Google Continues To Center On Location. Adds It To Its Toolbar.

Location-based services haven’t yet caught fire, but location itself is increasingly finding its way to web services as a complimentary feature. The latest to use it is the Google Toolbar. If you have it installed, and open Google Maps, it will now auto-center on your location.

That’s a small, but useful feature, but the ramifications of this move are potentially much large. This adds location capabilities to the millions of people who have Google Toolbar installed. You may be thinking that a lot of those users with the latest version of Firefox already had it — but this feature is for Internet Explorer only right now. That, combined with Mozilla’s use of its Geode location plug-in (which again, is built into the latest version of Firefox), puts location on a good percentage of browsers in the world.

And while it doesn’t mention it, that’s important for Google’s own larger purposes. Its recently launched Latitude location-based network is only useful if it can automatically update your location, or make it really easy to do. Up until now, it has been a pain on a computer.

But there are other big things Google could do with location information — such as serve you location-based ads. There are other companies working in that field, but you can bet Google wants to get out in front of them and lead the charge. And with its own toolbar to get your location, it could potentially do that. It also promises the ability to serve up location-based search results with feature.

Google has been been working on location for a little while in the mobile space, but most users are still experiencing the web first and foremost through regular computer browsers. Google’s toolbar pulls location data from both IP addresses and nearby Wi-Fi access points — since most computers don’t have GPS built-in.

Google Friend Connect Beta Officially Released

Google Friend Connect has become available in a beta version to any webmaster that is looking for additional “dash of social” to his or her site. According to a post that has been recently published on the official Google Blog, the service is meant to allow webmasters to add social features to their sites, by simply copying a few snippets of code, without the hassle of advance coding or the need of technical knowledge.

It's a common fact that people want to socialize on the Internet, so Friend Connect offers them the possibility to simply sign in, create customized profile, then look for other individuals who share the same interests. Moreover, people don't have to go through the trouble of setting up a new account, as the service allows them to sign in using the same username and password they already have on Google, Yahoo, AOL, or OpenID. At the same time, users can either build a new profile or import one they have already established on other social networks such as Plaxo and orkut.

According to the post on the blog, Friend Connect has been initially launched as a preview in May, and the developing team has been working closely with website owners and social networks, as well as with application developers, in an effort to increase the speed of the service and its scalability, in addition to making it easier to use and more customizable. Furthermore, users can now benefit from expanded features, including a wider range of embedded profiles and more ways of sharing content, for instance the inclusion of YouTube movies in their comments.

“Friend Connect's goal is to facilitate an open social web. Using open standards like OpenID and OAuth, Friend Connect makes it simple for people to instantly interact with one another on the sites that they already love to visit. Additionally, websites that use Friend Connect become OpenSocial containers, capable of running applications created by the OpenSocial developer community.”

The developers are expecting to see in the near future that more webmasters have added Friend Connect to their sites, thus encouraging more user interaction around the Web. The video below will help you draw a better picture of what Friend Connect is all about. More information on this service is available here.

Google Joins DRSG The Demand Response and Smart Grid Coalition is a smart-grid trade association

(Thursday, November 13), Google joined the Demand Response and Smart Grid Coalition (DRSG), an association that promotes the monitoring of electricity consumption in both the power grid and end users' homes. This step is the latest in a series of environment-friendly actions that Google.org engaged in over the past few years. The DRSG group includes multiple companies, all oriented towards promoting and supporting energy efficiency.


Google also announced that it signed a partnership with General Electric in early September, in a step aimed at supporting clean energy lobbying, as well as the development and implementation of energy monitoring equipment throughout the grid. The main stake of Google's efforts is to create a nation-wide smart power grid that will fuel smart appliances.


These appliances, including dishwashers and washing machines, could detect off-peak periods – via their integrated software – and trigger their programs accordingly, so as to minimize both costs of operations and the strain they place on power plants in the US. This leads directly to less carbon being emitted into the atmosphere by coal- or natural gas-powered production facilities.


DRSG also focuses on the issue of demand response, which means that its companies advocate the creation of pieces of software that will regulate and decrease energy consumption in offices and homes during peak times. Google was expected to enter this field for quite some time, and it would appear people saying this were right.


Besides Google, the DSRG group also includes companies like Cpower, Conservation Services Group (an energy service firm), and Corporate Systems Engineering (a smart-meter provider). Chances are that more companies will soon join the initiative as well, especially now that Google is in on it too. The Mountain View-based firm is also expected to soon launch a line of products, including gadgets and software that will monitor end-users' energy consumption.

Google says its success is tied to AdSense publishers

The global financial crisis could, at least as far as online advertising is concerned, be in Microsoft's advantage by destabilizing Google. Compared to the Mountain View-search giant, the Redmond company has little to lose in this arena. But Google, which Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer dubbed a “one trick pony” in the past, is intimately connecting with monetizing search, and almost nothing else. Acting as an intermediary between advertisers and websites, Google is bound to be hurt by the world economic crisis, and this is evident in an email sent out by Kim Scott, Director AdSense Online Sales & Operations to all AdSense publishers.

“We understand that the recent economic turmoil has created a lot of uncertainty in the lives of AdSense publishers. During these difficult times, we're continuing to invest in innovations that improve publisher monetization and advertiser value in the content network. We're focusing on further developing our product offerings and boosting ad performance for publishers. We recently announced advancements in AdSense for search and experiments to make ads more effective,” Scott revealed in the email, courtesy of Venture Beat.

Ballmer has repeatedly indicated that it would persistently gun down for Google until it gained a position that placed it on par with the Mountain View giant on the search engine market. At the same time, just as it is the case for Google, Microsoft also monetizes its search business via advertising. “We're absolutely the underdog. We are David to Google's Goliath,” Ballmer stated during a recent trip to Brazil.

“We're bringing DoubleClick technologies to AdSense publishers, and we'll continue to launch new products and features. We're also continuing to improve our offerings for AdWords advertisers, making it easier for them to target the Google content network. Features for advertisers, such as the new display ad builder, are designed to improve ad performance on AdSense publisher sites,” Scott added.

The letter Google sent out to AdSense publishers is a clear try to dispel the uncertainty generated by the financial crisis. In the financial quarter ended September 30, 2008, Google reported revenue of $5.54 billion, 3% more than Q2 2008, and 31% more than Q3 2007. In mid-October, Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, also indicated that the company would continue to invest in the evolution of search despite the “poor state of the global economy”.

“We’ll keep driving technological progress, but our best asset will always be our publisher partners. The strength of AdSense lies in the value of the content you bring to users and the quality of the sites you bring to advertisers. Our success is tied to yours. We look forward to partnering with you for the long term, and remain dedicated to helping you succeed,” Scott concluded.

Google CEO Could Be Obama's Tech Advisor

Rumor has it that Google CEO Eric Schmidt will be occupying the newly-formed tech advisor position to the president of the United States. Barack Obama created this position just shortly before visiting the Google headquarters during his campaign, and some believe that the reason this happened was because the job was promised to Schmidt.


The president-elect announced his support for maintaining the Internet neutral, meaning that he (and Google) opposed the addition of more fees for data transfer to end-users. Under Obama's tech policy, ISPs will be strictly prohibited from hampering data flow around the web. He says that the network is an indispensable tool in today's economy, and that it motivates growth by making trade simpler and easier, so any obstacle will mean a loss of capital.


The head of Google endorsed the Democratic candidate throughout the elections, though the ads the company posted on various sites were mostly Republican. However, Google employees donated far more to Obama's campaign than they did for John McCain – about $487,355, and $20,600 respectively, as estimated by the Wall Street Journal.


The naming of the Democratic candidate as the new president comes at the same time as the decision of the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to open up unused TV broadband frequencies to wireless Internet traffic. They will enter use when the entire television grid moves to the digital format.


No one can be sure that Eric Schmidt will be named as Obama's tech advisor until the event actually happens. But, in light of the relation they had during the campaign, and the earnings that Schmidt's endorsement brought the new president, it stand to reason that he will be, at the very least, considered for the job. In addition, Google's efforts to go "green" are in line with Obama's policy towards climate change and global warming, so this is another common ground for the company and the White House.

GooOS, the Google Operating System

GooOS, the Google Operating System

Great post about what Google is up to by Rich Skrenta. He argues that Google is building a huge computer with a custom operating system that everyone on earth can have an account on. His last few paragraphs are so much more perceptive than anything that's been written about Google by anyone; Skrenta nails the company exactly:

Google is a company that has built a single very large, custom computer. It's running their own cluster operating system. They make their big computer even bigger and faster each month, while lowering the cost of CPU cycles. It's looking more like a general purpose platform than a cluster optimized for a single application.

While competitors are targeting the individual applications Google has deployed, Google is building a massive, general purpose computing platform for web-scale programming.

This computer is running the world's top search engine, a social networking service, a shopping price comparison engine, a new email service, and a local search/yellow pages engine. What will they do next with the world's biggest computer and most advanced operating system?

I was thrilled reading this today because I had been thinking along the same lines as I wondered about Gmail (and the 1GB of storage in particular)...and that Skrenta had made the argument so well. This weekend, as I hacked through a bunch of XHTML and CSS for an upcoming site redesign, I jotted down a few notes for a follow-up on a post I made over a year ago called Google is not a search company. I was going to call it "GooOS, the Google Operating System".

My notes contained two of Skrenta's main points: the importance of the supercomputer and the scores of Ph.Ds being Google's main assets. A third key asset for Google is the data that they're storing on those 100,000 computers. As I said in that post:

Google's money won't be made with search...that's small peanuts compared to selling access to the world's biggest, best, and most cleverly-utilized map of the web.

So. They have this huge map of the Web and are aware of how people move around in the virtual space it represents. They have the perfect place to store this map (one of the world's largest computers that's all but incapable of crashing). And they are clever at reading this map. Google knows what people write about, what they search for, what they shop for, they know who wants to advertise and how effective those advertisements are, and they're about to know how we communicate with friends and loved ones. What can they do with all that? Just about anything that collection of Ph.Ds can dream up.

Tim O'Reilly has talked about various bits from the Web morphing into "the emergent Internet operating system"; the small pieces loosely joining, if you will. Google seems to be heading there already, all by themselves. By building and then joining a bunch of the small pieces by themselves, Google can take full advantage of the economies of scale and avoid the difficulties of interop.

Google isn't worried about Yahoo! or Microsoft's search efforts...although the media's focus on that is probably to their advantage. Their real target is Windows. Who needs Windows when anyone can have free unlimited access to the world's fastest computer running the smartest operating system? Mobile devices don't need big, bloated OSes...they'll be perfect platforms for accessing the GooOS. Using Gnome and Linux as a starting point, Google should design an OS for desktop computers that's modified to use the GooOS and sell it right alongside Windows ($200) at CompUSA for $10/apiece (available free online of course). Google Office (Goffice?) will be built in, with all your data stored locally, backed up remotely, and available to whomever it needs to be (SubEthaEdit-style collaboration on Word/Excel/PowerPoint-esque documents is only the beginning). Email, shopping, games, music, news, personal publishing, etc.; all the stuff that people use their computers for, it's all there.

Even though everyone's down on Google these days, they remain the most interesting company in the world and I'm optimistic about their potential and success (while also apprehensive about the prospect of using Google for absolutely everything someday...I'll be cursing the Google monopoly in 5 years time). If they stay on target with their plans to leverage their three core assets (which, if Gmail is any indication, they will), I predict Google will be the biggest and most important company in the world in 5-8 years.

Read more

Google Says No to Global Warming

The company invests in electric vehicles


Global warming and its implications have been hot topics in people's discussions for a couple of years now. "Global warming is caused by emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases that are emitted primarily by the burning of fossil fuels and the clearing of forests. These gases remain in our atmosphere for decades or even centuries," states a report of the
Union of Concerned Scientists.

As carbon dioxide emission is generally acknowledged as the main factor that leads to the phenomenon, international organizations took the matter into their own hands and put forward a series of solutions. The emergence of electric vehicles was the most famous and many manufacturers engaged into producing them, although the idea didn't bring them any money to burn.

Yet, Google.org, the philanthropic branch of the company, announced today that it invested in two companies that product and sell such vehicles. This comes as a continuation of Google's RechargeIT program that started last summer and consisted of offering eco-friendly cars to Google's employees. The two companies that will benefit from the support of the search giant are Aptera Motors and ActaCell, both U.S. based.

Aptera Motors' two prototypes of ecologic cars allow, after recharge, either a 120 miles ride, for the All Electric Artera, or a 40 to 60 miles drive, for the Plug-in Electric Hybrid of the Aptera. Details about the technologies of the second company supported by Google have not been disclosed yet. ActaCell announced that they would be available in early 2009.

"When we launched RechargeIT we announced a request for investment proposals, hoping to identify top entrepreneurs finding innovative transportation solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming," said Gregory Miller, Google.org's managing director of investments. At the moment, electric vehicles are perceived as interesting, but rather useless toys. With the help of Google, perhaps this outlook will change.

Google Invests $10 Million in Alternative to Petrol Based Energy

The philanthropic arm of Google announced an investment of over $10 million in unconventional geothermal energy. Google's decision to become involved in yet another environmental project comes a month after it invested another $2.75 million in the development of plug-in electric vehicles. This time, the investment is more substantial, but the total pecuniary requirements of the project are also greater.

While the use of geothermal springs normally implies the exploitation of pockets of hot water or steam, which appear naturally in certain areas, the Enhanced Geothermal Systems project aims to reproduce these natural conditions in a controlled environment. "The EGS process, by comparison, replicates these conditions by fracturing hot rock, circulating water through the system, and using the resulting steam to produce electricity in a conventional turbine." explains Charles Baron from the Climate and Energy Team, on Google's official blog.

While petrol costs are rising, leading to a global fuel crisis, the good thing about geothermal energy is that, with the proper investments, it could become available anywhere around the globe. "The most important economic aspect of geothermal energy use is that it's homegrown - using geothermal energy reduces our dependence on foreign oil, creates jobs here in the United States, and more favorably balances our global trading position." says the U.S. Department of Energy. Of course, any country can decide to stray from the beaten path to embrace the revolutionary technology.

Up until now, hot water and steam have been used solely in certain regions - California, Indonesia and Iceland, which are located at the conjunction of two continental plates. With the boost given by new technologies, which still need investments in order to reach a more extended scale, the eco-friendly energy solution could go national, and then global. And the larger the EGS network, the lower the prices.

EGS is "providing base load continuous power, with high availability. It's essentially emissions free and therefore carbon neutral and it has this distributed indigenous nature so it's not just in the South-Western parts of the U.S, it is extendible and scalable on a national scale. [...] Once you get large and you do this large at a national basis, then the costs will come down naturally." underscores Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT, Dr. Jefferson Tester.

Google Applies for Water-Based Data Center Patent

Google has applied for a new patent, this time for a water-based data center. The company plans to build several systems more or less at a close distance from the shore, as land is continuously being crowded by huge data centers, which use a lot of conventional energy.



Each center, if approved by the US Patent & Trademark Office, will consist of a plurality of computers contained on a floating platform. The machines will be powered by an electrical generator, and cooled by a cooling unit, all of which will be sea-based.



Google explains that, by gathering the individual centers into a honeycomb-shaped grid, the space necessary for the platform will be incredibly small compared with that required by conventional data centers. Also, the company intends to use wave-motion energy to power the system and also to cool it, so that it can be as self-sufficient as possible.



“In general, computing centers are located on a ship or ships, which are then anchored in a water body from which energy from natural motion of the water may be captured, and turned into electricity and/or pumping power for cooling pumps to carry heat away from computers in the data center. In particular examples, the water-powered devices for generating electricity are depicted as so-called Pelamis machines. The data centers may also be on shore and receive power and/or cooling water from floating systems.” the three inventors explain.



Google assures governmental organization that its data center will interfere as little as possible with other crafts situated in the vicinity of the system. “Motion-powered machines may be used in configurations which accommodate other shipping traffic in the area, such as fishing boats, recreational vessels, shipping vessels, etc. Such traffic may be unduly affected by encounters with the array, such as fishing nets tangled with the tethers. Various signaling mechanisms, such as strobing lights, flags, and horns may be used to alert other ships of the existence and location of a particular field of devices.” says the team applying for the patent.

The entire document is available here.

Google Toolbar 5 now available in Firefox

You can download the latest version of Google Toolbar for Firefox, available in 29 languages. It includes all the Toolbar features you know and love, such as Search, Bookmarks and Translate. When you install it, you can try out some of newest features.


READ MORE

Plan Public Transit Trips in and Around New York City with Google Maps

Users will now be able to access station and schedule data for every service provider overseen by the MTA: New York City Transit (which includes subway and bus service), Long Island Rail Road, Long Island Bus, Metro-North Railroad, and the MTA Bus Company. Other connecting services also provide data via Google Maps, including NJ Transit (commuter rail, light rail and bus), Staten Island Ferry, and The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey (PATH Rail, AirTrain JFK, and AirTrain Newark). The trip planner can create trips across multiple agencies.

Being able to plan public transit trips in Google Maps makes it easier than ever to take advantage of all that New York has to offer. With this new partnership, users can get detailed itineraries that utilize any MTA services across its 5,000-square mile service area. Itineraries will include three routing options, complete with station locations, schedule times, transfer information, total trip time, and step-by-step walking directions. Icons for MTA train and bus stops will now be visible on Google Maps which heightens awareness of the availability of public transit options for users who are exploring an area; when clicked, the icons will display the routes serving the stop and upcoming departures. Additionally, when a user searches for driving directions within the MTA service area, a public transit itinerary will appear as an alternative. Need directions while on-the-go? Transit routing is also available on many mobile phones via Google Maps for mobile.

The MTA joins more than 75 other transit agencies spanning 12 countries that have joined the Google Transit program. To learn more about this announcement, head to maps.google.com/nyc.

Original article from Google Press Center