Su Doku Mania

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Last week, the LIRR had a problem and we were forced to disembark at the Farmingdale station and take busses to points east. While on the bus, I saw this guy working on a puzzle in his copy of the New York Post. Watching over his shoulder, I got completely addicted to this new kind of puzzle - Su Doku. Su Doku puzzles are number puzzles that have to do with placement of numerical digits within a grid. I find them to be the perfect brain-teaser. I've been doing puzzles on the train on my way to work and am finding that they're the perfect brain warmup for the tasks ahead at Underscore.

The only unfortunate thing is that I've been buying copies of the trashy Post to get my daily fix. But I'm going to order a copy of a book from Amazon soon so I can take a bunch of puzzles with me on the train.

Here's a link to a guy's website that contains a nice strategy guide and puzzle generator.

Bad News

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Irit Spitalnik called me today. I thought we were going to have one of our usual cheery chats about the industry, her family and how life is going. Not this time. Irit told me she has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. She's beginning her chemotherapy regimen tomorrow at Sloane.

When she told me this, I had the worst flashback I've had in a while. Lots of things went through my mind, including the day my mom called me at school and told me about her ovarian cancer. I thought about Irit's usual upbeat demeanor. I thought about her husband, Michael. I thought about their 14-year-old daughter. It hit me pretty hard.

If there's anyone who can beat this, it's Irit. I've never seen her down in the dumps. She's one of those people who has so much energy and positive vibes coming off her at all times that she brightens up a room. I know she'll beat this thing.

Irit let me know that she's grateful for the support she's received from her friends and family and folks in the online marketing industry. It's giving her the strength she needs to face this thing. If you want to send something to Irit, drop your e-mail address in comments and I'll send you her e-mail address and home address so you can send a card or note of encouragement.

1/13/2006 Update: I learned a couple nights ago that Irit has passed on. I've started a new thread so we can share details on funeral arrangements and share our favorite Irit stories. Link here.

Atlas Corrects Cookie-Deletion DMI

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The new version is here: http://www.atlassolutions.com/pdf/AIDMIOnCookieDeletion.pdf

Here's what Young Bean Song, director of analytics and Atlas Institute, sent me in an e-mail:

Upon a deeper review of the data, it became apparent that the average lifespan was not the best way to describe and compare user behavior. Our analysis of the cookie lifespan distributions have revealed a different picture of consumer behavior than what the previously published average lifespans suggest. We found that most of the people who said they delete their cookies weekly do in fact have relatively short cookie lives. Of the people who said they delete their cookies weekly, we found 60% had cookie lifespans of two weeks or less. So what does this new information mean for the DMI that we just released?

The behavioral data from our study is actually in relatively close agreement with the survey-based studies. As a result, we have restated the portion of the DMI that focuses on the average lifespans and have included a more complete view of respondents' behavior. In doing so, you'll see a shift in our view of the survey-based studies. However, it's very important to point out, the main thesis of the DMI remains true - that the sky is not falling on cookies. The insights on conversions tracking, reach and frequency and profile targeting from the original DMI are sound and backed by rock solid research.

Among the survey-based studies Song refers to is the earlier one by Jupiter that showed nearly 40 percent of Internet users delete their cookies at least monthly.

My Online Spin column (registration required) on Mediapost of April 19th quoted from the earlier Atlas report quite a bit. While it attributed everything back to Atlas, it would be prudent for me to write a follow-up this coming Tuesday.

Song insists in his e-mail regarding the revised DMI that "[t]here has not been a radical shift in consumer behavior towards deleting cookies." I plan on reviewing this data with him as soon as possible, which will likely be tomorrow. For right now, the jury is still out as far as I'm concerned.

The conclusions I put forth in my column on 4/19 still hold true:

The fact remains, however, that several popular anti-spyware software packages available for download and/or purchase online have been identifying ad server cookies as potential threats as a default, and this could be prompting widespread cookie deletion as more people download and run the software. As I mentioned in a previous column, two such popular packages - Spybot: Search & Destroy and Ad-Aware - have been downloaded hundreds of millions of times from Download.com. While the average cookie lifespan may currently be long enough to convince us that the sky isn't crashing down on us, cookie deletion is almost certainly becoming more widespread. It's something we need to watch carefully.

So, while I write my follow-up piece for Tuesday, check out the revised report from Atlas.