Place your bets

Kottke checks in on Dave Winer’s long bet with Martin Nisenholtz that blogs will overcome The Times in Googlejuice for news. It’s trending Dave’s way. In the Times’ corner: the SEO expertise of About.com. [Full disclosure: I’m consulting there and so I see it firsthand.] In Dave’s corner: A treasure trove of newspaper content without permalinks that disappears behind pay walls where no one can find it and give it links. If newspapers got permalink-smart and opened it up to links (and AdSense, by the way), they’d stand a fighting chance, because the key means of distribution online is, after all, search, and the key means of marketing is your own audience. If they don’t, Dave’ll be a winnuh.