blending the mix

Techcrunch reports that Microsoft may be first to launch online storage and NOT Google. Rumours are flying that the much-vaunted Google GDrive will not be ready until 2007, to allow them to work on a way to provide it for free, giving Microsoft time to launch an early version, tagged along with their growing “Live” range of products.

I like the idea of having online storage. I use my backpack account frequently to enable me to track websie development progress as well as the office mvoe as well as the changes to the showroom . I like using Google Calendar to enable me to log on (in a time of total chaos) to any computer anywhere and see what is going on…but still have a hang up about giving Microsoft my personal, sensitive and sometimes financial information.

OK, I don’t have to use it, but the benefits of freedom to travel are immense. BUT, if IE is such an easy target for hackers, why would my MS data be any better protected?

TechCrunch reports on the now live Google Calendar. And what a GREAT product this is. I have used hipCal a few times but never managed to get everything running in Firefox perfectly, nor did it have such an attractive UI (although the hippo is kind of cute!)
GCal or Google Calendar (take your pic tagsters!) is attractive logical (layout and operation) and above-all FAST. Mouseovers are as instant as a desktop application and pop-ups are not much slower!

Public events on public calendars (holidays or sales meetings) can have comments added, guests can be invited, keep track of your calendar of interest via RSS (XML). For me what is the greatest benefit is that other calendars can be integrated into yours so that other dates you would otherwise assume filofax would put in your printed agenda (easter break, bank holidays etc.) - see below:

What makes this feature doubly useful is that I can also search for other events of interest to me that may have Google Calendars and include them - i.e. the england versus india cricket schedule!:

The Key features (thanks again to techcrunch for the features list):

• Text recognition - In adding an event, or detecting a new event from Gmail, Calendar automatically detects event-specific words and suggests the adding of a new event with data auto-structured.
• Manage Multiple Calendars - set up multiple calendars (work, personal, etc) and view them separately or together.
• Heavy Gmail integration - Gmail recognizes when messages include event information, so when you get emailed about an event, you can add it to Google Calendar with just a couple clicks. Google Calendar links on the right side of the Gmail page.
• Sharing - Calendars can be shared with others, and you can subscribe to others’ shared calendars. Read/write permissions can be granted on a per user basis. Calendars can be published via a web page or via RSS, so readers do not need to be on the Google Calendar platform.
• Importing - You can import events from other calendar programs, including Yahoo Calendar and Microsoft Outlook. Click “Settings,” then “Import Calendar”.
• Calendar Search

Technorati Tags: GCal, Google Calendar, Gmail

Inside Google reports on the failure this week of the potentially exciting Goole Print Advertising scheme.

Google bought up ad space in a variety of publications at bulk prices, then auctioned them off to the highest bidders.

In one instance, $177,000 of ad space sold for $4,000…how can that ad up?!!

In principle, it is a great idea…limit supply by buying up space, then force prices higher by actioning it all off to the highest bidder(s).

IG suggests that they should wait until the marklet is more comfortable with buying this way, but to be honest I am not sure if it ever will.

Here is why:

1) Schedule - Planners have a responsibility to their clients to know when an ad is going to be published. To find out you have not bid enough is too late to then fuind other vital space.

2) Price - with so much pressure from online media, print spend needs to be more carefully accounted for. To find out you have paid more for your spot on auction than you would have over the phone is criminal.

3) Tradition - rates are spots are improved over time with the development of the relationship between the agency (typically) and publication staff. Google does not allow for this and as a result, meaning flexible negotiations do not exist.

4) Creative limits - Your ad may be best run across a series of high-profile publications over several weeks, which involves a sequence of carefully planned creative executions as well as the knowledge that you will be in those publications. Budget changes, outbidding means much more than lost space.

It is without doubt a meritous scheme for one-off campaigns but I think the advertising industry is so (read: too) comfortable with the way it works at the moment that it is going to have to take an almighty leap of faith or improvement in the system for it to take off.

Merrell Ligons has a truly interesting post about Google’s posting of a wi-fi advertising patent - which could revolutionise the growth and use of wi-fi worldwide.

I honestly think that wifi growth is being slowed by loborious paid-for sign-up processes which in turn limits the willingness for companies to invest in the technology - therefore limiting coverage.

If sign-up was free (subsidised by ads), then there will without doubt be an explosion of demand from both users AND local advertisers willing to cash in.

Assuming the hotspot “hosts” receive a cut of the ad revenue cake for investing in the technology, then this could be the single-most important factor in taking wifi mainstream.

Marketeers, get your thinking caps on! Google Local is one thing when at your desktop, but being local when in the locality is quite another.

Powerful? Imagine being able to tie-in a hot-spot coffee house purchase with a discounted lunch at your restaurant around the corner…or being able to offer a discounted paper or magazine that the user may have picked up at the coffee house…or even a promotional offer from your around the corner cd shop for the music being played in the coffee house…

Mega-powerful…lunchtime special offers that pop-up as the user is at the computer…watch them walk over with their laptops in hand in response to your timed offers…as Merrell says…a Minority Report world is not too far away - fuelled largely by Google’s advertising-led revenue generation!

Technorati Tags: wi-fi, wifi, Google Local, Google

Welcome to iRows, surely a hot contender for Google’s next office application acquisition?!

It has all the great features you would expect from an excel-style application with, I have to admit, great speed:

iRows Looks good and surely one of the missing links from Google’s expanding desktop office suite. Thanks to Steve Rubel for the link.

Technorati Tags: iRows, Google

A BBC article here quotes 3 main reasons why Google does not want to comply with the government’s request for data:

1) Why should it do the Governent’s work for it - if the government want to see how easy it is to find porn, simply type sex into any search engine!

2) It wants to protect its product - by ensuring no government source can get access to understand Google’s workings!

3) It wants to show the world it is serious about consumer privacy - AND THIS IS THE CRUX!

The success of recent acquisition Writely, as well as well-known and much-used online products such as Gmail, Gchat, Google Reader etc. all rests on the ability of Google to present itself as a secure, reliable and above-all confidential data host.

Consumers mind less about the “Google-snooping” which allows them to place the contextual ads in these features as long as they know it is safe.

Whilst the government’s requirements are in a different area, most lay-people will no doubt be put off by hearing that the government is now snooping into Google UNLESS it can defy them and stand up for itself.

Technorati Tags: Google, Writely, Gmail, Gchat, Google Reader