personally, i can’t say i have and regardless of your desire to, google now gives you the ability via ‘searchwiki’, a technology that’s been rolled out to all google account holders with largely negative media reaction. some bloggers have been quick to criticise the technology’s lack of an ‘opt-out’ preference and the spam that’s already appeared in the results. users can of course simply ignore the new tools if they wish but there’s something about searchwiki and the way it’s been introduced that’s got some people really wound up

searchwiki lets users comment on, re-order, remove or add to their search results. these changes are then then saved and re-appear when the relevant link is returned in a later search. although the re-ordering does not affect standard searches there is the option to see a list of results that others have promoted and commented upon. picture ‘digg’ applied to the google homepage. very much like the social news site, users can also give a thumbs up or down to other people’s comments, while spam, abusive and illegal comments can be reported by users and will be removed by google

current comments add little value to search results

i’d expect to see something like this initially offered via google labs and have it undergo a few rounds of optimisation and feedback before it got anywhere near the google homepage but instead google have gone for the big bang approach. they’re betting this will be big and as product manager, cedric dupont put it

I would call this revolutionary. It’s a huge step, not a baby step in the world of search. This is part of an obvious movement of the web to become more participatory, so Google search is adapting to this movement

it’s not immediately clear what problem google are trying to solve with searchwiki. i’m sure that somewhere in the business plan they are going to mine the user generated data for advertising purposes but initially the move has caused some degree of confusion. perhaps one reason behind the negative reviews is that google search isn’t broken and doesn’t need fixing. it’s one of the few tools people use on a daily basis that doesn’t attract criticism and complaints, it does what it does very well and does it in a simple and elegant fashion. when google hit the mainstream people were crying out for a decent search engine, now-a-days i don’t hear of people crying out for revolutionary changes to google. perhaps the creatives at google are getting bored with tweeking the existing search engine and want something new to do. i’d rather they spent their time finalising their ever expanding list of ‘perpetually in beta’ on-line services or concentrated on improving searching beyond just text, incorporating video and audio searches perhaps

in order to explain how the service works google have presented a number of ‘real world’ examples, pitched to sell the idea of using searchwiki to it’s users. and they do have to try and sell it as without the input and effort of their customers the new technology is dead in the water. none of the examples are particularly convincing though

Maybe you’re an avid hiker and the trail map site you always go to is in the 4th or 5th position and you want to move it to the top, or perhaps it’s not there at all and you’d like to add it.

why would you want to move a result up the list? if it’s for your own personal use i would expect someone to either bookmark the site or in the future perform a more relevant search… or just click 4th or 5th position in the list. these scenarios just don’t sell the idea, there’s nothing that matches up to the ‘revolutionary’ changes that dupont speaks of

Most people are not going to engage with it and think about where the results should be – if it’s above this one or below that one. This is really for a motivated or elite core of user who really wants to participate in the process. Lots of people have tried so-called ‘social search’, combining algorithmic search with human editorial input, because the perception is that humans have the ability to craft a better result in any given situation because they can make distinctions machines can’t.

said greg sterling, an editor with searchengineland.com

unfortunately humans are also prone to favoritism and fanboy brand allegiance, whereas machines are not. Imagine a search for ‘what’s the best mobile phone’ or ‘what operating system is best’, for the regular user they would be unwittingly looking at some very biased results indeed

it’s a struggle to picture how the majority of google’s search customers will use the technology on a daily basis. granted, over time the idea of having cloud based ‘active bookmarks’ might be quite handy and putting yourself two or three years down the road on-line collaborative bookmarking could be a big thing but google aren’t really pitching it that way so far. it will take time before enough user content has been added, moderated and filtered so that it adds real value to the existing search engine routines, if it ever does

more concerning is the potential negative effects the service will have on google’s current ‘clean’ image. no-one wants to see the kind of childish flaming, biases and bickering that goes on in forums all over the web creeping into their search results. google will also have a fair amount of work to do keeping the comments and site rankings free of spam and self promotions, something that techcrunch’s mike arrington has already experienced and criticisedstrongly. google are also mindful of the potential for companies to claim liable over comments associated with their site. google state

We’ve always been supportive of tools that allow people to better express themselves online, and SearchWiki is no exception. In cases where people express themselves improperly or illegally against websites, we’ve made simple tools readily available for websites so they can take action appropriately

how much of an admin burden this will prove to be and how much control a site has over it’s related comments remains to be seen, but there is scope for abuse of the system from both comment posters and moderators

google believe that the added value of user comments against search results would benefit it’s search customers but this raises concerns when you look a few years down the line and imagine a lot of value being added to search results in google and not as freely available content out there on the web itself. whilst this is all good news for google it would take a lot of the content away from competing search engines and place unfair competitive advantages in google’s hands

i’m sure that the main concerns being heard around the web aren’t because of something inherently wrong with the idea behind searchwiki but are instead the product of association with the broken dynamics of other social voting sites and the nature in which the change has been forced upon google account holders. google has always sold itself as a company that will ‘do no evil’ and as the number one search engine on the web they have created a responsibility for themselves. by suddenly forcing something on their account holders they are seen to have abused that in some way. in a way it’s a compliment to how much people love google search, it’s treated more like an essential public service than the front to one of the most successful companies ever

whether it’s all just an over-reaction by a vocal few of the start of a wider rejection of changes to what is essentially the cornerstone of the web we shall see. i am convinced that if searchwiki had been introduced to google labs last week it would have received good feedback and maybe even graduated in some part onto the main search site. with so many better products in perpetual beta it just seems so odd that one bound to cause controversy has appeared from nowhere and landed heavily on what is basically the internet’s homepage

paul thurrott’s supersite for windows has the best review out there, spanning many sections and including plenty of screen-shots

my own opinion is that this is shaping up to be a great operating system and i’m already using it on my main, day-to-day laptop with very few issues. so why is it so nice to use? to copy a phrase from rival apple… ‘it just works’

when i install an operating system i normally have a checklist of things to do and things to install before i can really begin using it. for windows xp this includes installing some gui tweek tools, divx, ac3 and mp4 playback codecs, a few key pieces of software and some updated graphics drivers. with windows 7 i was surprised to find that it all just worked ‘out-of-the-box’. following a simple install windows searched on-line for updated drivers for my audio card and i was ready to go. divx and mp4 encoded video worked straight away via windows media player with no need to install additional codecs and players. performance is great, even on an aged pentium 4 based laptop with 1.5 gb of ram and a feeble graphics card

the user interface inwindows 7 is clean and elegant

windows 7 delivers plenty of ‘smile-to-yourself’ moments and the completely overhauled user interface is consistent, clutter free and elegant. paul’s review goes into the details so i wont repeat them here. the majority of people using windows 7 are posting positive feedback and a public beta is due early next year

You have to conclude, if you look at the focus of a lot of what you call ‘Web 2.0′, the relentless focus on advertising-based consumer models, lightweight applications, we may be living in somewhat of a bubble that, for instance, let people throw sheep, poke friends or send virtual drinks.

from harnessing collective intelligence to a bias toward open systems, the webs greatest inventions are, at their core, social movements

he went on to tell the bbc

For me, Web 2.0 is about the internet as platform and its power to harness collective intelligence.

Areas like the smart power grid, collective action on early disease detection or disaster response, or personalised medicine are all examples of how the principles that drove the consumer internet can be applied in other areas.

Back when Google first came on the scene everyone dismissed search as ‘Yeah, not much of a business there’. And these guys said no we are going to organise all the world’s information.

Then there was Microsoft wanting to put a computer on everyone’s desktop. The titans of industry said ‘No, the PC is just a toy’. So I feel we are at one of those inflection points where there are enormous problems to be solved and enormous opportunities.

read more from the web 2.0 summit here

too little, too late?

sony also seem to be placing more focus on making old ps1 games and existing umd-based psp games available to download via the store. that at least might give reason for psp fans to get excited about this news

whenever your PSP is connected to the Internet over WiFi, you’ll be able to download and enjoy the latest games, demos and trailers on the go without needing to sync up to your PS3 or PC

the problem is that the ‘latest games’ don’t really amount to much as the number of new psp game releases have dried up lately. however, it is good news that sony seem to be moving away from trying to tie every new exciting psp feature into also having to own a ps3 to get it working. this is an update that is long overdue

it’s also been reported that the update will enable more video out functions on the psp-2000 and upcoming psp-3000 units

The PSP-2000’s video-out feature will be able to display PlayStation format software (classics titles) at the full-screen size of the TV that the PSP is connected to; the feature will also support interlace displays

We need a new operating system designed for the cloud and we will introduce one in about four weeks, we’ll even have a name to give you by then. But let’s just call it for the purposes of today ‘Windows Cloud’

windows cloud - an online development platform

he also made some well aimed comments about google’s chrome browser

If you talk to Google they’ll say it’s thin client computing but then they’ll issue a new browser that’s basically a big fat operating system designed to compete with Windows but running on top of it

i’ve posted a lot about cloud computing recently and it’s good to see microsoft shifting up a gear to match the pace being set by competitors like google. i suspect that microsoft’s new platform will have strong links to the recently announced updates to it’s windows live services and technologies like the microsoft mesh platform, currently still in ‘technology preview’ status

Here’s what we do know. Windows 7 can and should be considered Vista Release 2 (R2). In fact, I think Microsoft should market the business versions of the OS under that very name. Beginning with the release of Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008, Microsoft no longer forks its Windows code tree for new releases. So the next versions of Windows client (7), Windows Server (2008 R2), and Windows Home Server (WHS) will all be based from exactly the same code. Microsoft will simply combine the right components to create the Windows version it wants and ship it. It’s a much simpler system than before.

windows 7, a.k.a. windows vista release 2

i generally agree with paul’s opinions but think that a branded ‘business’ version of windows might well be the way to go in order to distance corporate buyers from the commonly held perception that vista is a high gloss, entertainment-focused operating system

it’s been obvious for some time now (and has been proved with microsoft’s own mojave experiment) that a simple ‘re-brand, re-launch’ is what microsoft vista needs more than anything else. windows 7 is clearly that re-launch, and it’s no bad thing. i’ve posted a lot about cloud computing recently. with windows 7 and the expansion of their ‘live’ services microsoft’s position in the fight for cloud supremacy looks healthier

i applaud microsoft for their efforts to develop windows 7 as a component-based operating system. the idea that different versions of windows can be built by simply picking which of the many components ship is undoubtedly a good technical and strategic move. the best example of this ‘pick-and-mix’ architecture in my mind is windows server 2008 which can be set up to run without a gui if need be. if microsoft were to provide a ‘windows core/win min’ build that included enough to run the windows gui, core services like the network stack, file management etc i think they would be onto a real winner with it, especially in the emerging market of ultra portable laptops and mobile devices. there seems little point in them continuing to sell xp licences to the likes of asus for use in their eeepc laptops when a slimmed down version of windows 7 would do the same thing, and likely do it better as well

here’s hoping microsoft have more luck with windows 7, if only to keep their ever advancing competitors playing catch-up, something they haven’t had to do in a while

a development framework for mobile devices

from doc searles article in linuxjournal:

Until Chrome came along, Google’s Master Mobile Plan didn’t quite add up. Now it does. Chrome — Google’s new superbrowser — is cream on the top of a new mobile software stack. Let’s call it GACL, for Gears, Android and Chrome on Linux. Gears is a way to run Web apps on desktops and store data locally as well as in the cloud. Android is a development framework for Linux-based mobile devices. Chrome is a browser, but not just for pages. Chrome also runs apps. In that respect, it’s more than the UI-inside-a-window that all browsers have become. It’s essentially an operating system. 

it’s the last sentence that rings so true in my mind

online calendars are never going to set the world alight but google’s offering builds on the success of some of their other services and includes features like sms reminder messaging free of charge. one of the smartest features within the application is ‘quick add’, which analyses the text you’ve typed into the globally available pop up window and creates a calendar entry based upon what you have written. it does so with surprising accuracy and it soon becomes your default method of adding events

quick add interprets phrases so well you wont want to use anything else

the main screen displays events in day, week, month, 2 week and agenda views. selecting an event from the main calendar window allows you to edit the event details, delete the event or view the location via google maps

clicking the event gives access the map link

google map integration works well

editing detailed event information allows you to set up repetitions, edit the events duration and add a detailed description. you can edit dates manually or drag and drop them on the main screen

editing event details

google have provided three types of event reminder: pop-up, email and sms. within the uk the sms functionality is restricted to sending text message reminders a set number of minutes before the event is due to begin. set up is quick and free of charge and you wont find yourself receiving unwanted texts from associated third parties. in the united states the service has been extended and you are able to add calendar events via sms. it’s a great service for those without a web enabled mobile phone and although all of the google apps seem to perpetually be in beta, it’s also reliable

sms based reminders are free in google calendar

google are really pushing the idea of letting you share your data with friends and the public across all of their online apps. calendar is no exception and lets you add other people’s google calendars to your own, share you calendar with others and it even lets you publish content via rss feeds or web pages

you can create multiple calenders to help manage things like work and home events, allowing you to show all or just selected calenders. this can be used to overcome a constraint in the basic calendar functionality whereby you can’t tag events depending on type. it’s tough to criticise a free service but as yet there’s also no easy way to sync with imap enabled calendar tools such as microsoft’s outlook without the use of third party sites or software. as you’d expect, the service works well with the iphone and other mobile platforms and will likely work even better with android based mobile handsets

in summary, google calendar is a very good product offering a decent feature set without charge. as you’d expect from a company that makes most of it’s revenue via online advertising their ‘adsense’ adverts feature within the calender but are limited to a small area down the right hand side of the page. it’s a small price to pay for the functionality on offer. with the increasing level of integration between the googles online web services this is certainly something to try out if you are in the market for an cloud-based calendar solution

the prototype google website was originally hosted on stanford university servers way back in 1997

from ‘the intelligent cloud’:

As we’re already seeing, people will interact with the cloud using a plethora of devices: PCs, mobile phones and PDAs, and games. But we’ll also see a rush of new devices customized to particular applications, and more environmental sensors and actuators, all sending and receiving data via the cloud.

from ‘the future of online videos’:

Today, 13 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute, and we believe the volume will continue to grow exponentially. Our goal is to allow every person on the planet to participate by making the upload process as simple as placing a phone call. This new video content will be available on any screen – in your living room, or on your device in your pocket.