Posts on State of Search about ‘Google’

Will Eric Schmidt have to face the music in Congress?

When Google accidentally grabbed personal data like e-mails, passwords and other wifi information they most certainly were not thinking of the consequences. Last week Google got a slap on the wrist in the UK when the Information Commissioner’s Office said Google had “committed a “significant breach” of the UK’s Data Protection Act”. Google there got away with just the slap, they weren’t fined or punished in any other way.

The victory of the Republicans in the US elections last week however might be the setup for something bigger for Google.

U.S. Representative Joe Barton, the top Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, in a tv- interview last week said there was a big chance chief executives from companies such as Google and Facebook could be called before the Commerce Committee. (more…)

Marissa Mayer: “Launching Gmail on April Fools day was widely misinterpreted”

Digg has found an interesting format of interviewing: Digg Dialogue, getting their audience to send in the questions and then ask them to a ‘web-celebrity’. This time Marissa Mayer came back to Digg to answer questions. Mayer answered questions in all ranges, from the ‘disaster’ which was Google Wave up to Google TV, a Google Car and more.

A nice one: the one gadget she can’t live without: her Verizon card to get on the web and her smart phones.

See the entire interview below:

Google Analytics introduces “Major Contributors”: find out what is causing traffic changes

Google Analytics for many is a highly underestimated tool. My guess is that still the major part of the Analytics users ‘only’ looks at the incoming traffic numbers. How many visitors did we get yesterday? The question “where did they come from” even is too much information for some.

Luckily there are others who do understand the full potential of the free analytics tool and use all the features Google is giving us. And those users will be happy with the latest change Google made to Analytics: “Major Contributors“. (more…)

Google committed “significant breach” of UK’s Data Protection Act, but gets away

Just last week we told you that Google might face charges in the UK for taking e-mails, e-mail passwords, addresses and other data when collecting Streetview data in the UK. After Google admitted that it had taken that data The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) said they would now re-investigate after previous investigations had finished already.

The UK information commissioner, Christopher Graham, now confirms Google committed a “significant breach” of the UK’s Data Protection Act. He however does not feel that Google needs to pay a fine. Google however has been ordered to delete the data it collected and sign an undertaking that it won’t happen again. Plus they want Google to further train their employees. (more…)

Google launches its ‘blurred’ Streetview in Germany

There has been no country which has been so hesitant when it comes to Googles Streetview as Germany. Yes, in the UK there were people chasing Streetview cars, as were there people in France, Greece and Spain who highly opposed to the taking of the pictures. But nowhere the opposition was bigger than in Germany.

Now the biggest European country finally is accessible in Streetview. Well, a little bit. The Germans have demanded that before launching they could decide whether or not they wanted their homes to be in there. This resulted in the fact that Streetview now excludes 244,000 addresses that Germans have demanded be pixelated. (more…)

Matt Cutts (who is writing a novel!): “The Vince update was not about brands. Believe me or not.”

Remember the Vince Update? It really shook up the SEO world. Did Google favor brands there or not? The SEO world thought they did, Google denied. With that in mind the people at SEOBook made this video:

When SEOBook’s Aaron Wall tweeted to Matt Cutts about this Cutts responded as we know him: its not about brands:

(more…)

Discussion: what does the new Places Search mean?

Last week Google decided to take a completely different route when it comes to local. With the roll out of Place Search Google made huge changes to the way they are presenting local results. The “7 Pack” is gone, the map moved to the right, local results now are dominating the page on specific searches.

Google made these changes with a purpose. But why? Is Google aiming to go local all the way? Or is there something else? What do you think?

One thing which is remarkable is that Google has made the map “floating” which means that if you scroll down, the map scrolls down too, overlapping the ads…:

(more…)

Top 15 of Eric Schmidt’s Remarkable Quotes

Mr Eric Schmidt, now former CEO of Google, is making a habit out of getting quotes into the media which are to say the least ‘interesting’. In some cases they are plain stupid, in other cases remarkable and sometimes predictable.

One ‘slip of the tongue” on CNN, “Streetview the cars we drive only once, you can just move, right?” was corrected by the pr-department of Google who had Schmidt say he “misspoked”. But this surely wasn’t the only ‘mistake’ by Schmidt. Its interesting (and fun) to look back at some quotes of Schmidt in the past year to see how many times he has now said “something remarkable”.

1. “We know where you are. We know where you’ve been. We can more or less know what you’re thinking about.”
To the Atlantic (more…)

Google Instant is making us (or Google?) money!?

When Google rolled out Instant Search only a bit over a month ago (feels like its been there forever doesn’t it?) the first reaction of some was that it meant “the death of SEO”, which was rubbish. The second reaction was that it was “the death of PPC”. Which made more sense, but also was said too quickly. Now it turns out that it was rubbish also, Instant is not costing advertisers money, its making advertisers money!

That is at least if we can believe a research performed by Marin Software, one of the larger managers of advertiser spending on search engines. They noticed that the number of times their advertisers showed up in Google grew by 9% and the clicks on those ads grew with 5%. This lead to an increase of 2% in spending on ads. Which makes both advertisers and thus Google as big winners of the launch of Google Instant. (more…)

Don’t like Streetview? “You can move” Eric Schmidt jokes on CNN…

It is becoming some sort of a running gag. Eric Schmidt showing up in tv shows, at conferences or at press conferences and then trying to be funny. And unfortunately for him, a lot of the times the jokes are misunderstood. And for a reason.

Though Mr Schmidt I think “in real life” most probably is a funny guy and his jokes might do very well in a bar or at a birthday party, I do think that the CEO of Google should choose his jokes more carefully when he is making a public appearance. His timing sometimes just seems to be wrong. Even though personally I like it, I’m not so sure it’s the best way to go for Google. Last Friday “he did it again”. In an interview at CNN he said about those not liking Streetview “You can move…”. See the interview here: (more…)

Google could be sued in UK for taking e-mail passwords and more

Google’s Streetview has been a big headache for Google in Europe. What was supposed to be a fun tool turned out to be a monster when it comes to privacy issues. At least, in Europe. In the US Streetview doesn’t seem to be causing near as much issues as in Europe where countries like Germany, France and Britain really made a big deal out of the images of their streets. (more…)

How does Google work?

How does Google work? Not the algorithm but the way it does its research. At the University of Washington Alfred Z Spector, vice president of Research and Special Initiatives at Google, talks about how Google does its research innovation. A very informative and educational talk.