M35 Design

Dropped your phone down the lavatory?

2012-01-10T16:48:00.000Z

Despite all the 'smarts' built into them, Smartphones have one fatal flaw: They can't get wet. Yet.

Three start-ups aim to correct that in 2012, offering special, micro-thin coatings made of nanomaterials that can seamlessly and invisibly encase your next iPhone or Android phone and keep it safe from the rain, puddles... or even a plunge in the lavatory.

Visit website

Boxing Day single biggest online shopping day of all time in UK

2012-01-03T17:53:00.000Z

According to Experian Hitwise, Boxing Day 2011 was the single biggest online shopping day of all time in the UK. In total, 13 million hours were spent shopping online and retail websites received an astonishing 96 million UK Internet visits, 19.5% more than Boxing Day 2010 (80.5 million visits).

One of the contributing factors to the record-breaking figures was that in 2011 Boxing Day fell on a Monday. Traffic to shopping websites peaked on Mondays during each week during December 2011, including 'Cyber Monday' which was the biggest pre-Christmas shopping day of the year.

Amazon starts row with retailers in US

2011-12-14T09:22:00.002Z

Amazon has annoyed retailers in the US with a new price check app that allows shoppers to get a discount on items via the online store if they find them to be more expensive elsewhere.

Read more

UK - Top Sites & Search Engines - December 2011

2011-12-06T12:25:00.004Z

Top 20 Websites and Search Engines
Top 10 Websites for Entertainment and Social Networking
Top 10 Overall Search Terms
Top Fast Moving Search Terms Overall
Top Social Networking and Entertainment Fast Moving Search Terms

Data and statistics covering UK Internet activity for the retail industry.

Top 20 Retail Websites
Top 10 Retail Search Terms
Top 10 Retail, DepartmentStores, and Appliances Fast Moving Search Terms

Data and statistics covering UK Internet activity for the travel industry.

Top 20 Travel Websites
Top 10 Travel Search Terms
Top 10 Travel, Agencies and Destinations Fast Moving Search Terms

SEE DATA

Results of M35 Design's Social Networking Survey Published

2011-12-05T15:03:00.003Z

Click here to see results of M35 Design's social networking survey.

1/3 of 'the internet universe' is a Facebook user or subscriber

2011-04-13T17:07:00.000+01:00

As of 31 March 2011, Facebook had 664 million subscribers. That means that 1/3 of 'the internet universe' is a Facebook user or subscriber - an amazing feat.

Europe has a population of 816,426,346, and European Facebook subscribers number 200,260,360 (30.2 %).

Source: http://www.internetworldstats.com

How to make passwords 'hacker proof'

2011-02-14T17:50:00.007Z

Weak passwords can compromise your safety on-line. GetSafeOnline.org, a joint initiative between the government and the Serious Organised Crime Agency, have released figures showing that 15% of internet users fell victim to hackers last year.

To protect yourself simply and effectively, here are six tips for creating stronger passwords to outwit hackers.

Never use personal information, e.g. mother's maiden name, pet's name etc.
Use different passwords for different accounts. Government statistics say that 17% of people still use the same password for every site they access
Use random number sequences - ideally a random combination of numbers alongside your chosen base letters and special characters
Use mixed character types, e.g. f1ow3r1ng instead of flowering
Update your password regularly
Use long passwords (ideally between 8 and 16 characters in length)

Longer internet search queries up 5%

2011-02-10T00:52:00.001Z

Longer internet search queries of five to eight words were up 5% from December 2010 to January 2011. Shorter search queries - those averaging one to four words long - decreased 1% from December 2010 to January 2011. Two-word searches comprised the majority of searches, accounting for 23.59% of all queries.

Source: Experian Hitwise

Internet Explorer Open to Cyber Attack

2010-12-29T18:45:00.000Z

According to Microsoft, a security vulnerability in Internet Explorer for Windows versions 6, 7 and 8 could allow hackers to circumvent Microsoft's traditional defenses and take control of a user's system.

Microsoft's next monthly security update is scheduled for January 2011.

More

Beware SEO scam emails

2010-10-21T00:47:00.004+01:00

Today, M35 Design received an unsolicited email regarding one of our own websites. The email was typical of the kind of 'spammy' approach that so many unethical SEO companies use to try to obtain new business.

The unsolicited message purported to be from someone called David Charlton, from a company he says is called "The Web Clinic" (www.seo-clinic.net).

Amongst other untruths, the email said that our website was a Google PageRank 3. It's actually 4 - which is higher, although it's not a good idea to focus too much on PageRank nowadays. David Charlton also said that the site only has 29 Google backlinks (incoming links to a website, or web page) when, in fact, it has over 900. He reports that the site has 1250 pages indexed in Google, yet it actually has 1350.

Apparently there are, "issues with site content and structure" and the website is "underperforming in at least one of the major search engines such as - Google, Yahoo, and Bing." He continues, "You probably are aware that most people don't look past the first page of search results. I struggled to find you in the first couple of pages for highly relevant keyphrases, which means that you could be losing out on a significant amount of business." Well we struggled to find his site in Google at all, despite his claims of being on page 1 for two terms - "Website Marketing Company" and "internet marketing companies." That is presumably why he spams people - because his site cannot be found!

In fact, we are number 1 or 2 on page 1 of virtually all search engines for our top search term, and on the first or second pages for many other terms. These are organic listings, not something we have paid for. The site has been carefully 'nurtured' and has gained its ranking over a decade or more.

We tried to reply to David Charlton to set the record straight, but his email address and other common variations that usually work (webmaster@, info@, sales@, admin@ etc.) were all "refused" by their server. No surprise there!

This SEO company have recently changed their domain name from 'The SEO Doctors' to 'The SEO Clinic' - presumably due to negative publicity. Will they be changing it again in the near future? Probably, given their mode of operating and the contunuing bad press (see links at the end of this article).

At best, they and the many other SEO companies that use these tactics are just ignorant and send out a blanket email without actually researching any individual sites, hoping for the best. At worst they are scammers relying on that one person in a few hundred believing what they say about their site and paying them to 'put it right.'

Read more complaints about seo-clinic.net here and here.

Internet Explorer browser falls below 50% of worldwide market for first time

2010-10-21T00:41:00.000+01:00

According to StatCounter usage of the Internet Explorer (IE) browser has fallen below 50% of the worldwide market for the first time.

IE fell to 49.87% in September, followed by Firefox with 31.5%. Google's Chrome continued to increase market share at an impressive rate and more than tripled from 3.69% in September 2009 to 11.54% in September 2010.

In the UK, in the time period September 2009 to September 2010, usage of IE dropped from just under 60% to 54.63%. Firefox usage also dropped from just over 27%, to 23.56%. However, Chrome usage rose from just over 4% to 12.61%.

Google Instant - launch of 'search as you type'

2010-09-08T19:43:00.006+01:00

Today, Google announced the launch of 'Google Instant', which aims to predict what you're searching for and provide results for it.

Google Instant offers evolving search results that can potentially change with each character you type into the Google search box. Google says that by providing users with immediate feedback, they are able to refine their searches more quickly and find the results that more precisely match their needs.

Google aims to predict what you want by filling out the anticipated search term in grey as you type each character. Below that there will be a dropdown box offering other suggested queries.

The new interface applies to both search results and related ads. Therefore, Google say they expect increased user engagement with their search services, including ads.

Although Google Instant doesn't change the way ads are served, ads and search results will now be shown based on the "predicted search." For example, if someone types "flow" into Google.com, their algorithms predict that the user is searching for "flowers" (the predicted search) and therefore display both search results and ads for "flowers". However, if that user then adds the letter "c" to the query, their algorithms may predict that the user is searching for "flowchart" and show the corresponding natural and paid results for flowchart.

Marissa Mayer, Google's vice president of search and user experience said, "In 2000 we thought the idea of being able to search before you typed was so weird we made it our April Fools joke. Just 10 years later we're seeing that it's actually possible."
Matt Cutts, from Google, says: "The search results will remain the same for a query, but it's possible that people will learn to search differently over time. For example, I was recently researching a congressperson. With Google Instant, it was more visible to me that this congressperson had proposed an energy plan, so I refined my search to learn more, and quickly found myself reading a post on the congressperson's blog that had been on page 2 of the search results."

Starting from today, users with Chrome, Firefox, Safari and IE8 in the U.S. will begin seeing the new results. Google is also rolling out the service to users in the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Germany, Spain and Russia so long as they are signed-in to a Google product. Users in the U.S. do not need to be signed in.

If you don't want to see results as you type, you can turn off Google Instant by clicking the link next to the search box on any search results page, or by visiting your 'Preferences' page. People who do so will then see Google's standard results.

Will Google update search results as you type?

2010-08-25T13:46:00.002+01:00

A new Google experiment has been spotted which alters search results as you type your query (for a demo, see video below). It is currently only available to a small sets of users, but going on past experience Google will either turn this into a fully-fledged feature or discard it.

It may well never make its way to the mainstream Google experience, but some are already expressing a great deal of concern about it, particularly with regards to queries that begin with words that could yield undesired Not Safe For Work results.

Facebook second most visited website in the UK

2010-08-16T07:47:00.005+01:00

Last month, Facebook was revealed to have half a billion registered users around the world, and is the leading UK social network, with 26m British users.

In June 2010, Facebook accounted for 7.14% of all UK Internet visits and over half (54.48%) of all visits to a social networking websites. It was the second most visited website in the UK, only beaten by Google (9.59% market share for June). However, using the measure of total page views rather than visits, Facebook is way ahead of Google, accounting for 16.73% of UK page views during June. In other words: 1 in every 6 Internet pages viewed in the UK was a Facebook page.

Facebook also has a very high average average time spent on its site: almost half an hour.

Social networks now receive more UK internet visits than search engines

2010-06-29T12:32:00.001+01:00

During May 2010, social networks accounted for 11.88% of UK Internet visits, whilst search engines accounted for 11.33%. May was the first ever month that social networks have been more popular than search engines in the UK, in terms of visits.

Facebook was the most popular social network, receiving 55% of all UK visits - almost three times as many as the next most popular social network, YouTube. Twitter is now the third most popular social network in the UK.

However, despite its popularity, Facebook doesn't yet dominate the UK social networking market to the extent that Google dominates the search market. Together www.google.co.uk and www.google.com accounted for nine in every 10 web searches carried out in the UK during May. Consequently, Google UK was the most visited website in the UK during May, accounting for 9.29% of all visits. Facebook was in second place, accounting for 7.04% of all UK Internet visits during the same month.

Google search engine offers a personalised homepage

2010-06-10T12:37:00.000+01:00

British and American Google users can now set their own background to their iGoogle homepages. To do so, users must be registered with Google and then login to their account to adjust their iGoogle backgrounds.

You can choose a photo from your computer, your own Picasa Web Album or a public gallery hosted by Picasa which includes a selection of beautiful photos.

The feature was rolled out in the US last week and is being rolled out across the UK over the next few days. It can be identified by the presence of a link in the lower left-hand corner of Google's homepage.

Those Google visitors who do not want to personalise their homepage will not be forced to. To learn more go to Google.co.uk.

Zeus, internet banking virus back!

2010-04-22T12:14:00.002+01:00

A virus named Zeus, that steals online banking details from infected computer users, is more powerful than ever, warns web security company, Trusteer. It says it has seen a completely new version of the Trojan Zeus virus in one of every 3,000 of the 5.5m computers it monitors in the US and UK.

Zeus works by stealing the login information (recording keystrokes) of a user when they are on target websites - usually banks and other financial institutions. The user's data is then sent to a remote server to be used and sold on by cyber-criminals.

Trusteer claims that Zeus 1.6 can infect people using the web browsers Firefox and Internet Explorer.

Source: Infosecurity USA

Internet use - Top 10 European countries

2010-04-10T23:46:00.000+01:00

Data from 30 September 2009 showed that the UK had 46.7 million internet users, second only to Germany, with 54.2 million.

Following behind was Russia (45.3 million), France (43.1), Italy (30.0), Spain (29.1), Turkey (26.5), Poland (20.0), and the Netherlands (14.3). Ukraine was last with 10.4 million users.

Source: Internet World Stats

Top 50 UK e-retailers

2010-03-30T12:38:00.003+01:00

The sixteenth quarterly edition of the IMRG-HITWISE HOT SHOPS LIST provides a unique insight into the top 50 UK e-retailers, based on February 2010 rankings.

The leading four brands retained their dominance of the UK online shopping scene: Amazon.co.uk (1), Argos (2), Play (3) & Apple Computer (4). Amazon.com (5), Tesco (6) & John Lewis (8) all moved up one place with Easyjet (10) entering the top 10 by moving up 2 places. Marks & Spencer (7) fell two places and Next (9) dropped a single place.

The biggest movers this quarter were: Thomas Cook (15) moving up thirty one positions, British Airways (31) moved up eleven places, The Trainline (24) and Thomson Holidays (11) both climbed ten.

Source: Experian Hitwise

Chrome offers automatic translation of websites

2010-03-02T14:38:00.003Z

Google's new version of its web browser, Chrome, offers automatic translation of websites, as well as enhanced privacy controls.

Users will be able to specify that they want every web page they visit to appear in a certain language, also to set privacy controls that are specific to individual websites.

Visit the Google 'Chrome' page to find out more.

Google advertises it's Chrome browser offline!

2010-02-02T13:01:00.005Z

Google is taking the unusual step of using a billboard and newspaper ad campaign for its Chrome browser. In a departure from its usual dependence on viral and word-of-mouth marketing, it is advertising Chrome in the streets and underground train stations of London, Paris and Amsterdam.

Even though in many respects Chrome shows a superior performance to other browsers (e.g. speed of loading pages), it has still failed to gain any meaningful market share since it was launched just over a year ago.

According to statistics published on 1st February by NetMarketShare, Chrome had 5.2% of the global browser market for January, coming behind Internet Explorer at 62.2% and Firefox at 24.4%.

If Google is to succeed in creating a new Web-based operating system built on Chrome that could one day challenge Microsoft's Windows, increasing its browser market share will be crucial.

Britons become biggest internet spenders!

2010-02-01T22:25:00.000Z

According to a new report by the Centre for Retail Research on behalf of price comparison service Kelkoo, during 2009 shoppers in the UK spent more online than any other consumers in Europe.

The study showed Britons spent £38 billion on web purchases and this figure is expected to grow by 12.4 per cent to £42.7 billion in 2010.

Moreover, the BBC reports that the number of people who spent over £1,000 on a single internet purchase rose from 12% in 2008 to 25% in 2009.

In total, online purchases accounted for 9.5% of all British retail sales in 2009.

Bing takes 10% share of US search market

2010-01-31T18:00:00.002Z

It has been reported that search engine, Bing, has now taken 10% share of the US search market, denting Google's dominance.

2009 internet... in numbers

2010-01-27T15:26:00.005Z

I thought the following internet statistics for 2009 were interesting:-

Email

90 trillion - The number of emails sent on the internet in 2009.
247 billion - Average number of email messages per day.
1.4 billion - The number of email users worldwide.
100 million - New email users since the year before.
81% - The percentage of emails that were spam.
92% - Peak spam levels late in the year.
24% - Increase in spam since last year.
200 billion - The number of spam emails per day (assuming 81% are spam).

Websites

234 million - The number of websites as of December 2009.
47 million - Added websites in 2009.

Domain names

81.8 million - .COM domain names at the end of 2009.
12.3 million - .NET domain names at the end of 2009.
7.8 million - .ORG domain names at the end of 2009.
76.3 million - The number of country code top-level domains (e.g. .CN, .UK, .DE, etc.).
187 million - The number of domain names across all top-level domains (October 2009).
8% - The increase in domain names since the year before.

Internet users

1.73 billion - internet users worldwide (September 2009).
18% - Increase in internet users since the previous year.
738,257,230 - internet users in Asia.
418,029,796 - internet users in Europe.
252,908,000 - internet users in North America
179,031,479 - internet users in Latin America / Caribbean.
67,371,700 - internet users in Africa.
57,425,046 - internet users in the Middle East.
20,970,490 - internet users in Oceania / Australia.

Web browsers

62.7% - Internet Explorer
24.6% - Firefox
4.6% - Chrome
4.5% - Safari
2.4% - Opera
1.2% - Other

Source: Website stats from Netcraft. Domain name stats from Verisign and Webhosting.info. Internet user stats from Internet World Stats. Web browser stats from Net Applications. Email stats from Radicati Group. Spam stats from McAfee.

Spam "mastermind" fined £116,000

2010-01-20T16:04:00.002Z

A 26-year old man has been fined $210,000 (£116,000) by an Australian court after admitting his involvement in the international network that could send 10 billion e-mails a day.

Lance Atkinson, a New Zealander living on the Gold Coast, Australia, was accused of being the mastermind of the world's largest known "spam gang", along with his brother, Shane.

More >>