The Long Tail Theory is wrong?

Research has been cropping up in the last few years to challenge Chris Anderson's modern-classic theory of demand distribution. The Times of London had this to report today in their article - Long Tail Theory Contradicted:

The internet was supposed to bring vast choice for customers, access to obscure and forgotten products - and a fortune for sellers who focused on niche markets. But a study of digital music sales has posed the first big challenge to this “long tail” theory: more than 10 million of the 13 million tracks available on the internet failed to find a single buyer last year.

Personally, I don't think this is terribly shocking. The "Long Tail" demand theory has been questioned again and again in application to sales of popular culture related goods (hmm... I wonder why they call it "popular" culture). However, there's one arena where the Long Tail plays out almost perfectly - search queries. Evidence?

How about Udi Manber, Google's VP of Engineering, noting that:

20 to 25% of the queries we see today, we have never seen before

Or Google themselves explaining that:

so-called "long tail advertisers" make up half our revenue.

Or Dustin Woodard's investigation into the distribution of search query demand:

It turns out that, at least in this particular three-month data set, the top 100 terms accounted for just 5.7 percent of all search traffic. Expand to the top 500, 1000, and 10000 terms, and just 8.9 percent, 10.6 percent, and 18.5 percent of all search traffic is involved, respectively.
Steve Ballmer
"Top 100 Search Terms by Percentage of All Search Traffic" (Source: Hitwise)

This means if you had a monopoly over the top 1,000 search terms across all search engines (which is impossible), you'd still be missing out on 89.4% of all search traffic. There's so much traffic in the tail it is hard to even comprehend. To illustrate, if search were represented by a tiny lizard with a one-inch head, the tail of that lizard would stretch for 221 miles.

At SEOmoz, nearly every large client we work for has exactly the same type of traffic graph - I've even shown off SEOmoz.org's own via Enquisite. The long tail is regularly producing 50-75%+ of the search traffic to large sites. Don't be fooled by news that the "Long Tail" might not exist - it's just that it might not be as big or as valuable, particularly in "pop culture" niches like movies & music.

What do you think? Is the long tail dead? Are long tail queries driving the majority of your sites' traffic? What about value - are long tail queries impossible to convert or equally valuable?

Chinese workers leaving cities in droves

CHENGDU, China (Reuters) -- China's ocean of blue-collar workers is streaming back to the country's farming hinterland, bringing thwarted aspirations and rising discontent in tow as their city jobs, their paths out of poverty, fall victim to the global economic crisis.

Train K192 is a daily conduit of the reversing flow.

Every afternoon it pulls into Chengdu, capital of populous Sichuan province, after a 31-hour trip from Guangzhou, centre of China's once-thriving export heartland.

Hundreds of weary passengers, some of whom stand through the entire journey because seats are sold out, straggle into the grey light of the Chengdu winter and an uncertain future.

"Lots of factories have closed. Mine shut about three months ago. There was nothing to do, so I came home," said Wu Hao, 21, sporting a stylish striped sweater and a sleek metal suitcase.

After a year spent making circuit boards in Guangzhou, he was heading back to his family's patch of farmland, a full month before the Chinese new year when he would usually visit home.

Officials estimate that more than 10 million migrant laborers have already returned to the countryside as thousands of companies have been dragged under by weak global demand for everything from clothes to cars.

The government, always concerned about social instability, is now on high alert, fearful of the consequences of a huge mass of jobless, disappointed, rootless young men.

Beijing has urged firms to avoid cutting jobs despite falling profits, and many bosses have obliged by retaining workers but giving them unpaid leave.

"Sales were really bad and the boss just kept giving us holidays. We had 15 days off last month," said Tan Jun, who also clambered off train K192 in Chengdu. "Next year I won't go back."

With an impish smile, Tan looked more like a student than the factory hand he had been for a drug company in Dongguan, an industrial city next to Guangzhou.

"Menace to Stability"

Over the past three decades, about 130 million people have left China's countryside for the smokestacks, assembly lines and construction sites of cities.

That migration, described as the world's biggest ever by the United Nations, has underpinned the country's heady growth and also given its poorest citizens a share of the spoils, as urban residents' incomes are much higher than farmers'.

Known as China's "floating population", laborers rarely settle permanently where they work -- effectively prohibited from doing so by residency rules -- and return in droves to their hometowns for the Chinese lunar new year.

State media have put the best possible gloss on the in-bound tide of migrants under way: they are simply returning home early, one month ahead of the Year of the Ox which begins on Jan. 26.

But China is heading into uncharted territory and the picture could deteriorate quickly. Many economists forecast growth next year of less than 7.5 percent, the country's lowest since 1990 and a level that would swell the ranks of the jobless.

"The redistribution of wealth through theft and robbery could dramatically increase and menaces to social stability will grow," Zhou Tianyong, a leading Communist Party scholar, wrote this month in a newspaper issued by a state think-tank.

Workers and officials alike hope the migration reversal is only temporary, but the numbers are too vast to ignore. The social security ministry says 10 percent of all migrants have already gone back to the countryside.

New economy?

China, in the short term at least, is pinning its hopes on a smooth absorption of the returnees.

"We expect that there will be a big change early next year, probably in March or April," said Wang Min, a director at the Yuhui Labour Market in Chengdu. "A lot of people will stay here in Sichuan to look for work and not go to other provinces."

If so, they could be redrawing China's economic map.

Coastal provinces have long been the wealthiest in China and the main destination for migrants. But they have borne the brunt of falling exports, while the country's poorer hinterland is more closely tied to domestic fortunes that could rise on the back of a hefty government stimulus spending.

"We are seeing quite a few good, talented people come our way from Guangdong, people with business experience and skills," said Wei Chengyi, manager at Chengdu Doulton Trading Co., which sells ceramic filters. "It's a big help for us."

Unveiling its rural policy priorities for next year, the government said on Sunday that it will encourage unemployed people who return home to start their own businesses. Officials in Chongqing and Henan, two big sources of migrants, have already pledged to lend seed money.

Reconstruction after the devastating earthquake cent red on Sichuan this year has also created a huge need for labor that will sop up some of the floating population.

"I'm not worried. There are still places you can find a job. And when you've got a lot of friends, it's quite easy," said Long Zhaojun, who had spent nearly four years in coastal factories.

Just off the train in Chengdu, Long said he would stay in the bustling city of 10 million for a while to hunt for jobs and have some fun. He was in no rush to return to his farming village.

Sanlu company bankrupted formally

Due to the inferior quality milk powder,Sanlu company announced bankrupting formally.

After the 29th olympic game in beijing,many bad news about Sanlu milk powder turned up in the internet said the milk powder contains elamin.And elamin is a kind of pioson which make the baby sick even die.

According to the news,Sanlu have to amend more than RMB 900 millions to the casualties.Now,Sanlu have to get into debt.Its asset is -1.103 brillions.

As a consequense,Sanlu have to apply bankruption.

Sina makes coalition with Focus Media

BeiJing time:22th,Dec,Sina announced adding 47million stocks to make coaltion with focus media's ads of outside.after this even,focus media became the biggest shareholder of sina.

after the news of sina makes coaltion with focus media come out,the stock of sina droped 17%,and focus media droped 16%.

Amazon.com Review
Standards, argues Jeffrey Zeldman in Designing With Web Standards, are our only hope for breaking out of the endless cycle of testing that plagues designers hoping to support all possible clients. In this book, he explains how designers can best use standards--primarily XHTML and CSS, plus ECMAScript and the standard Document Object Model (DOM)--to increase their personal productivity and maximize the availability of their creations. Zeldman's approach is detailed, authoritative, and rich with historical context, as he is quick to explain how features of standards evolved. It's a fantastic education that any design professional will appreciate.

Zeldman is an idealist who devotes some of his book to explaining how much easier life would be if browser developers would just support standards properly (he's done a lot toward this goal in real life, as well). He is also a pragmatist, who recognizes that browsers implement standards differently (or partially, or not at all) and that it is the job of the Web designer to make pages work anyway. Thus, his book includes lots of explicit and tightly focused tips (with code) that have to do with bamboozling non-compliant browsers into behaving as they should, without tripping up more compliant browsers. There's lots of coverage of design and testing tools that can aid in the creation of good-looking, standards-abiding documents. --David Wall

Topics covered: Why Web standards (such as XHTML, CSS, ECMAScript, and DOM) are good for everyone, and why site designers and browser makers should move towards standards compliance. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Review
"Jeffrey and his web standards coconspirators have made it possible for those old enemies--beauty, usability, and accessibility--to play nice together in any website." -- Louis Rosenfeld, publisher, Rosenfeld Media "Zeldman explains complex technologies in a way that designers can not only understand, but actually get excited about. If you are serious about web design, you need this book. -- Hillman Curtis, author, MTIV: Process, Inspiration and Practice for the New Media Designer

Job seekers flood IT staffing site

About 20,000 people looking for jobs signed on to oDesk Corp.'s online staffing marketplace in November, the largest monthly increase -- by at least 40% -- that CEO Gary Swart has seen since joining the firm in 2005. Swart said he expects another 15,000 people to sign up this month.

About 4,600 contract jobs are listed on the oDesk site, about twice the number available a year ago. The growth in available jobs is a sign that contract work, like outsourcing, is countercyclical -- it tends to expand when the economy is troubled.

"Companies are trying to do more with less," Swart said.

In all, some 157,000 people are currently seeking work on the site.

Meanwhile, the National Association of Computer Consultant Businesses reported earlier this month that overall IT employment in the United States declined by almost 34,000 jobs between October and November. U.S. IT employment for the month stood at about 3.87 million.

Robert Scheier, a managing director for sourcing advisory services at PricewaterhouseCoopers International, said that the use of contractors is growing as companies look to cut IT costs.

Workers listed on the oDesk site are located around the world, and the hourly rates offered reflect the economic differences among countries -- averaging $12.52 in India, $6.33 in the Philippines, $16.86 in Russia, and $18.32 in the United States.

finish cet6

finally,i finished cet6 yesterday.After a week's hard working.i strongly believe that i can pass the exam.the article is about students's mental health.it seems that i do not do good at the article as cet4.But it doesn't matter,passing is everything.

as to the first reading comprehension,it is about nike shoes'company and its boss.the second involves in the agriculture sustainable.the last talk about what?i forget,haha.

in a word,i think i will pass the exam.certainly,i just can say i think.before the result comes out,nobody can ensure him a good mark or passing the exam.