I’ve flown on British Airways three times and all three flights went well. The last time on British Airways was in 2006 and was a short hop from Venice to London and I remember the crew making the trip smooth for someone who really doesn’t enjoy flying. So it was a shock to learn that an airline that has a good reputation is buying reviews and paid posts. I decided to take a look at two posts, one from former tech blogger Meghan Asha and the other from her NonSociety partner Jordan Reid.

You can read the posting on SocialSpark (that’s Izea’s posting service) where British Airlines outlines what they require to be included in the post. The paid post provides for $15 in earnings although I believe some Izea posters make more than what is listed.

It’s interesting that the posts from Jordan and Meghan basically follow the required script from British Airways exactly. Is that where the “real opinion” comes from? One requirement is that the post is more than 200 words; Meghan’s comes in below that at 186 words. Both bloggers provide a small button to note that the post is paid although it is at the bottom of the post. I know Izea founder Ted Murphy talks about the importance of disclosure is his network’s paid posts which is a good thing. One change I’d like to see is that the button is moved to the top and clear language is added to the top of every post noting that the post is paid. You may never even see the button on the two blogs because of the non-traditional layout that the NonSociety site employs.

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Earlier this month we reported on Canadian car sharing service CityFlitz as their website was removed and some customers were upset that they received no response to their customer service emails regarding their security deposits. The CityFlitz service concept offered car rentals for $1/hour (CAD) and the cars were wrapped with advertising.

Today I noticed that the CityFlitz website is back with the following unfortunate message:

German media company ProSiebenSat.1 Group has announced the launch of a new startup investment program. Deutsche Startups reports (translated link) that the program offers advertising space in return for equity in the startup. Sister company Seven Brand Ventures will run the new investment program to make sure the advertising is as targeted as possible.

Twenty startups are involved in the media-equity program to-date and all are in different stages of development.

Any company can apply for the program as long as they meet the criteria set forth by Seven Brand Ventures. The main criteria is that the startup has not appeared on any television stations. It appears that the media buys that will be used for this program will be remnant slots.

Regarding one of the startups in the program, Deutsche Startups notes (translated), “At Outlet Online Shop Sneakerloft can already draw a first conclusion: Since the campaign began three months ago are in the Web store, according to ProSiebenSat.1 has already received over 10,000 orders.”

The story concludes by noting that this program is a win-win for both parties. The television stations fill their open ad slots and the startups get free television advertising with a small equity position in return. This program could also lead to future partnerships between both parties as well.

Here are today’s startup and entrepreneurial updates:

• Doodle connects calendars and works now with Lotus Notes – Doodle
• Two new JimdoBusiness Layouts – Jimdo
• Super Gluer and Glue Crew Stickers – AdaptiveBlue
• Comments: New Translations Available – Disqus
• Announcing Zoho as Online Spreadsheet Partner – Zoho
• 5 Things I Wish Someone Had Told Me (about starting a company) – Bluyah Development Blog
• You Don’t Know Jack About Software Maintenance – Communications of the ACM

I just read on a sports blog that next week the Jets are going to allow their fans to call plays via Twitter. What a great use of social media! With that said, here are today’s startup and entrepreneurial updates:

• Brand new design – Sobees
• Print your Photobucket photos with QOOP – Qoop
• modu Moving Forward – modu
• Why Advertise Online? Here are 7 Important Reasons – Startup Your Online Advertising
• edocr Launches “edocr Exclusive” an exclusive club for our customers – edocr
• AddThis Now Supports 198 Link Sharing Services – AddThis
• What drives online collaboration in a company? – OneHub

Over the past month or so, New York State has started rolling out a new lottery machine at lottery retailers around the state. The old machines were in service for (as best as I can remember) at least 15 years. I’ve also learned that the lottery in New York is the largest lottery in the U.S.

From a customer perspective, the new machines are faster and use less paper than the old clunkers.

The old lottery machines used a landline to connect to the main center to transmit the lottery ticket information. It appears the new machines use a Sprint wireless card for data transmission. The top retailer in the state was delayed in receiving the new machines because they couldn’t get a signal underground. I was told that they were working on a new solution last weekend but haven’t been back as of yet to see if they found a solution. In my discussions with lottery retailers, all noted that at least once they had issues with the wireless access. Today one top 20 retailer was unable to redeem instant tickets due to an issue with their signal. Overall the retailers I spoke with are happy with the new lottery machines.

The title of this post comes from something I heard when I was at a newsstand last week. The new lottery machines play a very loud jingle and buzzer sound when the lottery retailer scans a winning ticket. It doesn’t matter if the customer won $1 or $1,000,000, the sound is exactly the same. If I remember, machines in South Carolina also play a jingle when a winning ticket is redeemed.

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Here are today’s startup and entrepreneurial updates for a spooky Friday the 13th – stay away from black cats, retweets and all paid posts.

• Rollover to Lending Club’s new No-Fee IRA! – LendingClub
• Startup Weekend comes to NYC $75 for 2 days – Startup Weekend
• Kyte Extends Mobile Video Support To Android and Nokia – Kyte
• New Feature: Forums – LifeMojo
• New web goodies – Dropbox
• How to Buy a Television – Gliffy