Yahoo! supports OpenSocial; Yahoo!, MySpace and Google to form non-profit OpenSocial Foundation
Yahoo!, MySpace, and Google today announced they have agreed to form the OpenSocial Foundation to ensure the neutrality and longevity of OpenSocial as an open, community-governed specification for building social applications across the web. Yahoo!’s support of OpenSocial and role as a founding member of the new foundation are landmarks for the rapidly growing specification which will now offer developers the potential to connect with more than 500 million people worldwide.
The OpenSocial Foundation will be an independent non-profit entity with a formal intellectual property and governance framework; related assets will be assigned to the new organization by July 1, 2008. The foundation will provide transparency and operational guidelines around technology, documentation, intellectual property, and other issues related to the evolution of the OpenSocial platform, while also ensuring all stakeholders share influence over its future direction.
“Yahoo! believes in supporting community-driven industry specifications and expects that OpenSocial will fuel innovation and make the web more relevant and more enjoyable to millions of users,” said Wade Chambers, Vice President – Platforms, Yahoo!. “Our support builds on similar efforts with the OpenID community and will expand the opportunity for developers and publishers to benefit from an open and increasingly social web.”
Source- Google press Release
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Expandable Google Search Box
If you entered long queries in a Google search box, you would notice that it’s difficult to edit them because Google optimized the size of the box for short queries. Things have changed and now you can much bigger queries and Google will adjust the search box’s size after you perform a search.
Google limits queries to 32 words, but most people don’t need that many words. The average number of words in a Google query was 4 at the end of 2007.
Source: Google Operating System Blog
Google unveils "white space" airwaves plans
Google Inc on Monday unveiled plans for a new generation of wireless devices to operate on soon-to-be-vacant television airwaves, and sought to alleviate fears that this might interfere with TV broadcasts or wireless microphones.
In comments filed with the Federal Communications Commission, the Internet leader outlined plans for low-power devices that use local wireless airwaves to access the "white space" between television channels. A Google executive called the plan "Wi-Fi 2.0 or Wi-Fi on steroids."
"The airwaves can provide huge economic and social gains if used more efficiently …," Google said in the comments.
Rick Whitt, Google’s Washington telecom and media counsel, said this class of Wi-Fi devices could eventually offer data transmission speeds of billions of bits per second — far faster than the millions of bits per second available on most current broadband networks. Consumers could watch movies on wireless devices and do other things that are currently difficult on slower networks.
The white-space airwaves could become available in February 2009, when TV broadcasters switch from analog to digital signals. Whitt said he expects devices using white-space spectrum could be available by the end of 2009.
Shares of Google surged $27.36, or 6.3 percent, to $460.91 amid a sharp rise in U.S. stock markets. The Nasdaq composite index was up 3.3 percent.
Google sees the white-space spectrum as a natural place to operate a new class of phones and wireless devices based on Android, Google’s software that a variety of major equipment makers plan to use to build Internet-ready phones.
The Silicon Valley company also said that, in general, it stands to benefit whenever consumers have easier access to the Internet. Google’s primary business is selling online ads as people perform Web searches.
Source- Reuters
Google to unveil new ad service for publishers
Web search giant Google Inc plans to unveil a new service that Web publishers can use to manage their online ad sales and serve up ads each time a consumer pulls up a Web page, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.
The new Ad Manager service will provide the ad service free, said the Journal.
Google is hoping that Ad Manager users will agree to carry some ads Google sells in any vacant ad spots on their own Web sites, and Google would take a commission on revenue from any ads it sells, said the report.
Source- Reuters
Microsoft to Expand Investment in Desktop Virtualization With Acquisition of Kidaro
Microsoft Corp. today announced its intended acquisition of Kidaro, a leading provider of desktop virtualization solutions for enterprises. In combining Kidaro’s virtualization technology with its suite of desktop management tools, known as the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack for Software Assurance, Microsoft will enable IT professionals to optimize their desktop infrastructure by providing management capabilities for Virtual PCs, streamlining deployments and easing application compatibility issues.
“The acquisition of Kidaro is an important component of our virtualization strategy, and it delivers a powerful new tool to help enterprise customers optimize their desktops,” said Shanen Boettcher, general manager of Windows product management at Microsoft. “Virtual PCs can help businesses address a number of challenges around application compatibility, mobility and business continuity. Kidaro’s seamless user interface and management capabilities allow enterprises to more easily use and manage Virtual PCs. Incorporating Kidaro’s innovative solutions into the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack further enables virtualization across the enterprise, and is another example of how we are helping customers keep up with the changing needs of their business.”
Source- Microsoft Press Release
EU approves Google’s DoubleClick bid
European Union regulators on Tuesday cleared Google Inc.’s $3.1 billion bid for online ad tracker DoubleClick, saying it won’t curb competition for online ads.
The approval clears the last major hurdle for a deal the U.S. Department of Justice approved in December, overruling complaints from rivals Yahoo Inc.and Microsoft Corp.and from advertisers and privacy advocates claiming the purchase gave Google too much control over the online ad market.
But the European Commission dismissed the objections, saying it found no proof that Google and DoubleClick would be able to marginalize competitors because Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL provided "credible" alternatives for placing ads on Web sites.
Google and DoubleClick are not currently rivals, it said, and Google’s purchase of even a potential competitor would not have an adverse impact on competition in the online ad market.
Regulators said their decision was based exclusively on the economic aspects of the deal and it had no bearing on the companies’ obligations under EU rules on personal privacy protection or how personal data is processed.
European data privacy regulators are currently examining how far search engines’ data protection policies comply with existing EU law and are due to publish a report in April. They said last month that rules would also apply to search engines headquartered outside Europe.
New York-based DoubleClick helps its customers place and track online advertising, including search ads, which Google — more than its nearest search competitors Yahoo and Microsoft — has turned into a lucrative business. It places ads on Web pages that targeted consumers are likely to use, generating money for smaller publishers and lesser-visited pages.
Source- CNNMoney.com
Google Health to launch today!!
Their has been news on the net that Google health is going to be released today.Even the Associated Press is now reporting that it recently learned from the Cleveland Clinic that Google Health will finally begin its pilot today.So,hope to see it in action today
Here is what the associated press reads-
The pilot project to be announced Thursday will involve 1,500 to 10,000 patients at the Cleveland Clinic who volunteered to an electronic transfer of their personal health records so they can be retrieved through Google’s new service, which won’t be open to the general public.
And this is by Tony Ruscoe, Blogoscoped
Early hints surfaced almost two years ago when I found a service called M Scrapbook (presumably short for “Medical Scrapbook”) which later changed its name to “Weaver”. Since then, we’ve seen some leaked screenshots and found more login pages. But the Associated Press is now reporting that it recently learned from the Cleveland Clinic that Google Health will finally begin its pilot today.
Google Asks U.S. School Kids to "Doodle 4 Google"
Today, Google announced the launch of "Doodle 4 Google," a competition that invites school children to design a Google logo inspired by the question, "What If…?" The winning student’s doodle will be displayed on the Google homepage on May 22, 2008; the champion "doodler" will also win a $10,000 college scholarship and a $25,000 technology grant for his/her school.
The "Doodle 4 Google" competition is open to K-12 students in the U.S. Participating classrooms can use accompanying lesson plans to help guide students, while also integrating the project into classroom learning. Suggested questions will help students start dreaming and doodling: "What if…I could see into the future? What if….I could build any kind of invention I wanted?"
Sample Doodles
"Finding engaging projects that are aligned with core curricula and state standards is hard," said Kevin Jarrett, an elementary teacher from New Jersey. "The Doodle 4 Google contest is a winner because it builds on the intersections of art, science, social studies and language arts, captures the imagination of students, and provides them with an opportunity to share their creativity with the world."
Students’ doodles will be judged on artistic merit, creativity, representation of the theme, and other criteria. A panel of independent judges and Google employees will select the top doodles across age groups, from which the public will help select the final four. The grand prize winner will then be selected by Google and announced at an event hosted at Google’s headquarters on May 21, 2008. The doodle will be displayed on the Google homepage the following day.
Source- Google Press Release
