More Hints at Google’s Social Strategy

Even before all of this Google “social layer” talk started, we talked about how Google already had many of the components of a powerful social network – just spread out across different products. Basically, there just hasn’t been an effective way of bringing it all together for users.

Putting The Pieces Together

It looks like Google is trying to correct that, as various hints have been revealed over the last few months – the navigation bar, the updated profile, and the Google accounts for YouTube users are a few that come quickly to mind.

It appears that Google is more adamantly promoting (or inserting, rather) the Google Profile in more of its services.

MG Siegler points to a note left on the Google Groups message board, saying, “Google Groups-specific profiles will no longer be supported. Instead, you will be able to use the new Google Groups to (optionally) link your new and improved Google profile with your groups. Starting July 1st 2011, you will not be able to make changes to your Groups profile. Your profile information will be available for export from your profile page until November 1st 2011. This change will not affect the nicknames you might have chosen for yourself to participate in groups. It will only affect the custom profile fields, such as your photo, location, and occupation.

One more example of things being more tied together.

Going Public

He also points to the following message in the Google Profiles Help Center, as previously pointed out by The Next Web:

The purpose of Google Profiles is to enable you to manage your online identity. Today, nearly all Google Profiles are public. We believe that using Google Profiles to help people find and connect with you online is how the product is best used. Private profiles don’t allow this, so we have decided to require all profiles to be public.

Improving Search?

That’s a very significant factor of all of this as well. We have to wonder if this won’t backfire in some Google Buzz-like privacy backlash, but it will certainly ensure that content there will be discoverable – by users, and perhaps more importantly to Google – by its search index.

You know how Google won’t do much in the way of connecting with your Facebook account? That hurts it in search (one area where Bing has an edge and Facebook itself could become a dangerous threat). Remember when Google CEO Eric Schmidt said they’d find other ways to get that data? This may have been at least part of what he was referring to. Of course that involves people using the profiles, but we’ll see how that goes.

Google’s Profile Message continues:

Keep in mind that your full name is the only required information that will be displayed on your profile; you’ll be able to edit or remove any other information that you don’t want to share.

If you currently have a private profile but you do not wish to make your profile public, you can delete your profile. Or, you can simply do nothing. All private profiles will be deleted after July 31, 2011.

The Components of a Good Social Network

So let’s look at some of the components that when brought together would give Google more of a social network-like experience:

1. Google Buzz – The Newsfeed
2. Google Profiles – The Wall
3. Picasa Web Albums – Photos
4. YouTube – Videos
5. Google Music (pending) – Music
6. Android/The Android Maket – The platform and means to obtain apps usage (including games)
7. Chrome/Chrome OS/Chrome Extensions Gallery/Chrome Web Store – Same as Above
8. Google Latitude – Location-based service/Check-Ins
9. Blogger – Blogs (More open version of Facebook Notes)
10. Gmail – Email, Chat, Video Chat
11. Google Calendar – Event organization
12. Search – important to any social network
13. Google Docs and Google Wave (tech still could appear in other services) – Group collaboration
14. Google Apps – Getting it used internally at businesses and schools
15. Aardvark – Q&A
16. Google Reader – Easily Follow news sources and share links
17. Knol – Wiki-like content to provide information pages about subjects (note: not wiki-exactly, but certainly a competitor to the information pages on Facebook)

The list goes on…

All of this can be expanded upon and promoted in Google’s most powerful product – search. Google also continues to rapidly acquire new companies, which will no doubt fuel the strategy even more.

The bringing together of all of these assets in a thoughtful and useful way will be critical, which is probably why it’s taking so long. Google’s not rushing this, because it could have a huge impact on the company’s whole future going forward. Much of it is about staying on the cutting edge of web technology – the biggest area where Google has to compete with Facebook. Facebook is taking away a great deal of engineering talent that might have once gone to Google instead (or in many cases actually came from Google) – much how Google was doing to Microsoft a decade ago.

Google has been criticized for its social efforts a lot over the years. With Larry Page taking the helm again, and reportedly looking to get back to the more startup-like atmosphere that Google had in its early days, there is another fascinating element of which we just don’t know the pending impact.

More Hints at Google’s Social Strategy

Even before all of this Google “social layer” talk started, we talked about how Google already had many of the components of a powerful social network – just spread out across different products. Basically, there just hasn’t been an effective way of bringing it all together for users.

Putting The Pieces Together

It looks like Google is trying to correct that, as various hints have been revealed over the last few months – the navigation bar, the updated profile, and the Google accounts for YouTube users are a few that come quickly to mind.

It appears that Google is more adamantly promoting (or inserting, rather) the Google Profile in more of its services.

MG Siegler points to a note left on the Google Groups message board, saying, “Google Groups-specific profiles will no longer be supported. Instead, you will be able to use the new Google Groups to (optionally) link your new and improved Google profile with your groups. Starting July 1st 2011, you will not be able to make changes to your Groups profile. Your profile information will be available for export from your profile page until November 1st 2011. This change will not affect the nicknames you might have chosen for yourself to participate in groups. It will only affect the custom profile fields, such as your photo, location, and occupation.

One more example of things being more tied together.

Going Public

He also points to the following message in the Google Profiles Help Center, as previously pointed out by The Next Web:

The purpose of Google Profiles is to enable you to manage your online identity. Today, nearly all Google Profiles are public. We believe that using Google Profiles to help people find and connect with you online is how the product is best used. Private profiles don’t allow this, so we have decided to require all profiles to be public.

Improving Search?

That’s a very significant factor of all of this as well. We have to wonder if this won’t backfire in some Google Buzz-like privacy backlash, but it will certainly ensure that content there will be discoverable – by users, and perhaps more importantly to Google – by its search index.

You know how Google won’t do much in the way of connecting with your Facebook account? That hurts it in search (one area where Bing has an edge and Facebook itself could become a dangerous threat). Remember when Google CEO Eric Schmidt said they’d find other ways to get that data? This may have been at least part of what he was referring to. Of course that involves people using the profiles, but we’ll see how that goes.

Google’s Profile Message continues:

Keep in mind that your full name is the only required information that will be displayed on your profile; you’ll be able to edit or remove any other information that you don’t want to share.

If you currently have a private profile but you do not wish to make your profile public, you can delete your profile. Or, you can simply do nothing. All private profiles will be deleted after July 31, 2011.

The Components of a Good Social Network

So let’s look at some of the components that when brought together would give Google more of a social network-like experience:

1. Google Buzz – The Newsfeed
2. Google Profiles – The Wall
3. Picasa Web Albums – Photos
4. YouTube – Videos
5. Google Music (pending) – Music
6. Android/The Android Maket – The platform and means to obtain apps usage (including games)
7. Chrome/Chrome OS/Chrome Extensions Gallery/Chrome Web Store – Same as Above
8. Google Latitude – Location-based service/Check-Ins
9. Blogger – Blogs (More open version of Facebook Notes)
10. Gmail – Email, Chat, Video Chat
11. Google Calendar – Event organization
12. Search – important to any social network
13. Google Docs and Google Wave (tech still could appear in other services) – Group collaboration
14. Google Apps – Getting it used internally at businesses and schools
15. Aardvark – Q&A
16. Google Reader – Easily Follow news sources and share links
17. Knol – Wiki-like content to provide information pages about subjects (note: not wiki-exactly, but certainly a competitor to the information pages on Facebook)

The list goes on…

All of this can be expanded upon and promoted in Google’s most powerful product – search. Google also continues to rapidly acquire new companies, which will no doubt fuel the strategy even more.

The bringing together of all of these assets in a thoughtful and useful way will be critical, which is probably why it’s taking so long. Google’s not rushing this, because it could have a huge impact on the company’s whole future going forward. Much of it is about staying on the cutting edge of web technology – the biggest area where Google has to compete with Facebook. Facebook is taking away a great deal of engineering talent that might have once gone to Google instead (or in many cases actually came from Google) – much how Google was doing to Microsoft a decade ago.

Google has been criticized for its social efforts a lot over the years. With Larry Page taking the helm again, and reportedly looking to get back to the more startup-like atmosphere that Google had in its early days, there is another fascinating element of which we just don’t know the pending impact.

Has Groupon Peaked?

You’ve got to wonder how things would be looking if Groupon had agreed to be acquired by Google when it had the chance. Groupon has been taking the world by storm, and has been considered one of the hottest startups of the past year or so. Lots of other companies are catching on to Groupon’s game, however, and it’s looking less likely than any one company – Groupon included – will be able to “own” the deals space.

In a recent article, we looked at how new deals sites are popping up in all kinds of markets and verticals, and businesses are more than happy to spread their advertising dollars around among different ones. Google is said to have offered as much as $6 billion for Groupon, and a lot of people were shocked that they turned it down, let alone that Google would offer that much in the first place.

Should Groupon have sold to Google? Tell us what you think.

It must be quite the interesting time for Groupon.  Not only is their President and COO Rob Solomon on the way out, but the company might be planning an IPO as well as expanding in Palo Alto.  After reports that U.S. revenues were down 30% in February, more bad news comes today via Yipit, a popular site that aggregates and recommends daily deals.

According to Yipit, they ran some numbers from their database and found that Groupon is having a worse March than it did February, down 32% this month.  Yipit suggests that the decline could possibly be caused by people simply being tired of wading through big deals, but that wouldn’t explain why LivingSocial is up 59% this month.  That’s right, according to Yipit, they have pulled virtually even with Groupon in terms of revenues in the top 20 markets.  Here is the graph they show:

What could be causing this shift in where people get their daily deals?  Yipit suggests that since 25 millions people now use LivingSocial,  people are using multiple services with regularity.  It could also be due to Groupon’s targeting of specific deals for specific zips codes in large metro areas.  These deals might be tailored to an specific area but not be as desirable as the general daily deals that people are used to.  It could also be a demographic issue:

Young, single-oriented Groupon has 68% of subscribers between the ages of 18 to 34, while 64% of LivingSocial’s is 34 and above. Groupon’s competitors may have a broader appeal as the Daily Deal universe expand beyond young singles.

Google will emerge in the Deals space. Make no mistake. In fact, Google’s Marissa Mayer recently spoke about how Google already has some Groupon-like products. Then there’s Facebook. Foursquare is also doing some very interesting things for local businesses (CEO Dennis Crowley has not ruled out a potential partnership with Google either). Bing, Yahoo, and others are looking at more of a deal aggregation approach, so consumers don’t have to rely on any one deals provider. Groupon will most likely continue to remain relevant, but they may find the playing field much more level. That goes for LivingSocial too, by the way. They’ve been doing a lot of TV advertising, and have done a good job of growing their brand, but if Groupon can’t “own” the deals space, it’s hard to see why LivingSocial “can”.

The fact of the matter is that there are plenty of businesses looking to give deals to customers, and there are plenty of services that will get them in front of people.

With expanding competition in the deals market, can Groupon remain the leader? Share your thoughts.

Has Groupon Peaked?

You’ve got to wonder how things would be looking if Groupon had agreed to be acquired by Google when it had the chance. Groupon has been taking the world by storm, and has been considered one of the hottest startups of the past year or so. Lots of other companies are catching on to Groupon’s game, however, and it’s looking less likely than any one company – Groupon included – will be able to “own” the deals space.

In a recent article, we looked at how new deals sites are popping up in all kinds of markets and verticals, and businesses are more than happy to spread their advertising dollars around among different ones. Google is said to have offered as much as $6 billion for Groupon, and a lot of people were shocked that they turned it down, let alone that Google would offer that much in the first place.

Should Groupon have sold to Google? Tell us what you think.

It must be quite the interesting time for Groupon.  Not only is their President and COO Rob Solomon on the way out, but the company might be planning an IPO as well as expanding in Palo Alto.  After reports that U.S. revenues were down 30% in February, more bad news comes today via Yipit, a popular site that aggregates and recommends daily deals.

According to Yipit, they ran some numbers from their database and found that Groupon is having a worse March than it did February, down 32% this month.  Yipit suggests that the decline could possibly be caused by people simply being tired of wading through big deals, but that wouldn’t explain why LivingSocial is up 59% this month.  That’s right, according to Yipit, they have pulled virtually even with Groupon in terms of revenues in the top 20 markets.  Here is the graph they show:

What could be causing this shift in where people get their daily deals?  Yipit suggests that since 25 millions people now use LivingSocial,  people are using multiple services with regularity.  It could also be due to Groupon’s targeting of specific deals for specific zips codes in large metro areas.  These deals might be tailored to an specific area but not be as desirable as the general daily deals that people are used to.  It could also be a demographic issue:

Young, single-oriented Groupon has 68% of subscribers between the ages of 18 to 34, while 64% of LivingSocial’s is 34 and above. Groupon’s competitors may have a broader appeal as the Daily Deal universe expand beyond young singles.

Google will emerge in the Deals space. Make no mistake. In fact, Google’s Marissa Mayer recently spoke about how Google already has some Groupon-like products. Then there’s Facebook. Foursquare is also doing some very interesting things for local businesses (CEO Dennis Crowley has not ruled out a potential partnership with Google either). Bing, Yahoo, and others are looking at more of a deal aggregation approach, so consumers don’t have to rely on any one deals provider. Groupon will most likely continue to remain relevant, but they may find the playing field much more level. That goes for LivingSocial too, by the way. They’ve been doing a lot of TV advertising, and have done a good job of growing their brand, but if Groupon can’t “own” the deals space, it’s hard to see why LivingSocial “can”.

The fact of the matter is that there are plenty of businesses looking to give deals to customers, and there are plenty of services that will get them in front of people.

With expanding competition in the deals market, can Groupon remain the leader? Share your thoughts.

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-FP7 Review

class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-55028" src="http://www.arabmobilenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/4a65b__Unknown-2.jpeg" alt="" width="270" height="187" />/> Okay, so first the veritable stuff, the camera looks nerveless, it’s very slender, has a sheeny front panel and easy fits in a pocket or purse. It enjoys 16 megapixel resolution. It comes packed with a four-times zoom for a little up near action and a pretty antiphonal 3.5-inch LCD touchscreen to page through your photos and change your camera settings. But, purchase the unexampled Panasonic Lumix DMC-FP7 digital camera, and you’ll find that it makes you stare better, literally.

Using built-in Beauty Retouch modes, this camera actually has the ability to soften some wrinkle, reduce shine, whiten your teeth and give you a rosy glow all with the touch of a button. The DMC-FP7‘s make-up mode gives you color options such as foundation, eye-shadow or coloring for the lips and cheeks. Seriously? Will this sucker make me 10 pounds thinner too?

The DMC-FP7 is the perfect camera, for your perfect life. You don’t ever have to take a badly picture again, now if we tin just find a camera that will make my house bigger, my car shinier and my husband have more hair, I tinning start sending some pictures to some friends I haven’t seen since eminent school.

Available now for pre-order from www.amazon.com, for under $ 230.00 bucks. Now I’m actually ready for my close up!

 

Source:  www.panasonic.net

 

 

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Sprint’s HTC EVO 3D have kickstand?

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Screen Protector for iPhone 4

rel="nofollow" href="http://www.amazon.com/Fosmon-Transparent-Screen-Protector-Cleaning/dp/B003RZTCWC%3FSubscriptionId=AKIAJI55PTUV6RZRWXUA&tag=downtbeiru-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B003RZTCWC">Fosmon Transparent Clear Screen Protector for iPhone 4 4G HD with Lint Cleaning Cloth – 3 Pack

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• 3 X Crystal clear screen Protector for Apple iPhone 4th Generation
• Can be removed and washed for reuse, leaves no residue!
• Perfect fit: precisely engineered to fit your phone perfectly
• Protect your screen from dust, scratches, smudges
• Please note, this is an aftermarket item. It is NOT manufactured by Apple.

Fosmon Transparent Clear Screen Protector for iPhone 4 4G HD with Lint Cleaning Cloth – 3 Pack

 

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