Online Observations » Google

Finding out what people are really about in this world

The Observer — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 00:47:00 +0000

Have you noticed how Google suggests search terms as you type in whatever it is you are searching for? Well, I always think it is a useful tool to find out what people are really about in this world. I mean, Google probably only suggests those choices based on what everyone is searching for, right? Well, to illustrate what I mean, take a look at these screenshots. I started out by typing some words, and let Google do the rest.

The top things that people forget – in today’s world, the number one thing that people forget is their password:

How people sleep:

This is what people think about their wives:

and their husbands:

and their kids:

and here’s what the kids think:

And people’s top needs:

If you are a girl:

And if you are a boy:

So, as you can see, you can learn a lot about people through Google. Go do some learning of your own.

Google is experimenting with Gigabit Internet – WOW

The Observer — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 16:12:58 +0000

This just came in. While Google has been discussing better bandwidth access with the US government agencies, it decided to take it up a notch by announcing an experimental gigabit internet access in Unites States for offer for up to 500,000 consumers. This is amazing, it really is. From their blog:

We’re planning to build and test ultra high-speed broadband networks in a small number of trial locations across the United States. We’ll deliver Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today with 1 gigabit per second, fiber-to-the-home connections. We plan to offer service at a competitive price to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people.

Well, I wish some of this high bandwidth stuff would come into India. Anyway, it would be interesting to see what people come up with for these type of bandwidths speeds. Google is hoping to see some innovation. So are we.

Google Dashboard is just too good

The Observer — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 20:45:07 +0000

Over the years, Google has entered our lives more and more (to some this is scary, to others like me, its great). We use Gmail, Orkut, Blogger, Google Analytics, Google Alerts, Google Docs, Calendar, and many more services. All of these services are accessed using one Google account that you have. So, it would only make sense that you should be able to configure, monitor, and access all these services from one single place. Till recently, this was not the case, but over a month ago, Google launched Google Dashboard. Yes, this is a place where you can doo all those things that I just talked about from one single place.

The Dashboard provides access to over 20 services. Not only can you configure the services from the single place, but it also shows you information about the service right there on the dashboard. For instance, for Gmail, it shows you how many emails, drafts, sent mail, chat, etc. do you have in your account and when the most recent one happened. Or for Google Docs it would show you how many documents are there in your account, and how many have been shared with you by others. There is all this data and much more.

Here’s a video that Google put up when it announced this feature on their official blog:

The Google Dashboard is part of the Data Liberation effort from Google.

A chance to get a Google Wave invitation

The Observer — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 19:25:28 +0000

Google is making waves with Google Wave. And people are running everywhere to get invited. And some people are coming up with excellent ideas to make most of their good fortune of having available Google Wave invites (reminds of the days when I used to sell or trade Gmail invites). One such blog is called Shout Me Loud. This guy has a competition going which may get you a Google Wave invite from him. Here’s the competition post, if you are interested. Basically, he invites you to comment on his posts, contribute to the posts (not stupid comments), for the next two days, and the top commentators get the invites that he has remaining.

Good idea I think. Great idea, in fact. I am definitely participating. If I win, maybe I will hold a similar contest.

A perfect match, IMO

The Observer — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 16:29:02 +0000

Google’s acquisition of reCAPTCHA is a thing that was bound to happen. reCAPTCHA’s technology has been working for identifying printed text from old books by combining them with recognized words in a dual word CAPTCHA. Google of course is spending big money towards books and newspapers, and so it makes perfect sense for them to acquire a company which is already working on digitizing old printed text which cannot be managed reliably through OCR.

Good show reCAPTCHA.

Google releases Chrome version 3, but still no plugins

The Observer — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 07:40:43 +0000

The latest release of Chrome sneaked up on me (I didn’t notice it update on my computer), but it was a pleasant surprise. I first noticed it when my “New Tab” page started showing a new look. And I like it. It is completely redesigned, and for the better I have to say. One of the newest things that got added to Chrome is Theme support. There is a decent themes gallery which can be used to customize the look and feel of your browser. Here’s a screenshot of the Theme gallery.

There are other improvements and bug fixes, and the browser is supposed to be faster now. However, the one thing that is conspicuously missing is support for plugins.

Yes, there is no plugin support still.

I think till that is available, there will be no major shift to Chrome, especially now that FireFox 3.5 is so much faster in rendering pages.

Play Monopoly using Google maps

The Observer — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 07:46:39 +0000

Remember Monopoly, the game? I loved playing that game growing up. And now it has finally come into the Internet age. You can now play the game online using Google Maps, and pitting yourself against players from around the world.

The game developers are releasing this version tomorrow (Sep 9, 2009), and here is the link to the website: http://www.monopolycitystreets.com/While not too much detail is available for the game today, it is already known that you will play the game using Google Maps, and will literally be able to buy anything in the world. Some of the game play details are available here and there, here’s what I came across.

You will get a starting set of $3 million (play money of course), and will be able to buy properties such as hotels, houses, stadiums, high rises, etc. And depending on the property, you will receive rent (up to $100 million a day for a sky scraper). Prices will be a function of the location. And in true Monopoly spirit, you will be able to sabotage other players by using Monopoly Chance cards.

I am very excited to start playing this game.

FAILURE: Google releases new version, but I can’t get it

The Observer — Sun, 24 May 2009 00:37:54 +0000

I use Google Chrome as my browser (it is just way faster than any other). However, there are a number of things that annoy me about the browser. One of the most annoying problems is that of update. My browser never auto-updates, despite the fact that there are two GoogleUpdate.exe processes running in my task manager all the time. So, the way I keep up with my updates is by manually going to the About box, and checking if a new update is available.

But, today even that is not working for me. Google has released a new update but it doesn’t matter, because I can’t get it. I have been trying again and again to update my copy, but I keep getting an “Update server not available” error (screen shot below).

This is such a failure. I would love to be able to run the latest and the greatest, but these stupid errors keep getting in the way.

FINALLY, Google comes down to Earth

The Observer — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 14:01:21 +0000

First of all, let me say that I am a Google fan. But I have often wondered how Google can go on spreading their wings without any consolidation. They have just kept on trying new things and starting projects, till now. A couple of months ago, I posted about something I considered as layoffs in Google (the demise of lively). But, those were not real layoffs of course. However, now there have been real layoffs at Google.

Google had started terminating its contracts with subcontractors sometime ago. But finally, it has taken away 100 jobs in their recruitment arm (as per the announcement on the official Google Blog). Not only has it reduced its workforce, it has also begun shutting down a large number of projects. These include Jaiku, Dodgeball, Google Video, Google Notebook, Catalog Search, and the Mashup Editor.

Whether Google will continue to shutdown more projects and whether it continues to reduce jobs is anybody’s guess. But, if Google is feeling the pinch, then we are in for a very rough time for 2009.

Case Sensitive Search using Google

The Observer — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 16:57:00 +0000

Google by default is not sensitive to the case of the search terms that you are searching. So doing a search for March or march gives you the same results on Google. Mostly this doesn’t matter, though sometimes it would (in the example, March is the name of a month, while march is the act of walking). While Google may not support this out of the box, someone thought it important enough to write an application which does support this.

Meet Case Sensitive Google Search on AppSpot.This application takes Google search results for a given term and filters the results based on the case of the search term. Give it a shot, it is really worth it.