According to a recent survey done by the University of Michigan, average Americans are happier with Google than they are with any other web service. Americans rank their satisfaction with Google at 86%, up ten percent from the previous year. The next highest on the list is Yahoo, which clocks in at a 77% satisfaction rate. On the other end of the scale is AOL, which sits at a disappointing 69% satisfaction rate.

Six Apart, the company responsible for the Movable Type blogging platform, has put together its own blog directory. The directory, appropriately known as blogs.com, covers a wide variety of subjects, from marketing to movies to golf. Each blog is also searchable by keyword, allowing you to zone in on the content that you really want to read about.

Websites aren’t just for browsers anymore. We have two new programs that let websites, even mail services like Gmail, to leave the browser and become their own free-standing, application-like tools. On the Windows side of things, there’s Bubbles. For all of you Mac fans out there, there’s Fluid. With both Bubbles and Fluid, you have the added bonus of being able to set the refresh rate on your new tools. That way, the Bubble containing your eBay auction can update every five seconds, while the Bubble containing CNN can update every five minutes. No matter the operating system, both Fluid and Bubbles are a fine way to retake your browser while staying in touch with the services that are the most important.

As many as you know, learning a programming language, especially one written for web use, can be daunting experience. The OPAL Group understands this, and they are willing to help. OPAL’s new tool, the SelectORacle, is an online CSS-to-English translating dictionary. Just type in the code or the website and press a button. In no time at all, the ORacle will explain everything in simple, easy to understand English, or if you prefer, Spanish. The SelectORacle is the perfect way for beginners to feel comfortable reading code without feeling too overwhelmed or flustered.

A big topic of conversation at the Search Engine Sessions conference in San Jose is the emergence of video search engine optimization, or VSEO for short. Our friends at WebProNews have a great article about both the concept and the minds behind it. This piece is a must for anyone who works with video on the web or is interested in where the web is going.

The retailing industry has discovered the power of social media to sell its products. JC Penney and Sears, for example, are using easy to play online games as a way to promote their clothing lines By using methods such as online games and Flash-based advertisements, companies are better able to reach their desired consumer bracket, teenagers. This, in turn, creates an overall brand awareness that is stronger than traditional televised or print ads. The end result is more sales and better, more qualified customers.

Yahoo has finally allowed mainstream access to their Digg competitor Buzz. Previously, Buzz was only available to a hundred or so specially selected users. Like Digg, Buzz allows you to vote for your favorite stories and articles, with the highest ranking stories appearing on the Yahoo main page. Many analysts believe that Buzz will bring more users to Yahoo. In the closed beta, stories that were deemed to be Buzzworthy were viewed more often than the other stories.

One of the most important things that you can do as a new business owner is to understand the needs of your potential clients. The easiest and, some might argue, most cost-effective, way of doing this is with a survey. For those of you who wish to harness the power of a survey but don’t have the time to write and conduct one yourself, there’s Frogmetrics. Frogmetrics transforms the surveying process into a simple, three-question quiz. Each quiz takes only seconds to take, and is full of invaluable information concerning your business. Simple and effective, Frogmetrics shows how wonderful three little questions can be.

As many fans of the Free Line know, it’s always a good idea to make your site search engine friendly. If your site is built upon a database, then you know that this is easier said than done. Don’t worry, because Mark Stubbs feels your pain and wants to help. In “Ten SEO Mistakes Made By Database Driven Websites,” Stubbs not only describes the problems that many webmasters deal with when it comes to SEO, but explains what the root causes are as well. This article is full of great advice for everyone, even those who don’t employ a database in their site’s structure.

In high school, popularity was gauged by word-of-mouth. In politics, popularity is gauged by the opinion poll. On the Internet, popularity is at least partially gauged by Socialmeter. Socialmeter scans everything from Delicious to Google Links in order to determine the social popularity of your site. The results are then displayed in an easy-to-read bar graph.

Sometimes it seems like SEO tools are a dime a dozen these days. It’s hard to know which ones are worthwhile until you’ve tried them all. Traffic Travis is one of the better tools we’ve seen. It features everything from a keyword finder to a page analyzer, and it has an easy-to-use interface to boot. And unlike a lot of SEO software that’s of this caliber, Traffic Travis is free.Next, tag clouds are great for a lot of reasons, and there’s a lot of ways you can use one. Wordle is a free online tool that lets you create a tag or word cloud out of any text you throw at it. The cloud then displays all the words from the text based on how frequently that word appears. Plus, you can easily display the words in different fonts and formats.

StomperNet faculty member David Bullock is always thinking about sophisticated ways you can get more out of your ongoing keyword research. In “A New Definition for Keywords,” he suggests that you should be looking at the “conversations” of search phrases rather than just current search volume. According to Dave, a conversation is the history that a keyword has with a particular subject. For more on this intriguing idea, check his website at davidbullock.com.

Finally, as faithful viewers of the Free Line know, a good showing on search engines such as Google and Yahoo can do wonders for your business. As important as search engines are, however, it is only a small portion of any good web marketing campaign. Here are three great tools to help you build presence in places other than Google:

Archaeologist – Archaeologist is a new web application that lets you analyze and study keywords and phrases found in Digg. Each keyword is presented in a convenient time line layout, allowing you track the popularity of said word or phrase over time.

Twello – Simply put, Twello is the “Yellow Pages” for Twitter. Each user and post are searchable by both name and subject.

Facebook Lexicon – A Facebook widget that monitors the most popular words within the service. Each result can be viewed individually or paired with a similar keyword.

It seems like there are five or six more Web 2.0 companies, tools and websites every single day. To give you an idea of the scope of social media proliferation, SimpleSpark created a video that flashes all the Web 2.0 company logos they could find into one short video. And that would be 5,000. They go fast, but it’s pretty cool if you have 333 seconds to kill.

Globex Designs has released a free Firefox plugin that reskins Gmail and Gcal and makes them look snazzier. But of course, sometimes beauty only runs skin deep. Many users are reporting less than glamorous performance.

Kevin Wilke and Matt Gill of Nitro Marketing are launching Nitro Quattro soon, so you can watch some cool free videos in the mean time. Like the PGA players of online marketing, you should take advantage of what they’re teaching for free. These guys are good. And in case you were wondering how Nitro Quattro compares with Ryan Deiss’s Self-Liquidating Offers, Ryan, who is also one of the internet marketing elite set the record straight. Yesterday, he emailed his own list to say that, no, the Nitro guys are not ripping off his ideas. If anything, they taught him some of these important concepts. And indeed these direct marketing principles have been around forever, or at least since Al Lasker learned that advertising is salesmanship in print from John E. Kennedy . . . in 1904.

We’ve got a link to a list of some of the best illustration-based designs on the web today, thanks to Abduzeedo. These wonderful illustrations can inspire you and give any web designer some great ideas, so be sure to bookmark this one.

Next, we’ve talked about Firebug, the free web dev tool for Firefox, before. But a lot of people haven’t tried this really powerful tool. If you want to make cool sites yourself, you should check it out This is definitely one powerhouse of a plugin.

Turning to the blogosphere, is content king when it comes to your blog? According to Jonathan Morrow, the answer is a resounding no. In “Why No One Links to Your Best Posts (And What to Do About It),” Morrow explains that making friends within the blogging community is the key to getting readers. According to Morrow, blogging is a lot like high school — it’s not what you know, but who you know and more importantly, who you are seen with. The friendlier you are with them, the more receptive they will be to your work. “It’s hard work,” he writes, “but it’s worth it. If you put as much effort into building relationships as you do writing great content, you’ll have a popular blog in no time.”

Blogging platform WordPress is the latest to jump onto the social networking bandwagon. Called “BuddyPress,” the developers aim to make the “social experience” even easier. Although BuddyPress is based upon Wordpress‘ own collaborative blogging software, Wordpress MU, many analysts predict that it will take on a much more traditional, MySpace-like, appearance. BuddyPress is scheduled for a fourth-quarter launch.

WordPress isn’t the only blogging platform experimenting with social networking. According to developer Six Apart, Movable Type Pro will contain a new feature called “social publishing.”  Social Publishing will allow users not only to post comments, but rate them as well. Bloggers now also have access to the “Action Stream,” which lets them easily change and switch content with other sites.

While some are anxiously awaiting the arrival of BuddyPress, many others are still signing up for established sites like Facebook, especially in markets outside North America. Facebook membership grew only 9% in North America, compared to 25% elsewhere according to comScore. Europe is especially on a roll, with 35 million users, a 303% increase from the year before. Many analysts agree that the North American market is in more of a “cooling off” period. North America remains Facebook’s strongest region, with roughly 49 million people subscribing to the service.

In other social networking news, CW Teo has written a great piece about how you can use sites such as StumbleUpon to enhance your business. In “Targeted List Building With Social Bookmarking and Networking,” Teo not only talks about the underlying principles of these sites, but how you can use them to create social buzz about your product or service. This article is a must for anyone who wishes to not only stay up-to-date with the current social trends, but expand their business as well.

Voice Over IP (VoIP) is coming to the iPhone. Global IP Solutions, a company known for their knowlege in the IP field, officially announced the launch of their development platform. Prospective iPhone developers will now be able to implement the Global IP engine called “VoiceEngine Mobile” into their application. As of now, VoIP will only be available through the phone’s Wi-Fi connection.

Disqus, the service designed to take the pain out of commenting in blogs, has gotten an upgrade. The new “Disqus 2.0” features several new tools, including a new user interface and general programming improvements. Perhaps the most intriguing addition, is the new WordPress plugin. With this plugin, commenters on your blog are now able to store Disqus comments directly onto your blog instead of Disqus‘ server, giving you more control. Disqus 2.0, and the WordPress plugin are available now — and they’re free.

The online advertising game has yet another player. MOG, best known for its musician-centric blogging platform, announced the formation of their new advertising wing, the MOG Music Network. Backed by the likes of Sony BMG and Rick Rubin, the MOG Music Network is promising custom ads, widgets, and considerably more revenue for web site owners than “traditional” services such as Google AdSense.

MOG isn’t the first online music service to try its hand at advertising. iLike, a similarly themed service with ties to both iTunes and Rhapsody, launched its own advertising business in July. Unlike the general advertisements found on the MOG Music Network, iLike Advertising is dedicated to promoting concerts, festivals, and other live events.

Turning to the iPhone, have you heard the rumors about a “kill switch” for iPhone applications? Turns out, it’s real. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Steve Jobs admitted that the ability to disable apps being run by individual users does indeed exist. The switch is looked at as being a “last resort” method of containing a malicious app. “Hopefully we never have to pull that lever, but we would be irresponsible not to have a lever like that to pull,” Mr. Jobs said.

So how are iPhone users taking the news? Well, it depends on who you ask. “I would argue that the kill switch is an innovative approach to protecting a platform in this age of criminal conspiracies to steal your personal information,” says Tony Bove, author of iPod and iTunes for Dummies. “I think Apple has a right to protect its platform with this innovative approach.”

Others are less forgiving. “The point is, the simple need for a switch like this means that [Apple’s approval process and use of DRM] has already failed,” says Jonathan Zdziarski, the programmer credited for discovering the “kill switch” code. “Bottom line: the iPhone kill switch is counterintuitive [sic] to security - not beneficial to it.”

Most iPhone users, however, are taking a decided “wait and see” attitude. “While it’s comforting to know that a harmful application can be immediately purged from all iPhones at the press of a button, it’s a little worrying, too. Given the level of secrecy inside Apple, some have speculated the company could use ‘malicious’ as a blanket term to disable any applications as it so pleases,” says Wired blogger Charlie Sorrel. “We have a picture in our heads of some kind of virtual Guantanamo Bay inside One Infinite Loop, where bad applications are kept locked up indefinitely and tortured to find their secrets.”

In less unsettling iPhone news, it appears as if users will now be able to access their Google Docs offline. Called MiGhtyDocs, this iPhone app gives users the ability to read Docs when they’re offline. A lot of folks are praising this new functionality, but it would be cool if it supported Google Presentation as well. But still, reading your basic Google Docs offline is nothing to scoff at. You can get MiGhtyDocs at the iPhone Apps store now - and it’s free.

Well, the world of social networking has finally come to your car. Specifically, your gas tank. Fuelly is a unique social service that allows you to track your gasoline purchases. Fuelly then breaks down the numbers, allowing you to view the real time fuel efficiency of your vehicle. Plus, you can compare the fuel efficiency your vehicles to that of other drivers. It’s compatible with the iPhone and other mobile platforms, and Twitter support is currently in development.

Now you can give a tip to your friendly neighborhood blogger. Thanks to Salon.com and Revolution Money Exchange, users of the “Open Salon” community can now slip their favorite writer a little somethin’ whenever they feel like it. According to Salon, the program is a way to foster goodwill between bloggers and readers and motivate writers and bloggers to produce their best content. So go out there and blog. That next two dollar tip could have your name on it.

8月14号，这里是午餐帮，我是帮主Brad Fallon，为你带来新鲜热辣的每日Web2.0新闻。首先，

在线广告游戏又有新玩家加入，MOG，即是以音乐人为核心的博客平台，宣布了他们最新的广告发布格式，MOG音乐网。这种广告更多的是鼓励自定制广告、Widgets、以及更多的站长分成，而有别于传统的如Google AdSense。新服务不久上线，午餐帮会为您跟踪报道。

再来看iPhone, 你有没有听说过关于iPhone的程序”强制关闭”后门的谣言。现在谣言变事实了。在一次访谈中，苹果CEO乔布斯承认了这个强制关闭功能的存在。这个所谓的杠杆功能，已被视为恶意软件们的最后目标。想了解此故事的更多新闻，登录freelinereport.com

iPhone也有好消息，最近有个新的三方服务，可以让你离线使用Google Docs，名字叫MiGhtyDocs，不过目前只提供离线读取文档的功能，虽然很多人觉得如果支持Google Presentation就更完美了。但对于只想阅读的朋友来说，不妨立刻去iPhone App Store去下载使用，软件也是免费的。

网络社区化的进程终于到了你的车里，尤其是对你的油箱。Fuelly是个很特别的社区化网络服务，提供在线的汽油购买跟踪服务。甚至你可以实时查看你车子的油耗，并与其他车主的车辆进行对比。油价井喷的今天，这可真是个非常实用的功能。更棒的是他还支持iPhone等其他移动平台，并即将支持Twitter。

最后，你现在终于可以给你的友好的邻家博客来点真正的建议。这要感谢Salon.com和Revolution Money Exchange，现在”Open Salon”的用户可以随时给他们喜欢的作家写点评论和建议。而Salon也建立了一个新项目，以帮助博客和读者之间更方便的交流，以及博客们和作家们更好的共同创作。马上去试试吧，说不定下一个价值2美金的小建议就是你的。

这里是午餐帮，帮主Brad Fallon. 明天接着来”2.0分钟搞定每日的Web2.0新闻”

The hucksters are hitting the iPhone app market. As you might have heard, a few unsuspecting shoppers “accidentally” purchased an iPhone app costing $1,000. Sadly, all the application does is display a red jewel on your iPhone. It really doesn’t do anything else… other than show off your ability to buy a $1,000 iPhone app, that is. Apple has since taken the application off of its store, but there is no word yet as to whether or not the , umm, “customers” who bought the application will get their money back.RSS feeds are one of the cornerstones of Web 2.0. For many, finding a good feed reader is a must in today’s networked society. Our new favorite is a free offering called Regator. Regator makes it easy to find out what the hottest blogs are talking about, and then some. And it’s got built in Podcast functionality. You can subscribe directly to, say… I don’t know… the Free Line Report official podcast without installing any additional software. Great stuff.

You know, if you don’t speak several different languages, you might just be missing out on some really good blogs. Now, a free service called Mloovi can help. It translates any RSS for free via Google Translate. Give it a try. We bet that you’ll be seeing, or rather, reading, things in a way that you never have before.

TwitterFone - It’s Twitter! It’s an answering machine! It’s both! TwitterFone is a free service that lets you call a local phone number and just leave a voice mail. Within moments, your voice mail message will appear as text in Twitter. It’s similar to former Free Line all-star Jott, but much easier to set up.

It can be hard to keep track of complex projects, with people scattered over the globe. Ididwork makes it easy. Ididwork is a free utility that helps you keep track of jobs you’ve done during the day. It also allows you to share your work reports with other members of a team, so everyone gets to see how much work is done on a project at any time. Ididwork is perfect for people working in teams online. It’s also the magic word: free. Can’t beat that.

首先来看，IT小贩们开始充斥iPhone 应用程序市场了，有些人最近买到了一个价值一千美金的iPhone恶作剧程序：”I Am Rich”，但是这个程序除了在屏幕上显示个红宝石之外，

就只能向全球人民展示你的富有了。看来除帮主我之外的有钱人还真是不少。苹果官方已经把该软件下线，并承诺会退回消费者的货款。

再来看，RSS是公认的Web2.0重要技术之一。那么一个好的RSS阅览器也成为了网民们必需品。一个全新免费的阅览器Regator，最近进入了帮主我的视线，Regator让习惯用Bloglines 和 Google Reader的用户们几乎有付钱购买的冲动。他不但可以找到目前最热门的博客资讯，还可以像阅读自己收藏的RSS那样阅读其他人的收藏RSS。并且他还支持播客视频订阅，这样一来，你就可以在不安装任何软件的情况下，轻松订阅我们午餐帮了。是不是想马上试一试？

如果你不是多国语言天才，那么接下来的新闻你肯定不能错过。又一个全新免费的服务叫做Mloovi，可以帮助你通过Google来翻译任何一个RSS订阅信息，并支持翻译成24种不同语言。相当的帅。还有，如果你是我们大多数的中文用户之一，别忘了午餐帮特别为你准备了中文版的视频，请别错过。

接下来，TwitterFone，可以让你通过电话语音留言给Twitter，当然绝不收一毛钱。并且很快你的语音留言将会转换成文字信息出现在你的Twitter上。之前Jott 同样由此功能，不过TwitterFone要来得更简便些。

另一个叫Ididwork 免费网络服务，非常的实用。他可以帮助你存取每日工作路径，允许你分享工作报告给团队伙伴。这样每个团队成员都可以随时随地保持合作。他非常适合那些在全球不同地方合作的商务人士，功能强大，使用方便。

Until next time, I’m Brad Fallon. Thanks for watching, and we’ll be back tomorrow with more Web 2.0 News, in 2.0 Minutes.

好了。感谢收看今天的午餐帮每日播报，我是帮主Brad，让我们明天一起回来，继续”在2.0分钟内搞定每日的Web2.0新闻”，回见！

According to Mozilla, only you can prevent boring and ugly web browsers. Yes, that’s right. If you ever wanted to have something to say about what the future of the Internet looks like, then now is your chance. It’s called Mozilla Labs. The web browsing company wants you to come in and suggest how a post-Firefox web browser should work. Anyone can participate. Just send a suggestion or idea, and Mozilla will look into it.

But Mozilla Labs is more than just suggestions and conversation. The Labs also feature mock-ups of a few of their “more promising” ideas. These short videos walk through some really cool new ideas that would completely change how everything works. Each of these demos are highly visual, and they’re difficult to describe. Thankfully, with the power of the web, I don’t have to. Isn’t the Internet wonderful?

So what is my personal favorite? Hmm… that’s a tough one. Honestly, I would probably go with Aurora, from the Adaptive Path design firm. Aurora is based upon the idea that the “web” can go beyond the average “browser window.” Want to drag sport scores to your desktop? With Aurora, you can do that. Want to follow your stocks? You can do that as well. Aurora also allows the user to see their bookmarks in a highly innovative, 3D view. Unfortunately, Aurora isn’t available for download… yet.

Of course, we can’t just sit around and just wait for the cool stuff to come out. Some of us, like yours truly, want to play with the new, interesting web functionality right now. As an example of the bleeding edge of browser technology, check out the new Snowl plugin for Firefox. Snowl lets you bring all your messaging platforms into one location — Instant Messaging, email, RSS/Atom Feeds, Twitter, FriendFeeds, and so on. At first glance, aggregating all your feeds is nothing new, but being able to handle all your messaging from within one web browser, as well as search and cross reference each one, could prove to be a very powerful. Snowl is available now.

It appears as if the folks at Digg have joined in the Mozilla rush as well. Google’s favorite social news service is finally compatible with Firefox 3.0. With that comes a host of cool new features, including notification messages that pop up in the right hand corner of your browser. The rest is all pretty much standard fare for social network plugins - a tool bar, a “Digg this” button, and instant notification if you have any new messages. If you are stillusing Firefox 2.0, have no fear. The old pugin is still available.