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Published: Mon, 14 July 2008, 07:16, also tagged: technology, internet, search, search engines, statistics, google trends, swastika, 卐, ǝlƃooƃ, ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ʞɔnɟ
Manipulation of the Google Trends query rankings seems easy as pie. On the 13th of July Google Trends top ten search terms included “ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ʞɔnɟ”. This is shortly after the swastika making an appearance.
Google states that a single post on a large forum community (4Chan) was the cause of the “卐” appearance:
Published: Thu, 10 July 2008, 14:37, also tagged: internet, search, statistics, hindu, nazi germany, google trends, swastika, 卐
Many blogs and news sources are reporting the swastika symbol was a top search term on Google Trends for a brief period. Google seem to have rectified the issue with the swastika no longer in the top searches list.
The swastika 卐 has innocent meanings as a Hindu symbol and negative connotations via the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany and the adoption of the symbol to represent Nazism.
The appearance of the swastika in the top searches list in my opinion appears to be spam via some kind of sophisticated manipulation. I’m not sure Google will issue information regarding its appearance, but nevertheless it’s very strange. The fact that a search for “卐” now produces:
Published: Tue, 8 July 2008, 17:01, also tagged: games, technology, internet, social networking, messaging, virtual worlds, second life, instant messaging, social software, avatars, google talk, gtalk, lively, google lively
Google today has launched a new service named Lively. Google Lively provides users interactive avatars on top of the Google Talk (GTalk) instant messaging platform.
Lively works through a browser plug-in that is currently only available for Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox on Microsoft Windows. The Lively browser plug-in allows the service to be embedded directly into web pages.
Second Life and other such competing services might be in for a tough time – although in its current form Google Lively doesn’t consist of a single world, each room is individually created by a user, so for now virtual worlds with a central world aren’t direct competition. It does seem very feasible that future iterations of Google Lively will have a central world where users can interact.
Published: Sat, 14 June 2008, 06:04, also tagged: business, technology, msft, internet, microsoft, search, yahoo, advertising, goog, money, finance, yhoo
Negotiations between Microsoft and Yahoo! are now finally over and now Yahoo! has stepping into bed with Google in an advertising partnership.
Not only did Yahoo! sabotage the original Microsoft acquisition bid (by creating an unattractive severance plan for staff and being suggestive of an advertising deal with Google) they also turned down a new deal that would see Microsoft purchasing $8 Billion of Yahoo! stock at $35 per share and purchase Yahoo!’s search and advertising businesses for $1 Billion with partnership with Yahoo! which would see them see improved returns on advertising supplied by Microsoft.
The original bid by Microsoft was very generous, the last one, not so much.
Published: Tue, 13 May 2008, 06:47, also tagged: technology, microsoft, software, microsoft research, google earth, jim gray, worldwide telescope, google sky, wwt, visual experience engine
Microsoft has released “WorldWide Telescope”, a fascinating product from the Microsoft Research group.
Synopsis from Microsoft Research:
“The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a Web 2.0 visualization software environment that enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world for a seamless exploration of the universe.”