Application developers are switching from the social network platform to mobile platforms in 2010, as an extensive survey DM2Pro and Quattro projects. Of the responding developers, some work for advertisers and agencies while others publish or develop apps as a business. For marketers and advertisers, trends are shifting for mobile operating systems and budgeting.

The advertisers that responded to “State of the Industry: APPS,” or the brands that the agency represents, were mostly from the consumer packaged goods, retail and automotive categories.

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As expected, online retail growth fell for the first time since 2001, when ComScore started tracking it. Growth fell 4% in so far in November. ComScore predicts flat growth for the holiday season, compared to last year.

“Despite the recent reprieve that plummeting gas prices have given American consumers, the depressed and volatile stock market, declining housing prices, inflation and the weak job market all represent dark clouds hanging over their heads this holiday shopping season,” said comScore chairman, Gian Fulgoni.

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“Young Adults Revealed,” a June and July Synovate/Microsoft Advertising study, was released this month showing the extent to which 18-24 year-olds interact with brands in their online activities. The survey covered 12,603 young adults in 26 countries, giving insight into their online behaviors. With high Internet and mobile phone usage, they engage with brands in an extensively active manner: nearly one-third regularly talk about brands in online forums or discussion boards.

“They are more than just ‘comfortable’ with brands,” said Julian Rolfe, global manager at Synovate, in a statement. “They want to associate themselves with brands they see as ‘cool’ and this is why we see them uploading clips to their social networking sites and IM services.”

This brand comfort translates to young adults accessing information about brands, products and services directly through search engines (47 percent of of US respondents and 46 percent worldwide), and favorite sites (eighteen or 26 percent). Other methods used to a lesser extent were personal start pages or homepages (iGoogle or similar), portal sites, conversations or links shared by friends via IM and email, and social networking sites.

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One of the main themes at last week’s Online Market World 2008 was how businesses can best use social media. This was oft discussed, but best summed up by Bill Hanekamp, CEO of The Well Inc. Advertising. In discussing strategies for viral marketing, Hanekamp gave a succinct summary of how to “let the customers spread the word about you for free.” I’ve fleshed out his list with some ideas offered by other presenters.

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It appears that in a country where over 90 percent of the downloaded music is illegally pirated, if you can’t beat them, join them. Google, Inc. has launched a free and legal music download service that is available exclusively to internet users in China. The plan is for the Web site to sustain on advertising revenue, which will be split among Google, a Chinese music company named Top 100.cn, and the participating music record labels. The move symbolizes a potential shift in strategy against piracy, which is also a significant problem— albeit much less pervasive—in America and other countries. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry estimates that the music industry loses hundreds of millions in dollars as a result of piracy.

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On August 4th 2008, the US Court of Appeals permitted Cablevision Cable Company to offer the services of digital video recording (DVR) to customers who do not own personal Tivo hard drives. The alternative, endorsed by the Second Circuit in New York, allows cable companies to record the programs to a central datacenter, thereby mitigating capital expenditures. Redlasso, an online Web site recently forced to suspend their video search, post, and clip services due to legal action by Fox and NBC, may have a viable business plan as a result of this decision. If a Redlasso user purchases the right to record digital video from a cable company, what is to stop that customer from transferring those rights to his account with Redlasso?

In such a scenario, Redlasso is acting as the internet-provider of digital video to cable company DVR customers. Of course, this hinges on the cooperation between Redlasso and cable companies, who may want to develop this service independently. Another possible obstacle is that Redlasso’s video content is delivered over the Internet rather than over the television. Hank Williams of the Silicon Valley Insider does not see this as a problem:

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Launched today, www.cuil.com, the stealth search engine was co-founded in 2005 by two former Google engineers (Anna Patterson and Russel Power) and a former IBM top manager (Tom Costello). To compete with rivals Google [GOOG] or Powerset, the Menlo Park, Calif., based startup, has raised $33M in funding in the past two years.

While suffering from the launch-day blues, Cuil.com (pronounced “cool”) is impressive, a search engine that casts a wide net.

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YouTube, once hailed as the “advertising medium of the future,” is having trouble fulfilling its promises of profit. While one of the most popular and influential sites on the internet, it is failing to make money for its parent company, Google [GOOG].

With 82 million unique viewers a month, and a large, if slippery, demographic, YouTube should be a huge money maker. But Google, who aquired the video sharing web site in 2006 for $1.65 billion, is finding that what it wound up with might indeed be a giant money sink. Don Reisinger of CNET believes Google’s buyout of YouTube was a “major blunder” that has “failed miserably.” Example: YouTube sends 300 billion GBs of data each month; bandwidth for that has been estimated to cost a million dollars a day.

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A U.S. Sentate committee is set to discuss privacy concerns relating to targeted ads with prominent Web site representatives from Facebook, Google [GOOG], and Microsoft [MSFT] on Wednesday.

The discussions are meant to detail the extent to which targeted ads approach the threshold of violating privacy laws, specifically a 1986 wiretapping law established by the federal government that says at least one party within a communication must agree to be recorded.

The reference to the law relates directly to online advertising company NebuAd, which is taking targeted advertising to the next level by working directly with Internet service providers to track user habits.

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On Tuesday, search engine giant Google Inc. [GOOG] announced the beta release of its own free 3D virtual world, Lively. Unlike Linden Lab’s popular virtual world, Second Life, to which it is similar, Lively is an internet plug-in, not a stand-alone program. Users create various locales and personalized avatars, create rooms that are embedded within websites, chat and interact with the environment. Integration with social networking Web sites like Facebook and YouTube – as well as the Google name – will very likely make Lively the most visible 3D virtual world.

Lively will also feature unique branded content. The first, “L.A. Hard Hats,” is a tie-in with National Geographic Channel series of the same name debuting August 3, 2008. Users will be able to visit a virtual version of a building being built on the show. This points to future possibilities in virtual narrative and advertising. As an immersive advertising platform, Lively should be especially effective.

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