GOOGLE EATS OWN DOG FOOD?

For those of you who dont know the term eating one's own dog food in the corporate world means that the very corporation uses the product that it makes. In an atrticle describing the corporate intranet of Google Inc. posted on the Blogoscope Blog by two journalists described the coprporate intranet that exists at Google offices and headquarters. Google employees seem to be saturated with Google Culture when they go to work. Located below are thier observations on, Moma, google's corporate intranet.

Original Blogoscope article on Google Inc.

Google Goes Government!

According to the Jacksonville Business Journal Florida State officials have joined forces with Google Inc. to create brand new features for those looking for various government services online. In a statement released today Gov. Charlie Crist stated,

"I am grateful for this chance to join with Google to further develop Florida's leadership in delivering open government services to the people of Florida."

The new partnership between Florida's government and Google is said to have been created to help better index online databases, making them simpler to locate on search engines. prior to this partnership locating government based services had been very difficult for Florida residents because most state info could not be found due to the way they were stored on databases.

Florida is just the latest in a string of states to team up with Google including California,Arizona,Michigan, Utah, and Virginia.

In my opinion state governments such as Florida are doing a smart thing . Anything that allows for greater access to government information for its citizens can only serve to increase the accessibility of a government to its citizens and can also be used to keep citizens better informed about what is going on with their government.

GOOGLE WIKI'S MAPS

I thought this might make an interesting post since we have been discussing wikipedia in class. What do you think?

According to an article on computer world.com by Heather Havenstein, Google map users in both the U.S and Australia can now edit the locations of their businesses or homes in order to allow others to correctly locate them. The article said the following.

"The program requires a user to search for his home address to find an arrow that will have information about the location. After clicking edit, a user then can move the arrow to the correct location and save it. When anyone else searches for the address, they will see the edited marker at the correct address, Google said."

According to the article Google users will also be protected from ,those individuals seeking to put markers in the wrong spot because their will be a feature that allows users to back track the original marker on the map.

I think that this is a great thing and the only sure way to make sure that the maps provided by Google is accurate. People get lost all the time using maps that they are sure were accurate. I am sure that Google ,maps are no different. Google has come up with a smart idea to make this service that they provide better, and the feature that protects the users from incorrect map location moves will ensure that users feel comfortable using the site. It is very interesting to see how the wiki idea can be applied to more things than just written information.

Google always getting better...

Google being the most visited, most profitable, arguably the most powerful company on the internet is always trying to improve to keep up its standards and popularity.

"Google remains a search engine. And its search pages, blue hyperlinks set against a bland, white background, have made it the most visited, most profitable and arguably the most powerful company on the Internet. Google is the homework helper, navigator and yellow pages for half a billion users, able to find the most improbable needles in the world’s largest haystack of information in just the blink of an eye."

This quote is taken from the NY Times article "Google Keeps Tweaking It's Search Engine".

This article touches on the fact the Google is the number one search engine yet often you are able to search something and not find it. The article also explains how they built a system able to not only give you what you ask for but to understand what you need , being that people sometimes spell words wrong, or mean one thing but say anothe. Overall Google is never complete. Google's engineers are steadly searching for new ways to improve the site as well as make it better.

LINK TO WEB 2.0 GOOGLE ARTICLE

Last week I published a post about Tim O'Reilly, the father of web 2.0 bashing Google. Here is a link to this article.Just click the link and please give feedback!

O'Reilly comments

You Need Google, Google Needs You!!

Google presents its news in various publications. In Belgian however, they wish to exclude Google from their papers because of the extent in which Google carries their news. The article from The Tech Beat entitled "Google Loses, or Did the Belgian Papers?" believes that Google provides a monumental amount of information with their news and in turn capturing more audience members than the Belgian Papers. This obviously rests on the issue of competition. With billions of customers, Google has the luxury of acquiring a sea of audience members, and due to their number of services, the Belgian Papers are in "fear" one can say, of losing their customers. However, from a critical standpoint, wouldn't it be more efficient to have Google news included in the papers? At least Google will help attract audience in addition to extending news coverages and as a result, more revenue is incurred. I think the Belgian publishing company should evaluate their future and keep Google on their team, for it's beneficial to both companies.

PHONE RUMORS SKYROCKET GOOGLE STOCK!!

According to Market Watch from the Dow Jones, Google stocks took a significant leap today. it generated an almost $700.00 price! This comes amidst rumors that Google will be getting into the wireless phone business and plans to develop software for wireless communications.

"The stock topped out at $698.48 around mid-day, up 2.8% from the previous close. The shares were trading around $696 in early afternoon."

Original rumors have been circling around the net and in newspapers for months now and as recently as two weeks ago Google was thought to be designing its own phones, but these rumors as cited by an earlier article in the Wall street Journal have been squashed. but the fact that Google will be developing phone software itself id still big news and the record breaking stock prices are proof of this.

"We believe, that to some extent, the run-up in the Google stock may have been attributed to expectations that Google may provide some color on rumored 'Google Phone,'" Trip Chowdry, an analyst for Global Equities Research, wrote in a report Friday. "Both Google Analyst Day and CTIA conference have come and gone, and nothing has been announced on Google Phone. We believe this may have caused expectations to get somewhat ahead of itself."

I think the rise in stocks is a great sign for Google. This huge jump occurred only amidst rumors of wireless phone involvement . Imagine when the real deal hits the market . The results could be very profitable for the already lucrative company. This is just another example of how the digital revolution is constantly evolving. However, many people believe that the phone software speculation had little to do with the rise in Google's stocks and that the Media Giant should be careful not to alienate other device makers or carriers.