I was logging into my GMail account when I noticed this note…

Now you can talk in GMail
Chat - Send instant messages from directly within GMail. When you go to your inbox, you’ll be online.

Status - See when others are online and let them know when you’re online, away, busy, tired, whatever.

History - Chats can be just like emails. Save them, search for them–never lose important chats again.

Cool little tweak from Google, which if you think about can be very crucial in reviving a relative bust, GTalk, to becoming a major competitor in the IM game by incorporating the immensely successful GMail.

One cool thing I noticed from this is that it automatically loads everybody that you have sent e-mails to through GMail with two options, Mail or Invite to chat, which I find extremely well done and convenient. The Invite to chat option by itself should substantially help increase the GTalk community. Nice job by Google, I’ll be trying GTalk now…

While surfing the web, I found this screenshot of Yahoo’s beta homepage design.

This new design should be a great hit, it removes the cluttered feel of the current homepage, with a nice navigation bar to the left which is marked with icons instead of the old directory style middle of the homepage plain text link navigation they currently have in place.

I also love the clean light colors and the metallic blocks look, not to mention the placement and look of the advertising.

It’s a pretty ironic that while Google keeps coming out with functionally better and better programs, Yahoo is the one that gets more and more popular with the average web user by bring out something shinier and shinier. Seems like functionality and style rarely mix, but don’t make any mistake about it both are essential, if only we could have a Yoogle, until then I will keep Yahoo as my homepage while I search through my Google Toolbar and check my GMail – MSN must be lonely, it has neither functionality nor style.

You can now use GMail on your own domain name. You will now be able to get the GMail’s standard 2GBs of space and software for your own domain (ex.emil@thirdsquare.com).

The service is currently in beta and you need to fill out this questionnaire and then wait to be accepted into the testing of the service, but it seems like it is worth the wait.

Some rumors about this service suspect that you will be able to replace the AdSense ads in the mail interface with your own, and in effect get AdSense revenue through offering e-mail on your domain. I would think this is a much better idea then the FireFox and AdSense referrals, in all sense it is a win-win, you get less load on your server and make some money while Google adds another leg to the AdSense empire and expends it’s GMail program to another notch above it’s competitors.

I had an interesting experience the other day that points out just how strong an influence the Great Google PR has in some webmasters lives.

I provide a free list of web directories for webmasters to submit their sites to. The list is designed to make it easy for webmasters to quickly find and submit to a large number of directories. Most directory owners like this because I send visitors their way every day. The visitor likes it because it saves them time. I like it when they click on some adsence along the way. Everyone is happy.
Read on …

Some of you might be aware of the fact that Google’s Blogger Team has been erasing blogspot blogs in an attempt to clean up their very own neighborhood and get rid of spammy, self-serving and useless weblogs which have solely been created in order to generate adsense revenue as well as accounts which have been abused to spam other weblogs that are run by blogger. This is something more than understandable and commendable. Blog spam has been rampant ever since blogger has been created, and it’s simply too easy for anyone to create his/her own blog for free, go out there and spam forums, guestbooks, other blogs as well as directories.
Now there are other reports that Google is also deleting blogspot blogs which are using techniques of interlinking the blogs, something that could be interpreted as spammy seo tactics. Here is an example that you can read up on on Digitalpoint and here is something that blogger has put up in order to respond somewhat to those allegations:

A Help Page without help.

The bloggers that I am aware of have lost their entire content from the free blogspot blog. The question is not whether they were doing something wrong or not, but whether anyone can take down your blog and not let you recover your content.
My question is if those measurements are legal?

Owners of blogs are busy writing and creating content and the quality is sometimes questionable. But does that give anyone the right to simply take it away from you without a warning? The Blogger Help Page avoids the issue by suggesting a mistake from the hands of the bloggers themselves considering confusion caused by multiple accounts. You judge for yourselves. My question is this: Is it legal, ethical, morally justifiable to take away the content regardless of whether the bloggers should have saved it on their end or been more careful interlinking their weblogs?

I personally don’t understand how anyone could possibly use blogspot instead of hosting the blog on his/her own domain (you will keep the content even if blogger bans you), but the question remains whether Google’s actions are justifyable and if they are going overboard and helpless against the flood of spam drawn and promoted from a platform that they themselves have created.

With the new browser comes a number of new features (many of which have been on other browsers for quite a while). Those of us that get tired of having our hand make the journey from out keyboard to our mouse, will appreciate a new list of short cut keys to remember.

Being half blind I appreciate the shortcuts for the zoom feature.

• Increase zoom (+ 10%) Ctrl+(+)
• Decrease zoom (-10%) Ctrl+(-)
• Original size (100% zoom)* Ctrl+0

Trying to catch up with some of the others browsers tab features IE 7 has added a number of new shortcuts for tabbing. These are particularly useful when you are working on a form or collecting information for a project and need to switch between pages quickly.

• Open links in a new tab in the background Ctrl+Click
• Open links in a new tab in the foreground Ctrl+Shift+Click
• Open a new tab in the foreground Ctrl+T
• Switch between tabs Ctrl+Tab / Ctrl+Shift+Tab
• Close current tab (or current window when there are no open tabs) Ctrl+W
• Open a new tab in the foreground from the address bar Alt+Enter
• Switch to the n’th tab Ctrl+n (n can be 1-8)
• Switch to the last tab Ctrl+9
• Close other tabs Ctrl+Alt+F4
• Open quick tabs Ctrl+Q

One of the problems I see with trying out this new browser is the inability to have multiple versions on one machine. As developers it’s nice to see how different versions will display a page. Having a separate computer for each version is a little cumbersome.

If you’re curious about some of the problems your current sites might have with the new browser MS have compiled a Developer checklist you can view at IE 7 Developer Checklist

It’s quite obvious now that eBay is feeling pressure coming from the headquarters of Google. Last May Google announced that they themselves are going to come out with an online payment system such as eBay owned PayPal. Within moments of learning about it, PayPal president Jeff Jordan has started to monitor any talks and chats related to the one project that could dethrone them from their King of Online Payment Systems status.

While Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt confirmed in press accounts that the company was building a payment service, Mr. Schmidt also denied it would directly compete with PayPal. Mr. Schmidt said Google didn’t intend to offer a “person-to-person, stored-value payments system,” which many people consider a description of PayPal’s service.

Mr. Jordan says he and his team immediately “dissected the wording” of Google’s statements. He says he doesn’t believe Mr. Schmidt..

This is just an example of the cat and mouse game that is being played now.
I believe that PayPal will be under a lot of pressure to improve its service. About time! There have been countless cases of PayPal taking it upon themselves to reverse online transactions without further proof on who was right, the buyer or the seller, causing distress and headaches to countless merchant being obligated to take matters into their own hand to legally fight for and receive monetary justice after being defrauded by those abusing paypal and its way to lose policies regarding refunds and their self given right to draw funds out of their clients’ bank accounts anytime that they please.

PayPal is finally getting some competition and I myself can’t wait to see some serious improvements on PayPal’s part as well as a new system that will hopefully give us a great alternative from day one.

PayPal has done a lot of good, but it’s not very healthy to corner a market that should be much more saturated.

Also, having a payment system run by Google, will make it a lot easier for Google Adsense advertisers to receive their funds rather than how things are currently set up.

Read article…

In many of the forums that I participate in, webmasters past and present rant about achieving large numbers of page views but low amount of clicks in PPC programs. From the webmasters’ postings, you can sense their frustrations where they rant speculations ranging from PPC programs cheating the statistics to non-display of high-paying advertisements.

Allow me at this juncture to add on to the speculations. Read on …

In case you have missed this article where Susan Decker, Chief Financial Officer of Yahoo!, Inc. has been quoted as saying

We don’t think it’s reasonable to assume we’re going to gain a lot of share from Google, It’s not our goal to be No. 1 in Internet search. We would be very happy to maintain our market share.

you might as well read the follow-up story which was aired a week ago where the tone has been changed to

We are still in the early days of search. We’re in it for the long haul, and we’re in it to win

on the Yahoo! Search Blog.
I’ve read this quote again after first laughing it off as something very corporate to say after an employee has goofed and face needs to be saved. I was curious to find out a little bit more about what Yahoo! is all about.

On their What we value … page they are saying things such as

Our mission is to be the most essential global Internet service for consumers and businesses.

They also stress the importance of Excellence, Innovation, Customer Fixation, Teamwork, Community and Fun.

Being in the industry of search engine marketing, you do get the feeling that Yahoo! is asleep at the wheel. There have been also indicators of a lack of ethics such as using images from other people’s sites without permission.

The question is what has made Yahoo! so successful over the years, and I believe that it is a combination of all of those values that they themselves are mentioning as the ones that matter the most:
Excellence, Innovation, Customer Fixation, Teamwork, Community and Fun.

Take Yahoo! Music, their messenger and email services, the colorful smilies, everything expresses fun. It’s been like that for years and somehow people will always think about the name Yahoo! when they are thinking about the internet. Staying power has made Yahoo! a force that can survive without Google’s quality when it comes to providing search engine results. So does that mean the area of search results is going to improve as well?
I highly doubt it! I really don’t see it one bit. What I do see is a lot more effective advertising from Yahoo!, a lot less organic traffic due to Yahoo! Publishers’ Network’s better placement of ads. I believe that their searches will be more commercial, they will make sure that wherever there is money to be made, they will make it.

But they will also cover new ground which Google doesn’t such as they did with their purchase of http://del.icio.us/
Yahoo! recognizes where there is interest amongst the web surfers, while Google seems to have a hard time doing so. Google could be considered too intellectual and too logical for the world of those who are on the internet for fun, to kill time and what not. Sure, it’s not a good reason to be online you might say, but that’s what is going on. The MySpace generation is going for the place where there are smileys, chat boards and a name that they have heard in commercials and amongst likeminded people when they were talking about something cool.

And what do they say? “Today’s kids are tomorrow’s lifelong customers”.

So there you have it. I think that their second statement about “winning the search war” is a ummmm … lie? Yeah, I think it’s BS. But overall they will fight a strong battle - and they do have a chance to win the war. The war of who will be the strongest web portal in general.

Who will dominate in 50 years? I’m not sure where Google will be, and honestly: I think that Google will be split into several new companies. Yahoo! will still be what it is today. And Thirdsquare is going to have it’s own cable TV channel. :)

Volkswagen has announced that they are now in the process of building a prototype car which would feature Google’s satellite mapping software.

The software would be used to give the drivers an overhead look at the road ahead.

Google and VW are working closely with Nvidia to build the in car navigation mapping system, which would display in three dimensions and be able to communicate to the passengers where they are in relation to things around them.

The prototype car was on display at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES).

So, it seems that Google is constantly expanding beyond the computer realm. I think this is an interesting move by Google, but I also believe that it still is a good fit for them.