On the same day that Apple launched DRM-free music, they made two other announcements regarding Apple TV. Apple said Wednesday, that they are bringing original content from the wildly popular and often sued YouTube, to the living room with Apple TV. Apple said to expect the feature by mid-June. Apple TV will wirelessly stream videos directly from YouTube and play them on a user’s widescreen television.

Full story: monstersandcritics.com 

Labels: Apple, TV, youtube

Google Desktop gives you easy access to information on your computer and from the web. It's a desktop search application that provides full text search over your email, computer files, music, photos, chats and web pages that you've viewed. By making your computer searchable, Google Desktop puts your information easily within your reach and frees you from having to manually organize your files, emails and bookmarks. It makes searching your computer as easy as searching the web with Google.

Google Desktop doesn't just help you search your computer; it also helps you gather new information from the web with Sidebar, a new desktop feature that shows you your new email, weather and stock information, personalized news and RSS/Atom feeds, and more. Sidebar is personalized automatically, without any manual configuration required (though you can certainly make your own customizations if you want to).

We've also improved your desktop search experience. With Quick Find, you can now launch applications and see search results as you type without even opening a browser. We've also extended our Outlook integration, so you can search Google Desktop with the Outlook Toolbar and see results within Outlook itself. Finally, you can search even more stuff, including your Gmail, files on network drives, many Outlook data types (including Contacts, Tasks, Calendar, Notes and Journal) and MSN Messenger chats. And if you yearn for even stronger security, you can encrypt your entire index.

Improved Sidebar and Google Gadgets. Add Google Gadgets to customize your desktop and Sidebar, Developers: Create and share your own gadgets.

Requires Windows Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista

Download: Google Desktop 5.1.0705.14375 | Gadgets 

Google upped its stalker factor this week by adding face recognition abilities to its image search. While currently unofficial and unannounced, users can now search for images that only contain faces by appending a query string onto the end of a search URL. For example, a general image search for "Ars Technica" produces a variety of image results, but when appending "&imgtype=face" to the end of the URL, all new results contain photos of people.

The hidden feature was discovered by Google Blogoscoped, and there is currently no way to indicate that you only want to search for faces through the image search interface. However, both "&imgtype=face" and "&imgtype=news" trigger different search results than what is presented by default—the latter showing only images that are associated with news stories.

Full article: arstechnica.com 

Labels: face, images, search

Firefox browser users love the myriad of third-party extensions that tweak the open-source browser's performance, but some of the most popular of those extensions have created a security hole so wide even a newbie AOL hacker could find it and millions of Firefox users are at risk of having their browsers hijacked.

Third party extensions including the widely used toolbars from Google, Yahoo, Ask, Facebook, LinkedIn, as well as social bookmark extension from Del.icio.us and two anti-hacking add-ons, the Netcraft Anti-Phishing Toolbar and the PhishTank SiteChecker all put users at risk of having their browser infected with malicious code.

Full story: blog.wired.com 

Labels: extensions, Facebook, Firefox, Yahoo

Google Toolbar is a popular browser add-on that makes it possible to quickly perform Google Web searches, prevent annoying pop-up ads from appearing, and fill in Web forms with one simple click.

Now you can make your Toolbar as unique as you are. You can add buttons and bookmarks; share web pages with friends; get instant search suggestions; and enjoy the web form filler and spellchecker.

Features

· Enhanced Search Box
· Google Safe Browsing
· Subscribe to Feed
· Send with Gmail
· Custom Layouts
· SpellCheck
· AutoFill
· Custom buttons
· Google Account Sign-in

· Google Docs & Spreadsheets
With the Google Docs & Spreadsheets feature enabled in the Google Toolbar, you can open most popular file types right in your browser.

· Bookmark frequently visited pages and access them from anywhere

· Add buttons to the Toolbar to search your favorite sites.

· Send To
You can use your Google Toolbar to share web pages via email, text message (SMS), or blog.

System requirements:
· Windows XP/2000 SP3+, Mac OS X 10.2+, or Linux
· Firefox 1.5+

Download: Google Toolbar for Firefox 3.0.20070420w Beta 

Labels: beta, Firefox, Toolbar

Since the next few weeks should get the iPhone hype to a fever pitch, we thought we’d kick things off with this lovely rumor. In an interview with the Seattle Times, AT&T’s president of national distribution, Glenn Lurie hinted that some additional Google applications may be headed for the iPhone.

Full article: wired.com 

Labels: Apple, apps, iPhone

This morning Google added Street View, an all new way to browse Google Maps. Launching with five major cities, Street View joins satellite and traffic maps as new ways to view geography. When in an area with a Street View, users can toggle the mode to navigate within a 3-D photograph using their mouse or keyboard shortcuts. Users get their own "person" that shows which direction you're looking at.

You can also just click and drag them to new locations. The experience is a mix between Quicktime's VR environment and Microsoft Live Labs' PhotoSynth project since users can zoom in closer in any shot. Google describes it as "immersive photography."

Read more: webware.com 

Labels: city, Maps, photo, street

Google has quietly made its first anti-malware acquisition, snapping up GreenBorder Technologies, a venture-backed company that sells browser virtualization security software.


The acquisition gives the search engine a key piece of technology to block Web-based exploits that prey on flaws in the two most widely used browsers — Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox.

Read more: dabcc.com 

Labels: browser, GreenBorder, malware, security

NEW YORK (AP) - CDC Corp., a maker of software and operator of the China.com site, said Tuesday it expanded its partnerships with Google Inc. and China Mobile Ltd.

Under the agreement with Google, the search engine launched video ads, called Video Adsense, in the English language portion of the site. Google will also place ads on the China.com portal to promote its search engine.

Read more: hemscott.com 

Labels: Adsense, China, mobile, Software, video

Google Earth combines the power of Google Search with satellite imagery, maps, terrain and 3D buildings to put the world's geographic information at your fingertips.

Features:

• Fly to your house. Just type in an address, press Search, and you’ll zoom right in.
• Search for schools, parks, restaurants, and hotels. Get driving directions.
• Tilt and rotate the view to see 3D terrain and buildings.
• Save and share your searches and favorites.
• Sophisticated streaming technology delivers the data to you as you need it.
• Imagery and 3D data depict the entire earth - Terabytes of aerial and satellite imagery depict cities around the world in high-resolution detail.
• Local search lets you search for restaurants, hotels, and even driving directions. Results show in your 3D earth view. Easy to layer multiple searches, save results to folders, and share with others.
• Layers show parks, schools, hospitals, airports, shopping, and more.
• KML – data exchange format let your share useful annotations and view. thousands of data points created by Google Earth users.
• Free for personal use.

Use it for:

- Planning a trip
- Getting driving directions
- Finding a house or apartment
- Finding a local business
- Exploring the world

Download: Google Earth 4.1.7087.5048 Beta Windows 2000/XP/Vista, Mac OS X, Linux 

Labels: 3D, Earth, satellite, search, terrain, World

Compatibility issues always exist with any new release of an operating system, said Steve Gillmer, Microsoft's business manager of collaborative technologies. He added that Microsoft works with software developers to reduce incompatibilities and with customers to manage the movement to new operating systems.

The story had a certain flair. In early March, the chief information officer of the Federal Aviation Administration , David Bowen, was reportedly considering forsaking Microsoft Windows and Office in favor of the Linux operating system and the Web-based Google Apps Premium office suite.

Could this be true? Might an office suite upstart topple the giant of giants? Does a Web-based suite of applications have enough punch to do the job?

Full story: technewsworld.com 

Labels: Linux, microsoft, office, Software

BERLIN: In the latest example of a U.S. technology giant potentially being called on the carpet in Europe, Google has been warned that it may be violating European Union privacy laws by storing data on its users for up to two years.

An advisory panel of data protection chiefs from the 27 EU countries sent a letter last week to the Internet search engine company asking Google to justify its policy of retaining data on Internet addresses and individual search habits, said Friso Roscam Abbing, a spokesman for European Union's justice commissioner, Franco Frattini.

Privacy experts said the letter was the first salvo in what could become a determined effort by the European Commission to force Google to change how it does business in the EU, whose 400 million consumers outnumber the U.S. population.

Any EU effort to impose limits on Google, which as a U.S.-based company operates under U.S. law, would be the latest in a series of aggressive actions taken by European policy makers to rein in global technology companies.

Frattini called the working group's query to Google "pertinent, appropriate and legitimate."

Full article: iht.com 

Labels: data, Europe, laws, privacy

Almost all my experience with the investment community is from the research side, but I did once work on the propaganda side: investor relations [IR]. For a short time after the troubles began, I was ambushed into doing IR for the ill-fated shared-memory processing manufacturer Kendall Square Research.

And if you know the story of KSR, you know why I did IR only once and for a short time. So based on this meager IR experience, it was with wonderment that I noticed that Google (GOOG) was letting two engineering VPs loose at a Goldman Sachs conference.

By just being there, Alan Eustace and Jeff Huber answered my question posed on seekingalpha on March 7: Is Google a media play or an IT investment? (And with the pending DoubleClick acquisition, add to that question the possibility that it should be measured like a large advertising/communications agency).

Full article: seekingalpha.com 

Labels: applications, DoubleClick, market, technology

Addressing an audience at the Open Source Business Conference, Free Software Foundation (FSF) lawyer Eben Moglen discussed the upcoming version 3 of the General Public License (GPL 3). Moglen anticipates broad adoption of the license even among open-source projects that do not use the current version of the GPL. Moglen also took the opportunity to nudge Google and encouraged the company to release the source code of open source application improvements used internally.

Full article: arstechnica.com 

Labels: companies, GPL, Open Source, Software

Google has begun testing with in-stream video ads from a small group of U.S. advertisers and publishers using AdSense.

Ad creative will be less than 30 seconds and made skippale by the users. Publishers will be able to choose which videos to monetize as well as their ad’s location within the video, and track their results using AdSense. Participating sites within the network will test using each publisher’s Flash player as opposed to Google video-hosted forums. In the tradition of AdSense deals, the ad revenue will be split between Google and the website publisher.

Full article: adotas.com 

Labels: ads, Adsense, Publishers, video

According to TechCrunch, Google has just acquired Feedburner, a web feed management company for $100 million. This was previously a rumor but now has been confirmed by Michael Arrington, who says that the deal mostly involves upfront cash payment by Google.

Interesting news for publishers currently running Feedburner’s advertising program because it’s likely that Google might integrate its Adsense contextual ad network with Feedburner.

Read more: doshdosh.com 

Labels: Adsense, advertisements, Feedburner, rss

If Google really wants to put its 'Do No Evil' mentality out there, they should lead by example and buy Internet radio service Pandora.

While Pandora is wildly popular, it runs the risk of being forced to shutdown entirely (it's already down in much of Europe and Asia) if the recent RIAA ruling goes into effect that drastically ups the royalty rates they will have to pay for the music they play.

Pandora simply doesn't have the funds to pay the increased rates and still maintain a viable business - but Google certainly does.

Full story: parislemon.com 

Labels: Internet, pandora, radio

'Big Brother' row over plans for personal database

Google, the world's biggest search engine, is setting out to create the most comprehensive database of personal information ever assembled, one with the ability to tell people how to run their lives.

In a mission statement that raises the spectre of an internet Big Brother to rival Orwellian visions of the state, Google has revealed details of how it intends to organise and control the world's information.

The company's chief executive, Eric Schmidt, said during a visit to Britain this week: "The goal is to enable Google users to be able to ask the question such as 'What shall I do tomorrow?' and 'What job shall I take?'."

Full article: independent.co.uk 

Labels: database, Eric Schmidt, information, personal

Just launched!

Increased attachment limit-- 20 MB!

Now you can start sharing more of those home videos, large presentations and files you just can't seem to get smaller. We have doubled the allowable attachment size to 20 MB to make your Gmail space even more useful.

Read more: About Gmail 

Labels: attachment, Gmail, mail, space

Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) has bestowed quite a wedding gift to company co-founder Sergey Brin and his new wife. The company has taken a $3.9 million minority stake in 23andMe, which is described as an early stage biotech company that just happens to have been co-founded by Brin's new wife, Anne Wojcicki. (I wish I hadn't edited out my planned joke in last week's wedding take, wondering about the possibility for some biotech search product. Ah, the missed opportunities!)

Full story: fool.com 

Labels: 23andMe, biotech, Sergey Brin

Need to dig up some information from a centuries-old text on ayurvedic medicine? Soon you'll be able to do so from the comfort of your living room. Google has agreed to index and digitize 800,000 texts stored at the University of Mysore in India as part of its attempt to broaden the Google Book Search program, according to the Indo-Asian News Service.

"Written in both papers and palm leaves, there are around 100,000 manuscripts in our library, some dating back to the eighth century," said the vice chancellor of Mysore. "The effort is to restore and preserve this cultural heritage for effective dissemination of knowledge." He also added, cryptically, that the University plans to "patent them before making them available on public domain."

Full article: arstechnica.com 

Labels: books, library, manuscripts, university

Google has launched a new addition to its growing lineup of…well everything, Google Hot Trends.

Google Trends takes the idea behind Google Zeitgeist to the next level. Instead of providing weekly details of top Google searches, Google Hot Trends provides similar data daily and goes as far as providing “hot” search results via state, city and country.

Read more: Techcrunch.com 

Labels: country, search, Trends, Zeitgeist

Microsoft's share falls despite recent resurgence

Google continues to dominate the search sector commanding over 55 per cent of the market share and gaining ground at the expense of rivals Microsoft and Yahoo.

Figures for April from Nielsen/Netratings show that Microsoft's minor resurgence in the market in recent months seems to have come to a halt.

Microsoft experienced its first market share increase for over a year in February, another in March, but has slipped from 10.1 per cent to nine per cent in April. In the same period Google increased its share by two per cent gain.

Read more: computing.co.uk 

Labels: market, microsoft, search, Yahoo

As the FCC considers which rules will govern one of the last great spectrum auctions in February 2009, some of the most interesting proposals are coming from startups and companies outside the wireless business. The latest suggestion comes from Google, which thinks the FCC should adopt an auction process much like the one it uses to sell advertising via its AdWords. That way winning bidders who end up not using as much spectrum as they pay for could reaction it to other companies. That would certainly make for a more efficient use of the spectrum.

Full story: blogs.business2.com 

Labels: ADWords, auctions, companies, FCC, wireless

I have just heard from a VERY trusted source that Google is buying Feedburner in order to get into the rapidly evolving RSS Ad market. The delay in announcing the deal, I am told is solely due to the delay in closing out the DoubleClick deal.

If true this deal makes a lot of sense for both parties. Today many of us predominately read blogs via our RSS readers and thus never actually visit the original blog source and/or see the sites supporting adverts.

Full story: vecosys.com 

Labels: ads, DoubleClick, Feedburner, market, rss

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues to subtly press its office productivity software into the hands of the masses, consumers and businesses. And yet, the company continues to say it is not targeting, as a whole, Microsoft's Office franchise, which requires a decent chunk of cash to purchase as well as installation on a PC (or network) to function.

Google's Gmail (email), Calendar (scheduling), Docs (word precessing) and Spreadsheet (calculations) require nothing but a web browser and an internet connection, while giving many "light" users the same capabilities as the Microsoft Office package. All for free.

Read more: bloggingstocks.com 

Labels: apps, calendar, docs, microsoft, office, Spreadsheets

A deal between Salesforce.com and Google makes sense from a PR perspective, with Microsoft planning to release its CRM tool as a hosted application, called Microsoft Dynamics CRM Live, at the end of the second quarter. Both Salesforce.com and Google would love to steal some thunder from Microsoft, one analyst said.

For all the mergers and acquisitions the business world has seen in the past month, Google and Salesforce.com are reminding Wall Street that strategic alliances are still in style.

According to a Monday article in the Wall Street Journal, the two Internet companies are in talks about a partnership that would target Microsoft . The paper cited unnamed sources that claim the companies are working out details of a possible alliance that might be revealed within weeks.

Full article: sci-tech-today.com 

Labels: crm, microsoft, Salesforce, tool

GButts display all of your Google Services as buttons just next to the adressbar or anywhere you like it!

You can go to settings to change which services should be available for you as buttons.
Left click on a button opens the service in the current tab, middle click opens a new tab.

Download: GButts 2.0 

Labels: adressbar, buttons, services, tab

A new agreement will see Fairfax sites carry Google ADWords advertisements and make use of Google Maps, and Fairfax video content will be available through Google.

Fairfax Digital will run Google ADWords advertisements across it sites, including the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age web sites. Revenue generated from these advertisements will be shared between the parties.

Read more: ITwire Australia 

Labels: advertisements, ADWords, Maps, video

New York Times' columnist and Pulitzer Prize winner Tom Friedman spent an hour chatting with Google CEO Eric Schmidt this morning at the Personal Democracy Forum (PDF.)

It was a casual conversation, and one of the most striking images that stayed in my mind was Schmidt's account of his own job interview with Google's founders, who had apparently data mined information about him, and projected the search results onto the wall as the interview commenced. The general point being made was Google's power to shape people's reputation, and how it will play out in general (unrelated) political processes.

Read more: Wired.com 

Labels: CEO, Eric Schmidt, interview, political

It's been a good couple of months to be in mergers and acquisitions on Sand Hill Road. Since April 17, companies Time Warner, WPP, Yahoo, Google and Microsoft have spent over $10.4 billion to acquire online advertising firms.

That sum, the disclosed amount spent on firms DoubleClick, aQuantive, 24/7 Real Media and the Right Media Exchange--does not include the undisclosed amounts spent on a set of relatively smaller acquired companies such asScreenTonic SA, ADTECH AG and Third Screen Media.

But the biggest buys were Google's and Microsoft's.

Full article: internetnews.com 

Labels: DoubleClick, GoogleClick, Media, microsoft

Why does Google become even more “valuable” day after day? That is not the $64,000 question, it is the $150 billion market cap question.

The Google CEO has the answer: “Network Effect,” big time.

The more information that goes into the “search” network, the more valuable it becomes, Eric Schmidt said in his Personal Democracy keynote Friday in NYC.

When Schmidt says the MORE information the better, he really means it.

Full article: ZDNet Blogs 

Labels: CEO, Eric Schmidt, Network

Google wins a nude copyright infringement case in the U.S. Federal Court of Appeals.

Google wins and is now able to show thumbnail sized photographs from sexually explicit sites. The Federal court of Appeals lifted the preliminary injunction against Google for showing such images. Though the court did say that the company might be liable for allowing links to such sites displaying unauthorized photographs.

Read more: gameshout.com 

Labels: Copyright, images, lawsuit, thumbnail

Google is overhauling its search system so it returns "universal" results not just those from webpages.

The change means users will also get results from news sites, blogs, video services and other relevant places.

Before now the different categories have been separate which meant searches had to be repeated to pick up all possible results.

The expanded results will be available via a series of tabs that will appear on the results page.

Full article: BBC News 

Labels: blogs, categories, news, service, video

Google co-founder Sergey Brin and long-time sweetheart Anne Wojcicki, herself a biotech entrepreneur, exchanged vows recently in the Bahamas, according to several sources, in an ceremony so hush-hush that it wasn't reported for more than a week, and even the date is uncertain (sometime between May 4 and May 6).

The ceremony combined the unconventional and traditional. The bride and groom and other members of the wedding party wore swimsuits, having swum to an offshore sandbar while other guests took a boat. About 60 guests were in attendance, said guests at the ceremony who requested anonymity.

Full article: MercuryNews.com 

Labels: ceremony, co-founder, hitched, Sergey Brin, wedding

Google went live Wednesday with a revamped Internet search engine that integrates video, books, maps and news into "universal" results to online queries.

Google spent two years transforming the architecture of its search engine to broaden results to include web pages that one had to previously seek out in separate search categories such as "photos" and "news."

"It's all the stuff on the web," said Google's vice president of search products and user experience Marissa Mayer.

Read more: physorg.com 

Labels: books, images, Internet, Maps, news, search, video

Google is exploring ways of further integrating its e-mail and instant messaging services with its hosted productivity applications.

Brains are working overtime at Google Inc. to explore ways of further integrating its e-mail and instant messaging services with its hosted productivity applications.

The intention is to boost the group collaboration capabilities of the Docs & Spreadsheets hosted suite of office productivity applications. Although the suite's word processor, spreadsheet program and upcoming presentations application lack the breadth of features in Word, Excel and PowerPoint, Google believes they offer users benefits over their Microsoft Corp. Office counterparts. Chief among the benefits, Google says, is the ability for workgroups to collaborate, since Docs & Spreadsheets files are hosted by Google and designed for multiple users to view and edit them. Word, Excel and PowerPoint, on the other hand, are desktop PC applications, which makes multiuser collaboration harder, Google argues.

Full article: PCWorld.com 

Labels: docs, Gmail, instant messaging, Spreadsheets

Internet giants Yahoo has announced that they are upgrading their online mapping service as they would now give driving directions in 34 European countries.

This is a major update aimed to take away users of competing services provided by AOL and Google.

Read more: TechWhack.com 

Labels: AOL, Maps, online mapping, services, Yahoo

Bill Richardson intends to call on Americans to give up some of their creature comforts in the name of the environment and energy independency and reconsider their air conditioning, washing machines and the cars they drive when he unveils his energy policy later this week.

During an appearance Monday afternoon at Google headquarters in Mountain View, the New Mexico governor and Democratic presidential aspirant gave a preview of his plan for "a national transformation" driven by community will, massive tax credits and subsidies, and private investment in renewable energy.

Full article: Hispanic Business 

Labels: headquarters, Mountain View, political

Internet giant Google has drawn up plans to compile psychological profiles of millions of web users by covertly monitoring the way they play online games.

The company thinks it can glean information about an individual's preferences and personality type by tracking their online behaviour, which could then be sold to advertisers. Details such as whether a person is more likely to be aggressive, hostile or dishonest could be obtained and stored for future use, it says.

Read more: guardian.co.uk 

Labels: games, monitor, preferences, track, users

Starting Monday, the Defense Department will block access to MySpace, YouTube and a host of other sites on official department computers worldwide, in an effort to boost its network efficiency.

Troops and families living on U.S. bases will still be able to view the sites through private Internet networks, but the move leaves servicemembers in Iraq and Afghanistan who use the popular picture- and video-sharing sites with little or no access to them.

Defense officials said the move is solely a reaction to the heavy drain the streaming video and audio can put on the defense computer network.

Full article: freerepublic.com 

Labels: Defense, MySpace, Troops, video, youtube

SouthPark dedicated an entire episode to the smugness of hybrid car drivers and San Francisco residents in general. The episode is funny because its largely true - Silicon Valley is well known for having a left-leaning, environment-loving population that sometimes feels superior to the rest of the country. They cheered when Al Gore won an Oscar for his movie about global warming, and they are cheering again as some of the largest Internet companies in the valley are jumping very publicly on the “green” bandwagon.

Google and Yahoo in particular seem to be in a race to prove who’s the greenest.

Full article: Techcrunch.com 

Labels: Al Gore, Environment, Silicon Valley, Yahoo

A lawsuit from four years ago has finally been scheduled for trial, and observers are saying it could threaten Google’s revenues like no other legal challenge has so far.

The trademark infringement case stems from a wallpaper reseller’s complaint that Google’s AdWords system lets competitors pay to use other companies’ trademarks to get their ads in front of Internet users.

Read more: itbusinessedge.com 

Labels: ADWords, Judge, lawsuit, trademark, Trial

MARK COLVIN: Google has filed a patent in Europe and the US for a program that could compile psychological profiles of people who play online games.

The Internet giant believes a player's online behaviour may give clues to their personalities and preferences, which advertisers could use to market their products.

But electronic privacy advocates say they fear that the plan is too intrusive, and players are worried it might litter their favourite games with unwanted ads.

Timothy McDonald reports.

Full article: abc.net.au 

Labels: advertisers, Europe, patent, us

Video-sharing website YouTube has agreed to block four clips Thailand says insulted its revered king, the latest twist in a spat that has stirred fierce debate about freedom of expression on the Internet.

However, in a letter to Communications Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom, YouTube owner Google said two other videos that had incurred the wrath of Thailand's military government would stay as they did not break lese majeste laws.

Read more: smh.com.au 

Labels: government, King, Thailand, video, youtube

MOUNTAIN VIEW, California (Reuters)—Google Inc.'s corporate tagline has become "Search, Ads and Apps," reflecting a shift beyond search and advertising into online software applications, its chief executive said on Thursday.
ADVERTISEMENT

Speaking to reporters at the company's headquarters ahead of Google's annual shareholder meeting, Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said his presentation to investors on Thursday afternoon would focus on the three parts of its business.

Full article: eweek.com 

Labels: ads, advertisements, apps, CEO, headquarters

Search engine company Google has already made two huge acquisitions (YouTube and DoubleClick).

The company now aims to accelerate their acquisition spree for faster growth as they are sitting on huge cash reserves.

Google Chief Eric Schmidt said in a statement that they are going to make more acquisitions and some of them can be huge.

Read more: TechWhack 

Labels: acquisitions, company, DoubleClick, Eric Schmidt, youtube

One in 10 web pages scrutinised by search giant Google contained malicious code that could infect a user's PC.

Researchers from the firm surveyed billions of sites, subjecting 4.5 million pages to "in-depth analysis".

About 450,000 were capable of launching so-called "drive-by downloads", sites that install malicious code, such as spyware, without a user's knowledge.

A further 700,000 pages were thought to contain code that could compromise a user's computer, the team report.

Full story: BBC News 

Labels: code, malicious, malware, pages, spyware, Web

A Californian company is in talks with Google to discuss the possibility of providing audio sounds to the search engine giant's Google Earth application.

Bernie Krause, the director of Wild Sanctuary, revealed that his company has archived over 3,500 hours of various sounds, which can be easily used as an add-on with Google Earth. The archive is the result of over 40 years of collecting sounds, which includes over 15,000 animal noises apart from various sounds of habitats such as cities.

Read more: Earthtimes.org 

A court of appeals for the federal circuit has upheld a ruling against a man who sued his former employer for Googling his name before firing him. He had accused his former employer of participating in "ex parte" communications—off-the-record communications that are used to play a part in the final outcome of a decision—that ultimately affected the decision to fire him from his job. However, the three-judge panel ruled that an ex parte communication did not occur in the case when the employer used Google.

The man in question, David Mullins, was a government employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Weather Forecast Office in Indianapolis, IN. Through a series of events, Mullins' employer found that he had misused his government vehicle and government funds for his own purposes—such as sleeping in his car and falsifying hotel documents to receive reimbursements, withdrawing unauthorized amounts of cash from the company card, traveling to destinations sometimes hundreds of miles away from where he was supposed to be (and using his company card to fill up on gas there), and spending company time to visit friends and/or his children. Mullins' supervisor provided a 23-page document listing 102 separate instances of misconduct.

Full story: Ars Technica 

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. -- Google Inc.'s stock price has been lagging the overall market so far, but that didn't seem to bother several hundred mostly festive shareholders who attended the online search leader's annual meeting Thursday.

About the only letdown during the 75-minute session came when Google Chairman Eric Schmidt said the company has no plans to split its stock, reiterating a stand that the board has consistently taken. The question comes up frequently because of Google's lofty stock price, which finished Thursday at $461.47.

Full article: hollywoodreporter.com 

Google Desktop gives you easy access to information on your computer and from the web. It's a desktop search application that provides full text search over your email, computer files, music, photos, chats and web pages that you've viewed. By making your computer searchable, Google Desktop puts your information easily within your reach and frees you from having to manually organize your files, emails and bookmarks. It makes searching your computer as easy as searching the web with Google.

Google Desktop doesn't just help you search your computer; it also helps you gather new information from the web with Sidebar, a new desktop feature that shows you your new email, weather and stock information, personalized news and RSS/Atom feeds, and more. Sidebar is personalized automatically, without any manual configuration required (though you can certainly make your own customizations if you want to).

We've also improved your desktop search experience. With Quick Find, you can now launch applications and see search results as you type without even opening a browser. We've also extended our Outlook integration, so you can search Google Desktop with the Outlook Toolbar and see results within Outlook itself. Finally, you can search even more stuff, including your Gmail, files on network drives, many Outlook data types (including Contacts, Tasks, Calendar, Notes and Journal) and MSN Messenger chats. And if you yearn for even stronger security, you can encrypt your entire index.

Improved Sidebar and Google Gadgets. Add Google Gadgets to customize your desktop and Sidebar, Developers: Create and share your own gadgets.

Requires Windows Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista

Download: Google Desktop 5.1.0705.4505 | Gadgets 

Palm Inc. has introduced a new Palm OS Treo for Sprint- the Treo 755p CDMA smart device. This device happens to be the first ever to offer built-in Microsoft Direct Push Technology email support andGoogle Maps for mobiles. Not only that, the Treo 755p Smart device features the latest Treo design with an integrated antenna, slimmer form factor and mini-SD slot.

With the new Treo 755p smart device, users will have quick, wireless access to the Web, email, business, multimedia applications and instant messaging for Sprint customers, as the Treo 755p smart device runs on the Sprint Mobile Broadband Network.

Read more: techshout.com 

The Thai government decided Thursday not to sue Google Inc., after the Internet search giant promised to remove all anti-monarchy videos from its YouTube.com website, according to media reports.

Information and Communications Technology Minister Sitthichai Pokaiyaudom said he had received an official letter from a Google vice president stating that the US company did not want to promote hostile feelings over the video clips, according to an online Bangkok Post report.

Full article: TMCnet 

The director of a U.S. intelligence agency has cautioned that the government may have to censor satellite images that could be a potential security threat to the country and its armed forces.

The warning came from Vice Admiral Robert Murret, director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which provides security information using satellite imagery.

In an interview with the AP he said," If there was a situation where any imagery products were being used by adversaries to kill Americans, I think we should act."

Full story: webpronews.com 

Pressure group applauds pressure

A Google shareholder has called for the search giant to clean up its act, a move that's been welcomed by Amnesty International.

An advisor to five public pension funds in New York has filed a shareholder proposal calling on Google to adopt a stronger anti-censorship stance. Google has been widely criticised for bowing to pressure from Chinese authorities to remove websites deemed "political" by the Chinese government.

The proposal calls on Google to resist attempts at censorship, tell people when it is censoring search results, and tell people what data it is retaining.

Full story: The Register 

The idea is simple. It’s a globe that sits inside your PC. You point and zoom to anyplace on the planet that you want to explore. Satellite images and local facts zoom into view. Tap into Google search to show local points of interest and facts. Zoom to a specific address to check out an apartment or hotel. View driving directions and even fly along your route. We invite you to try it now.

Google Earth is free for personal use. No registration is required. You may (optionally) choose to upgrade to Google Earth Plus.

Features:

• Free for personal use.
• Sophisticated streaming technology delivers the data to you as you need it.
• Imagery and 3D data depict the entire earth - Terabytes of aerial and satellite imagery depict cities around the world in high-resolution detail.
• Local search lets you search for restaurants, hotels, and even driving directions. Results show in your 3D earth view. Easy to layer multiple searches, save results to folders, and share with others.
• Layers show parks, schools, hospitals, airports, shopping, and more.
• KML – data exchange format let your share useful annotations and view. thousands of data points created by Google Earth users.

Use it for:

-Planning a trip
-Getting driving directions
-Finding a house or apartment
-Finding a local business
-Exploring the world

Download: Google Earth 4.1.7076 Beta Windows 2000/XP/Vista, Mac OS X, Linux 

From one world leader to another

YouTube's not just for clips of Diet Coke and Mentos: Tony Blair has used the video-sharing site to offer his congratulations to new French president Nicholas Sarkozy.

The video, which has been watched over 100,000 times, shows Blair praising his French counterpart and describing him as: "somebody I know well, I like him very much, I respect him, he's a strong leader."

Read more: silicon.com 

Google Inc. has released a redesigned version of its Web analytics tool Google Analytics.

The free enterprise-class tool allows executives, marketers and Web site owners to understand how their users interact with their sites and to maximize their online businesses. Google Analytics also tracks the effectiveness of online marketing initiatives — including display campaigns and cost-per-click programs — and creates e-mail reports that can be scheduled and distributed to colleagues.

Read more: dmnews.com 

Information and Communications Technology Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom said he will press a criminal lawsuit against Google Inc at the Bangkok criminal court on Friday.

The suit will charge that YouTube.com, owned by Google, hosted video clips offensive to the monarchy. It was not clear where Mr Sitthichai will charge the American company with lese majeste, defamation or a cyberlaw violation.

Google has no office in Thailand, although it does business with many Thai-based websites and businesses. The California company established an office in Singapore late last week to try to expand its advertising profile in Southeast Asia. YouTube.com has no offices in Thailand.

A ministry statement on Tuesday said the suit will take the form of "a petition to the criminal court for emergency protection," according to official Thai News AGency.

Full story: BangkokPost.com 

Google claims Viacom’s allegation that YouTube property infringes on copyright holders is “unfounded” under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA).

“Viacom’s complaint in this action challenges the careful balance established by Congress when it enacted the DMCA,” the Google response read. “By seeking to make carriers and hosting providers liable for internet communications, Viacom’s complaint threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment, and political and artistic expression.”

Google lawyer Michael Kwun formally petitioned the judge to dismiss the complaint filed in Federal District Court in Manhattan.

Read more: Adotas.com 

AdWords Editor is Google's free, downloadable account management application for your computer. Download your AdWords account to your computer, make your changes, then upload your revised campaigns. Benefits and features include:

• Navigate your account quickly and easily
• Make bulk changes to keywords and ad text
• Work offline, then upload your changes
• Copy and paste keywords and ad text
• Circulate proposed changes and get feedback

Requires: Windows 2000/XP/Vista, Mac OS X(10.4+)

Download: AdWords Editor 3.5.0 

BANGKOK, May 8 (Xinhua) -- Thailand's Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Ministry was preparing to file a charge against Google in Thailand after it refused to remove video clips that insulted the King of Thailand, a senior official said on Tuesday.

Since April 4 the ministry has blocked access to the YouTube website, owned by Google, after it showed film clips deemed offensive to the monarchy.

Read more: Xinhua 

Microsoft-Yahoo deal may hurt Google ad sales

A potential Microsoft-Yahoo merger probably doesn't have rivals at Google panicking just yet, but if a deal comes off Google may have to worry about its hold on the consumer search and online-advertising markets.

Google's performed well in creating and acquiring technology with audience and advertiser reach, says Yankee Group analyst Jennifer Simpson, while noting Google's purchase of YouTube and internet advertising company DoubleClick.

But if Microsoft and Yahoo officially announce a merger, Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page "might be kept up a little bit at night thinking about how they might improve the platform," Simpson says.

Full article: pcadvisor.co.uk 

Microsoft's proposed merger with Yahoo! shows just how desperate the company has become in its battle with Google.

No matter how much money it throws at its online services, Microsoft can't seem to generate the same buzz that any new Google product attracts. The company has completely revamped Hotmail but it continues to wilt in the shadow of Gmail; Windows Live search is a flashier facsimile of Google search, but is still losing ground on its rival. Even when Microsoft produces superior products, such as the superbly executed Windows Live Maps, it struggles to gain the kudos it merits.

Read more: pcpro.co.uk 

The discussion about a reported merger between Microsoft and Yahoo today has ended. According to unnamed sources cited by the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft broached the merger topic months ago and Yahoo quickly rejected the deal. The deal remains dead.

A Yahoo spokeswoman told internetnews.com the company refused to comment on "rumors or speculation." Microsoft did not respond to requests for comment.

Microsoft's motivation to merge with Yahoo likely stems from a series of Google successes -- its launch of Web-based applications for small businesses, its outbidding of Microsoft for advertising firm DoubleClick and another quarter of spectacular financial results -- has Microsoft hot for Yahoo's Web presence once more.

Full article: internetnews.com 

Media companies are banding together to fight YouTube for illegally publishing their material online, placing more pressure on the company to better monitor the video clips on its site.

The Football Association Premier League Ltd. and Bourne Co. filed a class action lawsuit Friday against YouTube and Google, which acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion last year. The Premier League, which owns the rights to British soccer games, and Bourne, an independent music publisher and the rights owner of such songs as "Let's Fall in Love," are seeking additional copyright holders to join their suit.

Read more: sfgate.com 

Developed for the conceptual stages of design, Google SketchUp is a powerful yet easy-to-learn 3D software tool that combines a simple, yet robust tool-set with an intelligent drawing system that streamlines and simplifies 3D design. From simple to complex, conceptual to realistic, Google SketchUp enables you to build and modify 3D models quickly and easily. If you use Google Earth, Google SketchUp allows you to place your models using real-world coordinates and share them with the world using the Google 3D Warehouse.

With just a few simple tools, you can create 3D models of houses, sheds, decks, home additions, woodworking projects - even space ships.

Google SketchUp is free for personal use. No registration is required.

Download: Google SketchUp 6.0.515 Windows 2000/XP, Mac OS Xnew window 

MOUNTAIN VIEW, California: For all Sen. John McCain's debate preparation, for all the speeches and chestnuts he has polished in his presidential campaigns, he was not ready for the opening question at the Google Interview.

"How do you determine good ways of sorting 1 million 32-bit integers in two megabytes of RAM?" wondered Google chief executive Eric Schmidt. More than 1,000 geeks in the audience roared. A stumped McCain laughed with them.

It was a quirky start to what is becoming a fixture on the presidential campaign — a grilling by the fresh-faced Googlers who are trying to revolutionize the Internet.

Full article: the International Herald Tribune 

Picasa is software that helps you instantly find, edit and share all the pictures on your PC. Every time you open Picasa, it automatically locates all your pictures (even ones you forgot you had) and sorts them into visual albums organized by date with folder names you will recognize. Picasa also makes advanced editing simple by putting one-click fixes and powerful effects at your fingertips.

Picasa also makes it a snap to share your pictures – you can email, print photos at home, and make gift CDs. And with the new Web Albums feature, you can upload your photos to the web with just one click. You can even download your friends’ photos directly back to Picasa on your own computer. It’s never been so easy to share photos online. Now with Picasa Web Albums!

Download: Picasa 2.7.0 Build 36.37 Beta 

Labels: album, photos, picasa, pictures, Software

With gTranslate you can translate any text in a webpage just by selecting and right-clicking over it. The extension uses the Google translation services to translate the text.

gTranslate is not affiliated with Google Inc. in any way.

Download: gTranslate 0.3.1 

Labels: Firefox, gTranslate, translate

To eliminate overlap in services, Yahoo will close its Yahoo Photos service in favor of photo sharing darling Flickr, acquired by Yahoo a little over two years ago and considered by many a pioneer of the Web 2.0 wave of Internet innovation.

“People are changing the way they use photography, and we have decided to shift our focus accordingly. [Digital photography] is evolving from its original purpose as a means to preserve memories into a social activity that allows people to communicate and connect,” a Yahoo spokeswoman said via e-mail.

Full story: Macworld 

NEW YORK - Microsoft Corp. is resuming its pursuit of search engine operator Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news) that could help it better compete with Web search leader Google Inc., published reports said Friday.

Yahoo shares surged more than 18 percent in morning trading.

The New York Post reported Friday that Microsoft has asked Yahoo to enter formal negotiations for an acquisition that could be worth $50 billion. Yahoo's market capitalization was about $38 billion on Thursday.

Read more: Yahoo! News 

Google has opened a new office for South East Asia in Singapore, serving the local market and Southeast Asia. This new office enables Google to more effectively bring its leading advertising platform, services and search experience to users, advertisers and partners in the region. Singapore...

Google has opened a new office for South East Asia in Singapore, serving the local market and Southeast Asia. This new office enables Google to more effectively bring its leading advertising platform, services and search experience to users, advertisers and partners in the region.

Read more: SDA Asia Magazine 

Google Inc. renamed and upgraded its Personalized Home Page this week, but one thing the update couldn't shake was a bug that began upsetting many users last Thursday and persisted until Wednesday.

The bug caused the free service, which lets users turn Google.com into a customized portal, to revert an undetermined number of pages to their default settings or to months-old versions.

The problem rattled users who spend significant time and effort tailoring their Google.com page with syndicated content feeds, as well as with "gadget" applications, to make it their hub for Web content, online services and applications.

Full article: itworld.com 

Cash from cache

Google and Belgian newspaper group Copiepresse have come to an agreement on a minor part of their dispute over copyright, but have not agreed on the major point of difference between them.

Copiepresse members will use an automated system to keep Google from saving its content in its cache, but that is a technical fix that has always been available to the group.

References to the 17 newspapers represented by Copiepresse will return to the normal Google search engine, but their stories will not yet return to the Google News service.

Full article: The Register 

Facing a $1 billion lawsuit from Viacom over copyrighted material distributed on YouTube, Google has claimed it is protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. By hosting content provided by others, the law's Safe Harbor provision protects it from liability so long as they act fast to remove copyrighted content once the owner notifies them, the search giant stated. Viacom refutes that defense.

Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) filed documents with the U.S. District Court Monday, addressing the US$1 billion lawsuit it faces from Viacom (NYSE: VIAb) . In the response, filed in the Southern District of New York, Google contends that it has not violated the rights of the media conglomerate based on a provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), enacted in 1998. Google also alleges that Viacom's lawsuit threatens to derail the phenomenon of user-generated content sites.

Read more: technewsworld.com 

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine announced Monday a first-of-its-kind partnership between Virginia and Google Inc. that makes it easier for citizens to search and find relevant Web-based information and services on Virginia's state government Web sites.

State webmasters, Virginia.gov and Google staff have worked together since January to implement a Sitemap protocol, a standard that enables a Web site owner to better communicate the contents of a site to search engines so that more pages on the Web site are searchable.

Full article: richmond.com 

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - Google feted a group of reporters at its Googleplex campus here to show off its latest efforts in personalization. The new services extend the features of Google's personalized home page service.

The Google personalized home page will now be known as iGoogle and use the same Web address. Google officials said Apple can rest easy though; this is the only service they said they plan to introduce with the "i" prefix.

One new feature slated to go live today on iGoogle is Gadget Maker, currently featuring seven consumer-oriented templates for creating personalized gadgets. To date, Google had made gadgets available only to developers.

Full article: internetnews.com