ok, well dragging the sections still doesn't work for me in any installation of FireFox that I have.
And to follow up on the rant I went off on about the personalized home URL being /ig, to their credit, if you select "personalized home", from then on when you go to google.com, you are automatically redirected to google.com/ig. I still think it would be better to actually integrate the personalized page into the front google.com page, but the redirection is good enough.

But on to the real news of the day - Google Maps is officially dead; it has not fully been enveloped by Google Local. That's why a couple days ago Maps all of a sudden got a new layout, with the map on the right side of the page instead of the left. It was to start the transition into moving it to Local. And the new Google Local is also out of Beta, so that's a good step.

It's also gotten more powerful, though. You can do all the old Google Maps stuff, but now the local searches work much better, and the map interface has gotten richer. Search for Pizza in Raleigh, for example - http://tinyurl.com/cybwm - and you get the listing down the left side and the locations mapped. But the map ballon is more functional now with an "address" tab and a "details" tab, where it pulls information about the location from various sources like citysearch and superpages. In the address tab they've also compiled a "reviews" rating, like they do for their movie pages - http://tinyurl.com/8gwou
I guess for other types of locations you'll get other content specific data.

10/6/2005 11:53:51 AM

^ do you have the google customize extension? try removing that and see if that works

10/6/2005 1:23:27 PM

^ah, you got me. COme to think of it, I don't really use any of the Customize Google features anyways. But that was the problem - I knew that I had seen it work in FF before, but couldn't remember when or under what circumstances.

Also, though, "The Courier-News", a paper in Queensland Australia reports:

Quote :

"INTERNET search engine Google has declared war on Microsoft, announcing plans to launch free spreadsheet and word-processing software online."

I am skeptical of this though, as I have seen no "official announcement" by Google, nor have I seen it reported anywhere else. Much less, the entire rest of the article focuses only on the Google-Sun partnership announcement, and doesn't expand on the supposed announcement of the free Office online version. Either they have some inside information, or it is a zealous reporter or editor jumping the gun (which, of course, we all hope will be true anyway).
http://tinyurl.com/cyo72

10/6/2005 4:15:14 PM

confirmed by inquirer, probably legit.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26734

10/6/2005 10:01:28 PM

well... considering the Inquirer is citing the Courier News a its source, I don't know if that confirms much.

Quote :

"More at the Brisbane Courier Mail, here. µ"

10/7/2005 1:49:23 AM

ok, finally - Google Reader is here - http://www.google.com/reader/things/intro
I'm getting extremely slow load times here in Germany, so i haven't checked it out fully. But from what I've read about it so far it's a slick AJAXed up RSS reader, albeit in beta and quite unpolished. And most disappointing of all so far, it's not integrated with Gmail at all. I really hope that is to come.
I'll play with it and hopefully import all my Bloglines feeds - as I've said several times, I'll dump Bloglines and all their framed-glory in a second if Google introduced a nice reader.

10/7/2005 4:02:06 PM

goddamn son of a bitch. I finally got Reader to work, was in the middle of a long initial-review post, then I went into Reader to check some things and it fucking crashed my browser.

now i'm in no mood to pontificate like I usually do, so here's some initial thoughts -
1) it's very slow so far, and right now it actually returns a server error. I assume it will get better and maybe it's getting more traffic than they expected, but come on guys - they own the largest (or one of) server farms in the world. There's no excuse for Google to set out a public service only to be immediately bogged down.

2) needs more import features. you can import from a downloaded OPML file, which is nice, but it would have been trivial for them to add a feature to import directly from your Bloglines, Yahoo, etc account. Hello - you have $10billion in the bank - put one extra programmer on it for 2 days and be done with it. None of this "beta" feature-incomplete bullshit - you can't hide behind that anymore.

3) I can't find a "mark all as read" feature. I think this is important, especially for a brand new reader where the initial users will be importing dozens/hundreds of feeds, which will initially be displaying thousands of unread posts.

4) From what I can tell right now, there is no link directly to the actually blog post that you are reading. There should always always always be a permalink back to the post on the real blog that you can visit. The blogs are providing RSS as a service for convience (and for revenue for those that have RSS ads), but they still need traffic to go to their actual site. - edit: somehow I missed the " Show original item" link beside each post. that's good.

onto the good - there is a "keep as unread" and Starred (as in gmail) features. THey seem kind of redundant, but I like having the Star system so I can easily mark a post and have a collection of posts I want to come back and read or do something with.
The AJAX business looks pretty good - lot's of smooth sliding menus and stuff. Responsive buttons and links. Like I said it's not integrated into Gmail, except for each post in the dropdown there is a "Gmail this" option that will open a new Compose Window with the post text and a link in the body.

[Edited on October 7, 2005 at 5:03 PM. Reason : original item]

10/7/2005 5:02:30 PM

About it not being integrated into Gmail - apparently some users of Gmail have this little thing at the top of their message list that's called "Webclips", and there is a separate page in the options to configure/disable it...I have yet to see this on either of my accounts, but some people say its been out for months. Do you have it? If so, I wonder if they are linked somehow or maybe there are plans to do this in the future...

10/7/2005 5:14:19 PM

yeah, webclips has been around since spring sometime, but I haven't seen it personally. That was especially one of the reasons so many people though we'd see a Reader introduced directly into Gmail. I was expecting something like an "RSS" or "Webclips" item added to the menu on the left so you could view the blog feeds in the pane on the right side like you do your email (optional though, set to visible through the Settings so it won't clutter the menu up if you don't use it).
It's possible they will give the option to integrate it later - kind of like how they just merged Local and Maps into one service a couple days ago.

Having yet another service tied to a Google Account, though, further underscores the imminent need for Google to solidify what they want the Google Account to represent, and they need to make it seamless to transition between services once signed in. As of now, there are no logical and immediate ways to transition between Gmail, Groups, Personalized Home, Reader, Video, and Shopping. When you go to https://www.google.com/accounts and sign-in (which, for some reason you still have to sign-in again to Google Accounts even when you're already signed into Gmail) you're faced with a pitiful page with some sparse and crappy options on the left side and no way to actually get to the main pages of the services that are linked to your Google Account.

It's obvious that right now Google has a bunch of disjointed development teams who's mission is to "use the Google Account" for sign-in, but with no further direction of how to actually integrate the services into each other. I fear this is out of the continuing charade of Google saying "we're not a portal". Yes, yes you are a portal - now, embrace your portal-ness and start giving us some benefits of it, namely one click access to any Google service, truly single-sign on, and better service integration.

10/7/2005 5:27:57 PM

well my not-so-enthusiastic response to Google Reader appears to be shared by others around the web -
http://google.blognewschannel.com/index.php/archives/2005/10/08/reaction-to-google-reader/

one of the biggest deficiencies they pointed out was that is is difficult/impossible to read large amounts of posts at the same time. With bloglines, I can click on a category header, or just a single blog, and it will list all the stories in one long page so I can scroll down them quickly, read what I want and skip what i'm not interested in. WIth Google Reader, you have to individually click on each post and read it individually. Way too cumbersome and time consuming.
Did they do any actual user testing? I can see if they brought some people in who had never really used RSS readers before and asked how they liked it. But if they had asked a handful of people who use Bloglines or Yahoo or anything, certainly they would have discovered all this. Of course, I imagine most of the engineers working on the product are blog readers, but I guess the usability issue was ignored in favor of creating something "different"

10/9/2005 7:16:54 AM

While everyone has been complaining about Reader, Google silently introduced some new features to My Search History. Now in your search history you can label (i.e. tag) and bookmark your search pages, and add notes and stuff. Then you can view bookmarks by label. This seems to be a direct shot at del.icio.us. If they make it easier to add bookmarks to the list, or the ability to import del.icio.us lists, it would probably surpass del.icio.us pretty easily. Of course, if you could add any old bookmark, the name "My Search History" would no longer be accurate, so they would need to update the name, or create another service called bookmarks or tags or something.

Also, if you add a label called "homepage", anything you add to that label is shown as a "Bookmarks" section on your Personalized home (you have to go to Add Content > My Stuff > Bookmarks)

10/11/2005 4:26:15 AM

in a move that appears to be motivated by the MSN VirtualEarth competition, Google Maps/Local has increased the size of maps to full browser width. Actually, when doing a "find businesses" or "get directions" search, you still have the column of text on the left, but if you're just looking at a map, the column will go away and the map will go full width.

For having full width, I say gg, but 2 things: 1) why not go all the way to the edge of the browser like VirtualEarth does. I kind of like the map running all the way, instead of having the ~8px margin. 2) I'm not sure I'm comfortable with changing map sizes based on the context. Either go all big, or all small, but don't switch back and forth depending on what the user searches for. This doesn't seem like a very well thought out or planned move as far as medium and long term planning for the future of Maps - it seems more like a seat-of-your-pants decision without a full analysis on how it will affect usability and expandability.

10/15/2005 6:11:36 PM

in a move that appears to be motivated by the MSN VirtualEarth competition, Google Maps/Local has increased the size of maps to full browser width. Actually, when doing a "find businesses" or "get directions" search, you still have the column of text on the left, but if you're just looking at a map, the column will go away and the map will go full width.

For having full width, I say gg, but 2 things: 1) why not go all the way to the edge of the browser like VirtualEarth does. I kind of like the map running all the way, instead of having the ~8px margin. 2) I'm not sure I'm comfortable with changing map sizes based on the context. Either go all big, or all small, but don't switch back and forth depending on what the user searches for. This doesn't seem like a very well thought out or planned move as far as medium and long term planning for the future of Maps - it seems more like a seat-of-your-pants decision without a full analysis on how it will affect usability and expandability.

10/15/2005 6:12:10 PM

in a move that appears to be motivated by the MSN VirtualEarth competition, Google Maps/Local has increased the size of maps to full browser width. Actually, when doing a "find businesses" or "get directions" search, you still have the column of text on the left, but if you're just looking at a map, the column will go away and the map will go full width.

For having full width, I say gg, but 2 things: 1) why not go all the way to the edge of the browser like VirtualEarth does. I kind of like the map running all the way, instead of having the ~8px margin. 2) I'm not sure I'm comfortable with changing map sizes based on the context. Either go all big, or all small, but don't switch back and forth depending on what the user searches for. This doesn't seem like a very well thought out or planned move as far as medium and long term planning for the future of Maps - it seems more like a seat-of-your-pants decision without a full analysis on how it will affect usability and expandability.

10/15/2005 11:17:42 PM

hey let's not turn this thread into that type of shenaniganry, thx

[Edited on October 16, 2005 at 1:18 AM. Reason : sp?]

10/16/2005 1:18:22 AM

eh, I was apparently just having a conversation with myself anyways, so whatever.

10/16/2005 4:32:19 AM

yeah it's old but i'm sure some of you haven't seen it:
Google Announces Plan To Destroy All Information It Can't Index http://www.theonion.com/content/node/40076

10/18/2005 1:15:00 AM

i love the onion but it has no place in this thread

10/18/2005 1:15:53 AM

relax, it'll be all right if there's a little humour in here...i promise

10/18/2005 1:21:36 AM

bttt

http://labs.google.com/sets

anyone notice this thing?

10/20/2005 10:38:10 PM

^wasn't that one of the first additions to the search engine like 5 years ago?

10/20/2005 11:35:27 PM

some confusion/speculation about a possible upcoming project - Google Base. The URL base.google.com was live long enough for some people to get some screenshots, but it's dead now.
http://blog.outer-court.com/archive/2005-10-25-n57.html

Looks to be somekind of database where you can upload any kind of files to be searchable (kind of like Video i guess). But also maybe create tables and real database structures that you can access with some kind of SQL. sounds interesting....

10/25/2005 10:12:53 AM

uh-oh.... GWA is back and may cause more problems than before....
http://tinyurl.com/8osqb
http://www.gadgetopia.com/post/4523

10/25/2005 11:00:33 AM

ah damn - busy day at Google. A new feature (or newly noticed, at least):

search for 2 locations, and Google will give you departure adn return text boxes where you can put in travel dates, then direct links to travel websites (expedia, orbitz, etc) to search for flights.
very very nice - that gives you a good and fast starting point rather than going to the pages and filling out all the other bullshit those sites ask for.

for example: my upcoming 1 year wedding anniversary itenerary:
http://www.google.com/search?q=munich+paris

[Edited on October 25, 2005 at 5:31 PM. Reason : .]

10/25/2005 5:30:25 PM

http://www.seweso.com/blog/2005/10/google-base.php


with screenshots

10/26/2005 11:38:16 AM

http://base.google.com

ITS UP RIGHT NOW

10/26/2005 4:12:53 PM

WOULDN'T LET ME LOG IN

10/26/2005 4:14:54 PM

why log in?

its just running a demo right now

i just previewed a page for selling my t-shirts

10/26/2005 4:16:28 PM

How do I see the demo?


I get login fields and forgot your password link.

10/26/2005 4:17:24 PM

don't bother logging in

just go to town

nothing is going to publish

but you can def see how this is going to be a craigslist/ebay threat

10/26/2005 4:19:04 PM

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051025-5480.html

10/26/2005 5:37:36 PM

very interesting

10/26/2005 7:03:09 PM

Quote :

"uh-oh.... GWA is back and may cause more problems than before...."

google is gonna be responsible for the end of the fucking world

10/26/2005 7:22:22 PM

All your base are belong to Google

10/27/2005 1:31:44 PM

Yahoo: WHAT YOU SAY??

10/27/2005 3:20:04 PM

smae here, just login box and forgot password. Whne you go into your account area there is a link but nithing shows up

10/29/2005 2:04:45 AM

finally print is here on google, great for research:
http://print.google.com/

11/3/2005 12:31:19 PM

google print is fucking annoying. well it's not google print itself, but the fact that the pages you want to read are restricted.

i'm not going to buy the book just because there are restricted pages. the book publishers are not going to make money off of me either way so they may as well let me read it online. grrr!

11/4/2005 12:27:38 AM

Quote :

"the book publishers are not going to make money off of me either way so they may as well let me read it online. grrr!"

that's basically the same (unsuccessful) arugument kids have been using for years for stealing music - i'm not going to buy the CD anyway, so you're not losing anything if I download it instead.

anyway, though, we certainly haven't heard the end of the Google vs. Publishers fight. Here's a good short editorial that I'm inclined to agree with - http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051103-5520.html - Ars thinks that Yeah, as copyright laws stand right now, Print is probably illegal, but in the long run this is better for everyone so publishers should jump in line, and Senators should start revising the laws. I think that publishers really are, just like the RIAA and MPAA, missing out on the "big picture". Google is not trying to give anything away for free or overtake the publishing business.

I know some people claim that downloading a free MP3 or two leads a lot of people to "go buy the CD".... I personally don't believe that - i think people who want free music just want free music. But with books I think this is different. Books still are and will generally continue to be a format that people will prefer to read via a physical medium. The book industry needs not worry about rampant book stealing or downloading. Google Print, in its current format, i really believe will lead to increased sales, especially for obscure or non-marketed books.

A somewhat related announcement came from Amazon today too - http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051103-5524.html
I think this is unfornate timing for them. If they were trying to take the spotlight away from Google, they should have known they were going to fail. They should have waited a week or two for the GPrint hullabaloo to settle down, then drop their own bombshell. Anyway, they announced 2 new programs: Amazon Pages allows you to buy only certain parts of a book in electronic form.
Then a really intriguing service called Amazon Upgrade - when you buy a physical book, you will have full access to the book in electronic form via your Amazon account. In short, anything you buy from Amazon, you will be able to access online from any computer, regarless of where the actual book is.

Why the Publishers union isn't making a big stink about this, i don't know. I guess because it has a money-making business model tied directly into it, but it certainly seems like it has the potential to allow large amounts of copyrighted information to be unwittingly let loose, much more so than the rather restrictive GPrint.

[Edited on November 4, 2005 at 10:39 AM. Reason : .]

11/4/2005 10:38:42 AM

here's a NYT article on the Google vs Amazon online book situation -
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/04/technology/04publish.html

One thing that wasn't mentioned before was that there is speculation that Google Print + Google Base + Google Wallet = Direct Amazon Competitor.

11/4/2005 11:23:23 AM

Quote :

"Books still are and will generally continue to be a format that people will prefer to read via a physical medium."

That's the same arguement as "most people would rather have music on a CD, rather than an electronic format like an MP3"....when't the last time you saw someone lugging around a CD player? Memory-based music players are certainly the standard these days, and most people's music purchasing experiences are rapidly shifting over to an electronic-only process. Likewise, books could very well become obsolete in the near future, as more portable electronic readers and tablet PC's mature. Ever heard of e-paper? It's entirely likely that people will prefer to download a book onto a single sheet of e-paper and eliminate the bulky book, much like most people today have eliminated the need to carry around "bulky" CDs.

11/4/2005 12:28:13 PM

yeah, i've heard all those arguments, and yes, i've heard of e-paper. When/If e-paper is produced in a form that truly rivals paper books then yes, the rules of the game will completely change.

But I simply don't buy the CD-MP3 vs. Books-PDF/electronic book story. If in 1993 when peoples cars were overflowing with scratched CDs and they had to carry piles of CDs between their car and their house had someone said "how would you like to have all your music on a small portable device that you can take anywhere, as well as have it replicated on your computer, and you can still have your CDs, or create new ones?", you're telling me you think people would have said "no way, i want to keep my stack of CDs that get scratched, broken and blistered"? People would have jumped all over that, just like they did in 1998-99 when MP3s became popular. The point is that the act of listening to music is exactly the same if you're using an iPod or a Discman.

Reading a book (novel) on a computer screen as it is now (i.e. in a format like PDF), PDA, or tablet PC will never be the same as holding a book. Like Steve Jobs has said over and over again (about watching video - which, of course, he negated by introducing the video ipod....), reading books is an active experience. Therefore it matters greatly on what physical format/medium you use to do the activity. Listening to music is a passive experience, so it doesn't really matter how the music gets to your ears, just as long as it gets there.

You can get eBooks now to read on your PDA/laptop/tablet, but as far as I know they are a failure, and they will continue to be a failure because reading pages of text on a small shiney screen is not enjoyable. If e-paper/e-ink/whatever actually takes off in the next 5-10 years (which I hope it does), I'll eat my words. But until then, which will require some more big advances in hardware and silicon processing, the paper book industry does not need to be threatened by something like Google Print.

11/4/2005 12:52:04 PM

look

you can never enjoy reading a book unless you can toss it around...mark on it...dogear it...or sleep in your bed with it laying on your face.

and whoever said that the paperbook-ebook debate is similar to CD-MP3 debate...he's dumb.

11/4/2005 12:54:54 PM

Quote :

"Listening to music is a passive experience, so it doesn't really matter how the music gets to your ears, just as long as it gets there. "

Very true. However, audiobooks have changed 'reading' into a passive experience as well.

Quote :

"If e-paper/e-ink/whatever actually takes off in the next 5-10 years (which I hope it does), I'll eat my words."

That's pretty much the point I'm trying to make...all indications suggest it will reach maturity within this amount of time, and when it does, it will be superior to the traditional methods of reading. Obviously, the current methods of acquiring and reading e-books are awkward at best, but you can't count out something that's still in development.

Quote :

"and whoever said that the paperbook-ebook debate is similar to CD-MP3 debate...he's dumb."

Remember "640K ought to be enough for anybody"? Times change, buddy. You cannot tell me for certain what will or will not be commonplace in 5-10 years; besides, someone who gives money to random hobos on the streets has no room to call others dumb

11/4/2005 2:13:56 PM

ummm dude

Everyone knows that reading something on screen isn't as good as reading something with your head bowed down.

ou can do that with PDAs...but you cannot curl a PDA or throw it around.

And bringing the 640kb comment in here is again stupid. We aren't discussing limitations...we are discussing practicality here. Listening to music is a very stupid example because there was never a debate about CDs sounding better than MP3s...music is music.

Reading is interactive.

11/4/2005 2:29:05 PM

i'm gonna agree with the "actual book" people

hell, sometimes i won't even read a book if it has the wrong type paper or print

if i can find a better spaced, or a crisper font, or a softer page, i will pay the extra money

i would almost certainly NEVER read a whole book on a computer tablet....

[Edited on November 4, 2005 at 2:32 PM. Reason : `]

11/4/2005 2:31:32 PM

Studies have proved that reading something with your head looking straight doesn't arouse the same level of concentration as reading something with your head bowed down.

If only people did some research before arguing.

11/4/2005 2:33:21 PM

Quote :

"Everyone knows that reading something on screen isn't as good as reading something with your head bowed down. ou can do that with PDAs...but you cannot curl a PDA or throw it around."

christ, you really are a fucktard. why someone has to be able to "curl" or "throw [books] around" i have no idea, but e-paper can do both of those.

you guys are only considering CURRENT technology as the means for which one can read material. yes, vertical monitors/tablets/laptops/e-readers are awkward as hell. we have covered that point. do some research into exactly what e-paper is (and is being developed as)...i'm not going to explain but once you do, you might see why I think it will be completely plausible to read e-books just as comfortably as paper books

11/4/2005 2:43:41 PM

I know all about e-book...and did a research project with Xerox Corporation.

All I am saying is that your comparisons are inherently stupid...

Besides, e-paper is still a PDA screen...not to mention that I personally see more uses in BillBoards and signs rather than you and me taking it to school in our bookbags because hey the hard drives to store all that data are suddenly as good as real books.

11/4/2005 2:46:04 PM

e-paper is not a pda screen

e-paper is a paperlike medium that uses electronic charges to arrange electronic ink. it'll revolutionize boooks, newspapers, magazines, etc

the thing I reallly DON'T like about the idea is that if something bad happens to our energy infrastructure, and we don't print books anymore, we'll lose everything.

11/4/2005 3:11:33 PM