googleblogging

Google Earth helps discover rare hominid ancestor in South Africa

2010-04-08T21:54:00.000-07:00

Today, scientists announced a new hominid fossil discovery in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site in South Africa. The discovery is one of the most significant palaeoanthropological discoveries in recent times, revealing at least two partial hominid skeletons in remarkable condition, dating to between 1.78 and 1.95 million years. We are especially excited because Google Earth played a role in its discovery.

So how did this come about? Back in March 2008, Professor Lee Berger from Witswatersrand University in Johannesburg started to use Google Earth to map various known caves and fossil deposits identified by him and his colleagues over the past several decades, as it seemed the ideal platform by which to share information with other scientists. In addition, he also used Google Earth to locate new fossil deposits by learning to identify what cave sites looked like in satellite images.

At the beginning of this project, there were approximately 130 known cave sites in the region and around 20 fossil deposits. With the help of the navigation facility and high-resolution satellite imagery in Google Earth, Professor Berger went on to find almost 500 previously unidentified caves and fossil sites, even though the area is one of the most explored in Africa. One of these fossil sites yielded the remarkable discovery of a new species, Australopithecus sediba. This species was an upright walker that shared many physical traits with the earliest known species of the genus homo - and its introduction into the fossil record might answer some key questions about our earliest ancestry in Africa.

We're absolutely thrilled about this announcement, and delighted that our free mapping tools such as Google Earth and Google Maps continue to enable both individuals and distinguished scientists to explore and learn about their world. With these tools, places both foreign and familiar can be explored with the click of a mouse, allowing for new understandings of geography, topology, urbanism, development, architecture and the environment. Our efforts to organize the world's geographic information are ongoing - but at the end of the day, seeing the way these tools are put to use is what most inspires us.

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/google-earth-helps-discover-rare.html

Google Code Jam 2010 registration now open

2010-04-07T01:44:00.000-07:00

Let's say that you have x different stocks, and the plots of their prices over time. You want to print them in newspaper, printing multiple plots on the same chart to save space. But here's the catch: no two plots on the same chart can overlap, lest the readers be confused. Look at the plots and figure out the smallest number of charts required.

Looking for a challenge like the riddle above? And I mean an exciting brain-twisting and turning kind of challenge. I mean competing with fellow coders from around the world for top bragging rights kind of challenge.

Since 2003, we've brought you our annual Google Code Jam - a competition in which professional and student programmers from all around the world solve tough algorithmic challenges in a limited amount of time. Last year's 23,000 contestants vied for the title of Google Code Jam champion. After five rounds and some furious typing, China's Lou Tiancheng (code-named ACRush) was named champion.

Sound like the challenge for you? Well registration is now open. And you can try your hand at problems from previous competitions and get up to speed with the rules. We recommend that you practice hard - Code Jam is not for the weak of heart! And, this year we've decided to take the show on the road - for the very first time, the final competition will take place in Google's Dublin office.

The qualification round starts on May 7, 2010 and after four rounds of online competition, the top 25 competitors will be flown to Dublin to match wits for the $5,000 first prize - and, of course, the title of Code Jam champion!

P.S. Have you solved our "Stock Charts" problem yet? Test your solution on the Code Jam website.

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/google-code-jam-2010-registration-now.html

Google Model Your Town Competition: Cast your vote!

2010-04-06T00:41:00.000-07:00

The first-ever Google Model Your Town Competition has entered the public voting phase. It's now up to you to help decide which of the five finalist towns should be the overall winner. Cast your vote before May 1.

Barranco (Lima, Peru)

Braunschweig (Niedersachsen, Germany)

Donostia - San Sebastián (Gipuzkoa, Spain)

Dursley (Gloucestershire, United Kingdom)

West Palm Beach (Florida, United States)

These five teams used Google SketchUp and Google Building Maker to create beautifully detailed 3D models of their communities - and now they're viewable in Google Earth by everyone in the world. To see all of the towns who entered the competition, check out the Google 3D Warehouse collection.

The winning town will receive an event hosted by Google in their honor, US $10,000 for their local schools and more. Don't forget to vote by May 1, and we’ll announce the winning town by May 15.

And if you're interested in learning how you can model your town, check out our Your World in 3D website for examples and other tools to help you get started.

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/model-your-town-competition-cast-your.html

Google TV is Coming to a Living Room close to You

2010-03-18T00:08:00.000-07:00

Not too long ago we got word that Google is working on a TV search project with Dish Network, and now there's all indication the search giant wants even more direct involvement with the television ecosystem. According to the New York Times, they're partnering with Intel and Sony in a new Android-based platform literally dubbed Google TV.

The new set-top box will allow users to surf online video from the comforts of the couch, and will compete with the likes of the Popbox and the Boxee Box we got our hands on at CES this year, the Roku set-top device, and to a few extent video game consoles that have the ability to stream content from Netflix, Amazon Video on Demand, and others. Beyond straight up video, the idea is to give users an interface to access popular social web sites like Twitter and browse photos on sharing sites like Google-owned Picasa on their TVs as well.

As with Android itself, Google TV will probable be an open source platform, with Sony stepping up to manufacture the first hardware that will run it - likely including both set-top boxes and internet-connected TVs. In the meantime, peripherals manufacturer Logitech is reportedly working on accessories for Google TV devices like a remote control with a small keyboard.

The project is reported to be a few months in already, though without official commentary from Google itself the news technically remains in rumor status.

Finding awesome stuff online with Google Reader Play

2010-03-11T22:28:00.000-08:00

I use Google Reader a lot - not only to stay on top of the news, but also to find interesting blog posts and articles. I'm always telling my friends about Google Reader, and while some of them love it, others don't want to take the time to set it up. For those of you who fall into this second category, we're announcing Google Reader Play, a new product that makes the best stuff in Reader more accessible for everyone. Reader Play is a new way to browse interesting stuff on the web, customized to the topics you're interested in, with no setup required.

Items in Reader Play are presented one at a time, and images and videos are automatically enlarged to maximize the viewing experience. We use the technology behind Recommended Items in Reader to populate Reader Play with the most interesting content on the web. While you don't need a Google account to use Reader Play, your experience will be personalized if you sign in. As you browse, you can let us know which items you enjoy by clicking the "like" button, and we'll use that info to show you other content we think you'll enjoy.

We think Reader Play is a fun way to browse interesting items online that you wouldn't find otherwise. We designed it especially for people who don't want to spend time curating their own set of feeds - but folks who already use Reader can easily use it to read their feeds as well. Just click the feed settings menu on any feed in Reader and select "View in Reader Play." We're launching Reader Play as an experiment in Google Labs so that we can test it out, get feedback from you and then improve it as quickly as possible. Visit google.com/reader/play to give it a try, and let us know what you think!

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/03/finding-awesome-stuff-online-with.html

Google welcomes Picnik

2010-03-01T20:55:00.000-08:00

More than ever before, people are sharing and storing their photos online. But until recently, you had to edit your photos using client software on your computer. Today, we're excited to announce that Google has acquired Picnik, one of the first sites to bring photo editing to the cloud. Using Picnik, you can crop, do touch-ups and add cool effects to your photos, all without leaving your web browser.

We're not announcing any significant changes to Picnik today, though we'll be working hard on integration and new features. As well, we'd like to continue supporting all existing Picnik partners so that users will continue to be able to add their photos from other photo sharing sites, make edits in the cloud and then save and share to all relevant networks.

We're very impressed with the Picnik team and the product they've created, and we're excited to welcome them to Google. We're looking forward to collaborating closely with them to improve the online photo editing experience on the web. In the meantime, we encourage you to head to Picnik, import some of your photos from Picasa Web Albums, Flickr or Facebook and try your hand at photo editing in the cloud!

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/03/google-welcomes-picnik.html

Google Launches Powerful Mobile Shopping Application for Android

2010-02-25T22:57:00.000-08:00

Google has now rolled out "Google Shopper," a new mobile application for Android devices that offers a variety of different ways to search for products.

In addition to basic search functionality, users can search by voice, take a picture of cover art, or scan a bar code to get detailed product information and the price comparison. Google introduces this application on its website and in the video below.

As AndroidAndMe notes, the app obviously competes with the likes of ShopSavvy, who tells the publication that Google [and Amazon] "are and always have been our biggest competitors."

Google could deal a much stronger blow to the upstart by including Shopper - now a Labs product - with new Android handsets. We also don't see why Google wouldn't extend the application to other mobile platforms as well.

Google Goggles to Translate Text captured in Photos

2010-02-18T00:06:00.000-08:00

At the Mobile World Congress, Google CEO Eric Schmidt showed off a new prototype of Google Goggles - Google's experimental Android visual search application - that can easily translate text captured in photos.

The prototype uses Google's machine translation technology and image recognition capabilities to create an extra layer of useful context. So should the user take a photo from his Android device, the application can easily translate the text in that photo - though right now it only supports German-to-English translations.

Here's how Google explain the process:

"You may question what's happening in the background. On the very simplest level, this prototype connects the phone's camera to an optical character recognition (OCR) engine, recognizes the image as text and then translates that text into English with Google Translate."

You can't get your hands on updated application yet, and Google is being coy about when it will release an update, but you can expect the application to eventually support photo-to-text translation in all of the 52 languages supported by Google Translate.

Once translation makes its way into Google Goggles we can only imagine how helpful the application could become to travelers looking to quickly translate menu items, street signs and transit information.

Google Gives $2 Million to Wikipedia's Foundation

2010-02-17T01:45:00.000-08:00

Google has opened up and doing its charity wallet once again. This time, the search giant has donated $2 Million to the Wikimedia Foundation, the organization that runs and maintains Wikipedia.

The donation, in true social media fashion, was announced via tweets from Wikimedia Foundation advisory board member Mitch Kapor and Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales. Neither Wikimedia Foundation nor Google the have made an official announcement yet - it's supposed to come tomorrow.

The donation's absolutely in line with Google's generosity to foundations that promote a faster and more open web. However, we think it's very interesting that Google is giving money to the Wikimedia Foundation now, only a year and a half after the search giant launched its own Wikipedia killer, Google Knol.

Back then, we said it was doomed to fail, and so far Knol's stagnation has proven us correct. Is this a sign that Google's abandoned the project and is embracing Wikipedia as the web's center for knowledge? Hopefully we'll get a few answers tomorrow.

Introducing Google Buzz

2010-02-09T20:35:00.000-08:00

We've blogged before about our thoughts on the social web, steps we've taken to add social features to our products, and efforts like OpenSocial that propose common tools for building social apps. With more and more communication happening online, the social web has exploded as the primary way to share interesting stuff, tell the world what you're up to in real-time and stay more connected to more people. In today's world of status messages, tweets and update streams, it's increasingly tough to sort through it all, much less engage in meaningful conversations.

Our belief is that organizing the social information on the web - finding relevance in the noise - has become a large-scale challenge, one that Google's experience in organizing information can help solve. We've recently launched innovations like real-time search and Social Search, and today we're taking another big step with the introduction of a new product, Google Buzz.

Google Buzz is a new way to start conversations about the things you find interesting. It's built right into Gmail, so you don't have to peck out an entirely new set of friends from scratch - it just works. If you think about it, there's always been a big social network underlying Gmail. Buzz brings this network to the surface by automatically setting you up to follow the people you email and chat with the most. We focused on building an easy-to-use sharing experience that richly integrates photos, videos and links, and makes it easy to share publicly or privately (so you don't have to use different tools to share with different audiences). Plus, Buzz integrates tightly with your existing Gmail inbox, so you're sure to see the stuff that matters most as it happens in real time.

We're rolling out Buzz to all Gmail accounts over the next few days, so if you don't see it in your account yet, check back soon. We also plan to make Google Buzz available to businesses and schools using Google Apps, with added features for sharing within organizations.

On your phone, Google Buzz is much more than just a small screen version of the desktop experience. Mobile devices add an important component to sharing: location. Posts tagged with geographical information have an extra dimension of context - the answer to the question "where were you when you shared this?" can communicate so much. And when viewed in aggregate, the posts about a particular location can paint an extremely rich picture of that place. Check out the Mobile Blog for more info about all of the ways to use Buzz on your phone, from a new mobile web app to a Buzz layer in Google Maps for mobile.

We've relied on other services' openness in order to build Buzz (you can connect Flickr and Twitter from Buzz in Gmail), and Buzz itself is not designed to be a closed system. Our goal is to make Buzz a fully open and distributed platform for conversations. We're building on a suite of open protocols to create a complete read/write developer API, and we invite developers to join us on Google Code to see what is available today and to learn more about how to participate.

We really hope you enjoy the experiences we've built within Gmail and for mobile phones. If you want to learn more, visit buzz.google.com. We look forward to continuing to evolve and improve Google Buzz based on your feedback.

Ref Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/02/introducing-google-buzz.html

TOUCHDOWN: Google's Super Bowl Ad

2010-02-08T23:10:00.001-08:00

The rumors were right: Google took the bold step of running a Super Bowl ad in the third quarter of the game today, marking its first main push into TV advertising and a new frontier of marketing for the company that has triumphed in online ads above all else.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt's Tweet hinted at the ad yesterday, reading: "Can't wait to watch the Superbowl tomorrow. Be sure to watch the ads in the third quarter (someone said 'Hell has indeed frozen over.')"

Google-enthused designer collections

2010-02-07T23:24:00.000-08:00

Every year, Vogue and the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) sponsor a Fashion Fund to support emerging designers. In 2009, every participating designer was asked to create a one-of-a-kind item inspired by Google in some way - whether through our logo's colors, technology or our commitment to equal access to information. Last October, Google transformed 10 of the finalists' designs into iGoogle Artists themes. While Google loved seeing fashion meet iGoogle, they wanted to see these pieces in person - and wear them! Now, they're debuting three of our favorite designs from this challenge. These three featured designers have customized their original designs for a broader audience, and they're making them available to the public to purchase for a limited time.

Doodle 4 Google - Tell us what you would do if you could do anything...

2010-02-03T01:00:00.000-08:00

Today, we're excited to announce our third annual Doodle 4 Google contest in the U.S. Google doodles, created by our talented team of doodlers, have helped us celebrate events and anniversaries from Van Gogh's birthday to Valentine's Day. And since 2008, Doodle 4 Google has given K-12 kids the opportunity to create their own logo and have it displayed on the Google homepage for hundreds of millions of users to enjoy for a day.

In addition to the winner's art appearing on Google.com on May 27, 2010, they'll also receive a $15,000 college scholarship, a laptop computer and a $25,000 technology grant for their school.

This year's theme is "If I Could Do Anything, I Would..." and it's all about pushing the limits, dreaming big, and seeing what you can accomplish in life. When coming up with inspiration for this year's contest, we turned to some of our very own Googlers, including Ed Lu, a former astronaut.

Ed typifies this year's theme in action, and shares an inspiring anecdote:

On my first mission STS-84, one of my crewmates and I were having dinner aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis. After all our work for the day was done, we decided to eat "upside down" on the ceiling, gazing out at the Earth moving by below our feet. As we flew around the Earth, watching the continents go by, my crewmate remarked how amazingly large the Earth really is. But at that same time, it also felt small to us. There we were, flying at 18,000 miles per hour around the Earth in a machine built by humans, with a crew made up of astronauts from all over the world. Both of our observations were true at the same time. The world is indeed a big place with many challenges. But by using science, technology and the power of people working together, nearly anything is possible.

So dream big! If you could do anything, what would you do?

For even more inspiration, you can see last year's winner, Christin Engelberth, a sixth grader at Bernard Harris Middle School in San Antonio, Texas. She titled her doodle "A New Beginning" to express her wish that "out of the current crisis, discoveries will be found to help the Earth prosper once more."

We're happy to let you know that this year, we've also assembled a panel of well-known "Expert Jurors," including creative directors, cartoonists and famous animators ranging from Sesame Workshop to Pixar Animation Studios. Our Expert Jurors will help us narrow down the cream of the crop to 40 regional finalists, who will come to the Google office in New York City on May 26, 2010. For the second year, we'll also be partnering with the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, where the top 40 regional finalists will get to have their artwork displayed in a national exhibit. And for the first time this year, we'll give out eight Technology Booster awards to schools that submit maximum number of doodles per school by March 10th and have students in our 400 State Finalists.

Please visit the official competition website for a full listing of all contest rules and requirements. Only students from registered schools can enter, so be sure your school is registered by March 17, 2010. All doodles must be submitted by March 31, 2010.

We hope you're as excited about this year's contest as we are. Good luck!

RefLink: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/02/doodle-4-google-tell-us-what-you-would.html

Google's Privacy Principles

2010-01-28T21:45:00.000-08:00

Thursday, January 28th marks International Data Privacy Day. We're recognizing this day by publicly publishing our guiding Privacy Principles.

Use information to provide our users with valuable products and services.

Develop products that reflect strong privacy standards and practices.

Make the collection of personal information transparent.

Give users meaningful choices to protect their privacy.

Be a responsible steward of the information we hold.

We've always operated with these principles in mind. Now, we're just putting them in writing so you have a better understanding of how we think about these issues from a product perspective. Like our design and software guidelines, these privacy principles are designed to guide the decisions we make when we create new technologies. They are one of the key reasons our engineers have worked on new privacy-enhancing initiatives and features like the Google Dashboard, the Ads Preferences Manager and the Data Liberation Front. And there is more in store for 2010.

You can find out more about our efforts at the Google Privacy Center and on our YouTube channel.

Ref Link:http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/googles-privacy-principles.html

Hillary Clinton tells China Should Investigate Google Attacks

2010-01-22T22:29:00.000-08:00

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's promised speech on Internet freedom took place last morning. Clinton called for China to "conduct a thorough review of the cyber intrusions" that Google implied were conducted by Chinese government against human rights activists.

A small background: In response to the cyber attacks, Google said that it may shut down Google.cn and its Chinese offices if it can't strike a deal with the Chinese government to run an uncensored search engine. The circumstances might also threaten Google Android's place in China's cell phone market.

China is already censoring the news reports about the Google situation within its borders. Its representatives have said that it doesn't need the conflict between it and Google to be "over interpreted," and that this incident shouldn't affect its relationship with the United States. Hillary Clinton does not agree. "Countries or individuals that engage in cyber attacks should face consequences and international condemnation," she said.

Clinton's speech also addressed some other issues, (indirectly) including Iran's decision to censor Twitter and Facebook in the wake of the country's election crisis. She announced that the United States will spend more million dollars on initiatives to protect Internet freedom around the world.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt: We're Hugely Optimistic About the Internet

2010-01-21T22:54:00.000-08:00

Google's been investing heavily in its future over the past quarter, both in the form of main acquisitions and new product launches.

Today, the company is out with its recent earnings report, with the results indicating that the economy may indeed be recovering, and the company's CEO Eric Schmidt painting a bullish picture on Google's future prospects.

Here are some of the highlights:

Google's income for the quarter jumped 17% year-over-year to $6.67 billion.

Google grew its cash position to $24.5 billion - up from the $22 billion it reported previous quarter.

Google's headcount increased slightly during the quarter to nearly 20,000 employees in worldwide. That's significant given the company was forced to create the first cutbacks in its history during the worst of the economic downturn.

As for the 2010, Eric Schmidt offered the following statement: "We remain hugely optimistic about the Internet and are continuing to invest heavily in technological innovation for the benefit not only of our users and customers, but also the wider web." With $24 billion in cash, expect those investments to include more acquisitions, as well as further spending on huge projects including handsets, the Chrome OS and even potentially tablet computers.

Wall Street doesn't seem to be sharing Schmidt's optimism, however, in the instant aftermath of the numbers - shares of Google are trading down about $30/share after hours, or about 5%.

Google Releases New High-Resolution Satellite Images of Haiti

2010-01-20T22:08:00.000-08:00

Google has released new, higher-resolution satellite images of the Port-au-Prince area of Haiti that was devastated by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on January 12.

The new impressively detailed photos were taken on Sunday, January 17 and have resolution of around six inches, according to Google. You can see the full set of images in Google Maps in the Satellite mode.

Last week, Google and GeoEye released a set of satellite images of Haiti taken on January 13, just a day after the earthquake, along with earlier images of the area from 2008.

Google is working to create the new imagery available as a layer in Google Earth as well. An updated Haiti earthquake layer for Google Earth is presently available with images from multiple sources as well as maps, including earthquake epicenters.

Google to show live IPL Matches on YouTube

2010-01-19T22:56:00.000-08:00

YouTube will begin live-streaming Indian Premier League cricket matches from 12th March. It's possible that the matches will be viewable in countries like the United States that don't presently have a place to watch IPL matches on traditional TV.

YouTube has been a destination for both the lPL (Indian Premier League) and live streaming before, just not at the same time. It streamed U2's Rose Bowl concert to ten million viewers across seven continents last year, and there's an IPL cricket channel that shows pre-recorded highlights from league matches.

Live sports coverage has been one of the greatest reasons to keep those cable or satellite subscriptions, so YouTube moving into this area could be an additional step towards the dominance of Internet-based TV. There have really been live-streaming options for sports online before; they just usually come with subscription fees. For example, ESPN Insider members have the access to live streams of much of what the network of sports channels covers.

Martin Luther King Day Logos From Google & Others

2010-01-18T22:29:00.000-08:00

Every year, search engines post special logos for Martin Luther King, Jr. This year is no different, we have logos from Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask.com and others. MLK, Martin Luther Kind, Jr wants no explanation. It is a legal US holiday and a day celebrated by many around the world. And here are the logos:

Google's MLK Logo:

Yahoo's Flash MLK logo:

Bing's MLK Theme:

Ask.com's MLK Theme:

DogPile.com MLK Theme:

Survey the Damage in Haiti With Google Earth

2010-01-14T23:48:00.001-08:00

Now you can get a satellite's-eye view of the devastation in Haiti with Google Earth. Google worked with satellite imaging company GeoEye to put together a map layer file that provides up-close views of the wreckage of government buildings and extra in the Haitian capital city of Port-au-Prince.

Download the file to check it. It's in KML format, and it should load in Google Earth automatically if you have that desktop application installed. Alternatively, you can just pull it up in the web-based Google Maps application.

If you switch the layer on and off for some before-and-after perspective, you'll see just how serious the damage is - as if the pictures circulating on Twitter and additional places on the Internet weren't harrowing enough already. Here's an embed with the data to create things even easier.

Real Time Ads Coming to Google Street View?

2010-01-12T23:02:00.000-08:00

Imagine this: You're strolling virtually through your favorite Google Street View destination, when abruptly you notice an animated ad on one of the billboards beside the street. "Buy product X," it beckons you, replacing the obsolete ad that was initially on the billboard when the Google Street View car took the picture.

This might extremely well turn into a reality. Google has been granted a copyright named "Claiming Real Estate in Panoramic or 3D Mapping Environments for Advertising," detailing "techniques for identifying groups of features in an online geographic view of a real property and replacing and/or augmenting the groups of features with advertisement."

The idea is ingenious, truly. Most of those obsolete ads on billboards serve very small purpose in the virtual world of Street View, but if one could replace them with up-to-date advertisements, they could be another source of income for the giant from Mountain View.

Of course, there's a jungle of legal obstacles that Google would have to solve before really going through with this. Who owns the virtual billboards? And what about the companies who paid for the original ads on them? ReadWriteWeb points out a few of the possible issues, but one thing is certain: Google's strategy of amassing virtual real estate will pay off in one direction or another.

Near Me Now: Google's Mobile Homepage is Location Conscious

2010-01-11T02:27:00.000-08:00

Go to Google.com in your iPhone or Android browser and you'll see a little new addition to the homepage: a tiny Near Me Now option below the search box. The new functionality turns your location into an automated search query and makes finding or learning about places in your instant vicinity a no-brainer.

The U.S.-only functionality uses GPS on your device to pinpoint your whereabouts and sort nearby results - right on the www.Google.com mobile homepage - into the following functional categories: Explore right here, coffee shops, restaurants, bars, and ATMs and banks.

Actually, the "Explore right here option" serves up an instant drop-down menu, providing you with results that are literally right in front of you. You'll immediately get a fast glance at a venue's Place Page rating and its distance from you. As a result, the simple and smart addition to the mobile Google experience is bound to be both a large time saver and a boon for Place Pages.

It's no mystery that Google is trying to attack mobile location-based services and customer review web sites like Foursquare and Yelp head-on, and actively promote its Place Pages. This update is natural progression to help it do just that. We do have to wonder, however, as to why the functionality isn't a part of Google Mobile app yet.

Flash Player on Google's Nexus One

2010-01-06T22:18:00.000-08:00

If you're an iPhone owner, you probably don't need to hear about Flash. Full support for Adobe's rich media technology has been promised for the iPhone several times, but it's still not there yet.

However, if you plan on getting the Google's Nexus One, you'll be one of the first users to be able try out Flash Player 10.1, currently in beta.

Adobe posted a video showing the latest Flash Player happily working on the Google's Nexus One. It can be used to browse Flash-heavy web sites and play online games, but it can also be used to deliver Flash-based ads. From what we can see in the video, Google Nexus One's powerful Snapdragon CPU handles Flash with ease.

The Year in Review Captured On a Google Wave

2009-12-22T03:34:00.000-08:00

From the same folks at Whirled Interactive who brought us the superbly funny "Pulp Wave Fiction" comes one more intelligent use of Google Wave as a video production medium - this time it's used to encapsulate the year in news and social media.

In "Waving Goodbye to 2009," embedded after the break, that we see a Google Wave rendition of the year's most memorable moments. From Obama inauguration to the Iran elections, from Susan Boyle to Kanye West, the video highlights the best - and worst - moments of 2009.

Google Wishes you Happy Holidays

2009-12-21T01:40:00.000-08:00

Google has recently been prone to changing its own logo, often turning it into a series of doodles with a riddle attached. It seems we're about to see another series of logo changes, but this time their purpose is fairly easy to discover.

If you've visited Google today, you may have noticed that Google home page logo has turned into a holiday postcard. Clicking on it leads to a "Happy Holidays" landing page, with the present logo listed as the first in a series.