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ComScore Internet Usage Survey Shows Microsoft “On Top”

Justin Kerr — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 14:29:09 -0600

A recent ComScore survey on Internet usage is reporting that Microsoft might not be leading the way in search, but in terms of total hours spend online, it has a commanding lead over its competition. The survey, which measured a whopping 27 billion hours of Internet usage by Web users aged 15 or older is an increase of nearly 24% over the year prior, and of those studied, over 3.9 billion hours were spent using Microsoft services. Google came in a not so close second place with around 2.5 billion hours.

The big winner in the Microsoft portfolio might surprise you however, with about 70 percent of the usage being attributed to Windows Live Messenger. Of course, this number measures time spent “online” and not just those “actively engaged” with the service, but it certainly shows the popularity of Microsoft’s instant messenger. Google’s numbers are pretty typical explain analysts, since they make it their business using search to try and get you “in and out” as quickly as possible. The most successful Google property continues to be YouTube with nearly 1.2 billion hours logged watching video.

Yahoo placed third with 1.7 billion hours, and Facebook commanded a respectable fourth place with 1.4 billion hours. The individual rankings may have been a bit of a shock, but the trend showing “Internet usage on the rise” certainly isn’t. Did any of these results surprise you? Let us know what you think.

Google CEO: "We Won't Repeat Microsoft's Mistakes"

Paul Lilly — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:04:55 -0600

During an interview with the Fox Business Network, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said his company has learned from Microsoft's past follies in terms of antitrust issues and letting the competition catch up.

"Hopefully we won't repeat the mistakes that Microsoft made 10 years ago that ultimately led to all these things that happened to them," Schmidt said.

Schmidt was also pressed on the potential for Twitter and Facebook to steal the thunder from Google among younger Internet users. But according to Schmidt, it's not a big concern because users of social networking services end up using Google even more.

You can view the two-part interview here and here.

Google Releases Dashboard to Show You How Much Data You Have Stored In the Cloud

Ryan Whitwam — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:53:51 -0600

We all know Google has a lot of information about us. Now there’s a way to have all that data laid out before you in terrifying detail. Google Dashboard is the search giant’s new site aimed at increasing user control over personal information.

The Dashboard is available in your account settings page (or just go here), and kept behind an additional sign-in page. Once logged in, you’ll see all the Google services you use along with a summary of its use. There is currently support of more than 20 Google services including Gmail, Latitude, Google Voice, Google Docs, Gtalk, YouTube and Picasa.

Google offers quick access to the settings for each service if you’re not happy with the information being stored. So, feel better?

Google's video overview:

Choose Which Gmail Messages are Downloaded for Offline Use

Jason Barry — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:05:29 -0600

Google announced on the official Gmail blog a handy new upgrade to the Offline Gmail labs app. Before the update, you could enable Offline Gmail and it would use specialized heuristics to download messages for offline use.

With the new update, once you enable Offline Gmail, you can find some customizable options under the “Offline” tab in Settings. You can now select specifically which labels to download and how deep into your mailbox you would like the downloading to begin. Once the settings are saved, the app will immediately start downloading any emails weren't already synced to your computer. Of course, less downloads means faster Offline Gmail so you should be careful with the settings.

It's a substantial upgrade to a very handy lab application for commuters or travelers.

Acer Liquid A1 is Quick on Google's Platform

Paul Lilly — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:59:31 -0600

While the mobile world drools over Droid, there's another smartphone that has a shot of stealing a few headlines. We're talking about Acer's upcoming Liquid A1, which is expected to ship in Europe within the next few weeks.

The Liquid A1 is the first Android-based smartphone to be built around Qualcomm's Snapdragon chipset. And even though the CPU has been downclocked to 768MHz, that's a lot more pep than most Android phones are boasting.

Oddly, Acer has decided not to step up to Android 2.0 (Eclair), and the Liquid A1 will instead run on Android 1.6 (Donut). That puts it a generation behind the Droid and other upcoming Android 2.0 smartphones, although this could change by the time the A1 ships. We also wouldn't rule out a software update after the fact, although Acer has spent some time tweaking "a new user interface with easy access to entertainment and web bookmarks."

No word yet on price or when this one's expected to land in the U.S.

Image Credit: Acer

Novell Demonstrates the Potential of Google Wave

Paul Lilly — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:55:21 -0600

During the Enterprise 2.0 conference in San Francisco on Wednesday, Novell unvieled its Novell Pulse, a real-time social and document collaboration platform for enterprises. And the kicker? It works seamlessly with Google Wave, Novell said.

"We designed Google Wave and its open federation protocol to help people collaborate and communicate more efficiently," said Lars Rasmussen, software engineering manager for Google Wave. "We are very excited to see Novell supporting the Google Wave Federation Protocol in their innovative Novell Pulse product."

Novell Pulse gives administrators to ability to provision sign-on and permissions to both keep data secure and make it possible for workers to collaborate on documents online in real-time. Perhaps more importantly, Novell Pulse is one of the first major Wave providers.

Novell said its Pulse platform will be available in the first half of 2010, with a beta scheduled for earlier in the year.

Google Friend Connect Gets a Little More Friendlier

Jason Barry — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:21:22 -0600

Google launched Friend Connect back in early 2008 as a means for website owners to turn their sites into homegrown mini social networks. The service allowed users to login and connect with the other people browsing the site through various widgets.

Fast forward to today, and Google has expanded Friend Connect to include an “Interests” section. Its primary purpose is to capture pertinent information about the users browsing a site using customizable questions.

Logged in users can answer questions posed by the website owner and “connect” to others by seeing their answers (i.e. music website asks what your favorite bands are). Web site owners can also send newsletters infused with content it collects in the site’s “Interests” section.

Further, the update allows website owners to collect information from its user base so it can serve up ads tailored to their interests using the “AdSense” widget—making this a huge selling point for owners to adopt the system on their sites.

Do you use Friend Connect? Would you use it knowing site owners are collecting information to serve you ads?

Ten Interesting Facts You May Have Never Known About Google

Ryan Whitwam — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:00:15 -0600

Google has risen to become a behemoth in the tech world in just a bit over a decade. Even in that short time, enough weird tidbits of information resulted that it makes an entertaining read. Perusing this list of ten interesting facts about Google will make you chuckle and scratch your head.

For instance, did you know that the original name for Google’s PageRank algorithm was “BackRub"? PageRank is probably better and less creepy. Have you ever used Google’s “I’m Feeling Lucky” button? Well, that button costs Google about $110 million per year, because it skips past the ads on the results page. Hit the story link for the full list.