of comedian Trevor Noah criticising the company, amongst others. It was later revealed that Noah had been ...

The hack that wiped everything off the website of South African hip-hop act Die Antwoord, is over. It seems that everyone involved in the sorry saga has decided to move on and get back to the business of musical world-domination.For nearly 48 hours there was no word out of Die Antwoord, the hip-hop superstars, who burst to global fame through their seductive use of YouTube and Facebook. Some took the silence to be indifference, but it turns out that ...

To dream is as easy as breathing; it is one of the things that make us quintessentially human. But sometimes hopes and dreams get pushed aside due to time pressures and the daily grind. Now there is a social media solution that allows you to keep your dreams alive and in focus.Launched September 9th 2010, the self funded project CREATORmakers.com wants to help people make their dreams come true. It is both a website and an iPhone application that provides ...

Japan's Sony will again delay the global release of the latest version of its popular "Gran Turismo" car-racing game, which was due out early next month, officials said Thursday. Gran Turismo 5 for the PlayStation 3 video-game console was to hit US markets on November 2 and Japan the following day, but the release will now be "this holiday season", Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. said.The delay is due to "production reasons," said Makiko Noda, a spokeswoman for the electronics giant's ...

There is no longer any doubt about the awesome impact that Twitter is having on the media landscape. Every day, the micro-blogging phenomenon cements its place at the center of news gathering, social networking and information dissemination. But while its basic functionality has been widely accepted, the delivery mechanisms employed are being challenged on various fronts, most notably by the Flipboard app on the iPad, and now by paper.li.What paper.li does is organise links shared on Twitter by your ...

The world-wide acclaimed TED talks took to the iPad with the release on Thursday of an application that allows users to watch the famous conference's videos on Apple's tablet computer.TED is a non-profit devoted to "Ideas Worth Spreading", bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design.An iPad app available free at Apple's online iTunes shop lets people access videos of presentations made at TED gatherings renowned for seeking ways to inspire fresh ideas and fight the world's ills."The iPad ...

Skype and Facebook joined forces on Thursday to let users of the popular Internet messenging and voice-over-IP service chat with their friends on the booming social network.The new Skype version 5.0 for Windows includes a Facebook tab and integrates Facebook's news feed and phonebook into Skype, the Luxembourg-based Skype said in a statement.Skype users can call Facebook friends directly on mobile or landline phones, send SMS messages or make free Skype-to-Skype calls to Facebook friends who are also Skype users, ...

Mobile phones are changing the face of communication and marketing in emerging markets around the world, and the implications are profound. The environment is changing at a rapid pace, but I've identified seven major trends that are defining the mobi space right now, and suggested ways that businesses can adapting to them.Here are a few basic points:1. Mobile usage has become pervasive In 1999, 11% of South African adults had access to a phone. In 2009, this number had reached 70%. ...

Microsoft's search engine, Bing, has received a massive endorsement from Facebook, which could potentially see Bing becoming a credible rival to Google, the company that has dominated the search category for so long.Early on Wednesday at Microsoft's Silicon Valley HQ, management teams from Facebook and Microsoft gathered to address the media on new developments and partnerships between them.In a nutshell, it was announced that the social context of Facebook's information database will be brought into a Bing search. ...