Ads Appear Here, There, and Everywhere Across Google Landscape
September 12, 2016
The article on CNN Money titled Google Is Going to Start Showing You More Ads discusses the surge in ads that users can expect to barely notice over the coming weeks and months. In efforts to ramp up mobile ad revenue to match the increasing emphasis on mobile search, Google is making mobile ads bigger, more numerous, and just more. The article explains,
Google will be simplifying the work flow for businesses to create display ads with images. The company says advertisers need to “simply provide headlines, a description, an image, and a URL,” and Google will automatically design ads for the business. Location-based ads will start showing up on Google too. If you search for “shoe store” or “car repair near me,” ads for local businesses will populate the search results… The changes come as Google is trying to stay ahead of customers’ changing demands.
Google claims in the article that the increase is already showing strong results for advertisers, which click-through rates (CTR) up 20%. But it is hard to believe. As ads flood the space between articles, search results, and even Google Map directions, they seem to be no more significant than an increase in white noise. If Google really wants to revolutionize marketing, they are going to need to dig deeper than just squeezing more ads in between the lines.
Chelsea Kerwin, September 12, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
Revolving Door Hires at Google
September 7, 2016
It looks like Google has determined the best way to address its legal challenges in Europe is to infiltrate and influence its governments. The Guardian reports, “Google: New Concerns Raised About Political Influence by Senior ‘Revolving Door’ Jobs.” The personnel-based tactic has apparently worked so well in the U.S. that Google is applying it to the European arena. Writer Jamie Doward cites research by the the Google Transparency Project, a venture of the Campaign for Accountability (CfA), when she writes:
New concerns have been raised about the political influence of Google after research found at least 80 ‘revolving door’ moves in the past decade – instances where the online giant took on government employees and European governments employed Google staff. … The CfA has suggested that the moves are a result of Google seeking to boost its influence in Europe as the company seeks to head off antitrust action and moves to tighten up on online privacy.
The article gets into specifics on who was hired where and when; navigate to it for those details. In sum, Doward writes:
Overall, the research suggests that Google, now part of parent company Alphabet Inc, has hired at least 65 former government officials from within the European Union since 2005.
During the same period, 15 Google employees were appointed to government positions in Europe, gaining what the CfA claims are ‘valuable contacts at the heart of the decision-making process’.
Anne Weisemann, CfA executive director, points to Google’s success influencing the U.S. government as a driving factor in its EU choices. She notes Google spends more to lobby our federal government than any other company, and that Google execs grace the White House more than once a week, on average. Also, CfA points to more than 250 of these “revolving door” appointments Google has made in the U.S.
For its part, Google claims it is just hiring experts who can answer government officials’ many questions about the Internet, about their own business model, and the “opportunity for European businesses to grow online.” There’s no way that could give Google an unfair advantage, right?
The article concludes with a call to reevaluate how government officials view Google—it is now much more than a search engine, it is a major political actor. Caution is warranted as the company works its way into government-run programs like the UK’s National Health Service and school systems. Such choices, ones that can affect the public on a grand scale, should be fully informed. Listening to Google lobbyists, who excel at playing on politicians’ technical ignorance, does not count.
Cynthia Murrell, September 7, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
Verizon Strategizes to Get Paid for Installing Big Brand Apps That You Will Probably Never Open
September 5, 2016
The article titled Verizon Offered to Install Marketers’ Apps Directly on Subscribers’ Phones on AdAge discusses the next phase in Verizon’s marketing strategy, a seeming inheritance of product placement: automatic installations for big brands onto your phone. Next time you notice an app that you didn’t download on your phone, look no further. Verizon has been in talks with both retail and finance brands about charging between $1 and $2 per device, which sounds small until you multiply it by 75 million Verizon smartphone subscribers. The article discusses some of the potential drawbacks.
Verizon has stoked some user frustration in the past with “bloatware,” as have many carriers and phone manufacturers. Bloatware comprises the often irrelevant apps that arrive pre-installed on phones, though they’re less often major brands’ apps and more often small, proprietary services from the carriers and manufacturers…There is no guarantee, however, that Verizon subscribers open the apps they find pre-installed on their phones. “If a user is not interested, they just delete it without activating.
Sara Choi, COO of AirFox, is quoted in the article making a great point about the importance to carriers to innovate new strategies for profit growth. Ultimately, the best use for this marketing technique is a huge number of immediate downloads. How to engage users once you have gotten into their phones is the next question. If this goes through, there will be no need to search to get an ad, which could mean bad news for online ad search.
Chelsea Kerwin, September 5, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
The Equivalent of a Brexit
August 31, 2016
Britain’s historical vote to leave the European Union has set a historical precedent. What is the precedent however? Is it the choice to leave an organization? The choice to maintain their independence? Or is it a basic example of the right to choose? The Brexit will be used as a metaphor for any major upheaval for the next century, so how can it be used in technology context? BA Insight gives us the answer with “Would Your Users Vote ‘Yes’ For Sharexit?”
SharePoint is Microsoft Office’s collaborative content management program. It can be used to organize projects, build Web sites, store files, and allow team members to communicate. Office workers also spurn it across the globe over due to its inefficiencies. To avoid a Sharexit in your organization, the article offers several ways to improve a user’s SharePoint experience. One of the easiest ways to keep SharePoint is to build an individual user interface that handles little tasks to make a user’s life easier. Personalizing the individual SharePoint user experience is another method, so the end user does not feel like another cog in the system but rather that SharePoint was designed for them. Two other suggestions are plain, simple advice: take user feedback and actually use it and make SharePoint the go information center for the organization by putting everything on it.
Perhaps the best advice is making information easy to find on SharePoint:
Documents are over here, discussions over there, people are that way, and then I don’t know who the experts really are. You can make your Intranet a whole lot smarter, or dare we say “intelligent”, if you take advantage of this information in an integrated fashion, exposing your users to connected, but different, information. You can connect documents to the person who wrote them, then to that person’s expertise and connected colleagues, enabling search for your hidden experts. The ones that can really be helpful often reduce chances for misinformation, repetition of work, or errors. To do this, expertise location capabilities can combine contributed expertise with stated expertise, allowing for easy searching and expert identification.
Developers love SharePoint because it is easy to manage and to roll out information or software to every user. End users hate it because it creates more problems than resolving anything. If developers take the time to listen to what the end users need from their SharePoint experience than can avoid an Sharexit.
Whitney Grace, August 31, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Microsoft to Sunset China Search and News Services
August 22, 2016
Recent news has made clear that online content from the U.S. or any country foreign to China faces challenges in China. An article from CNN Money recently published Microsoft is giving up on its Chinese web portal. This piece informs us that Microsoft will sunset it’s MSN website in China on June 7. Through their company statement, Microsoft mentions their commitment to China remains and notes China is home to the largest R&D facility outside the U.S. An antitrust investigation on Microsoft in China has been underway since July 2014. The article shares an overview of the bigger picture,
The company’s search engine, Bing, also flopped in the country amid tough competition with homegrown rivals. It didn’t help that in Chinese, “Bing” sounds similar to the word for “sickness.
In September, Microsoft finally ditched Bing for users of its Edge browser in China, striking a deal with Chinese Internet giant Baidu (BIDU, Tech30) to use its search engine as the default.
Other Western tech firms have come under scrutiny in China before, including Qualcomm(QCOM, Tech30) and Apple (AAPL, Tech30). Social networks like Facebook (FB, Tech30) and Google (GOOG) remain blocked in the country.”
It looks like Bing will bite the dust soon, in China at least. Does this news mean anything for Microsoft as a company? While regulations China are notably stringent, the size of their population makes up a notably sized market. We will be watching to see how search plays out in China.
Megan Feil, August 22, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden /Dark Web meet up on August 23, 2016. Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233019199/
Oracle v Google Copyright Trial in Progress
July 22, 2016
The battle between Google and Oracle over Android’s use of Java has gone to federal court, and the trial is expected to conclude in June. CBS San Francisco Bay Area reports, “Former Google CEO Testifies in Oracle-Google Copyright Trial.” The brief write-up reveals the very simple defense of Eric Schmidt, who was Google’s CEO while Android was being developed (and is now CEO of Google’s young parent company, Alphabet): “We believed our approach was appropriate and permitted,” he stated.
Java was developed back in the ‘90s by Sun Microsystems, which was bought by Oracle in 2010. Google freely admits using Java in the development of Android, but they assert it counts as fair use—the legal doctrine that allows limited use of copyrighted material if it is sufficiently transformed or repurposed. Oracle disagrees, though Schmidt maintains Sun Microsystems saw it his way back in the day. The article tells us:
“Schmidt told the jury that when Google was developing Android nine years ago, he didn’t believe the company needed a license from Sun for the APIs. “We believed our approach was appropriate and permitted,” he said.
“Under questioning from Google attorney Robert Van Nest, Schmidt said that in 2007, Sun’s chief executive officer Jonathan Schwartz knew Google was building Android with Java, never expressed disapproval and never said Google needed a license from Sun.
“In cross-examination by Oracle attorney Peter Bicks, Schmidt acknowledged that he had said in 2007 that Google was under pressure to compete with the Apple Inc.’s newly released iPhone.”
Yes it was, the kind of pressure that can erode objectivity. Did Google go beyond fair use in this case? The federal court will soon decide.
Cynthia Murrell, July 22, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark
Web meet up on July 26, 2016.
Information is at this link: http://bit.ly/29tVKpx.
More Variables Than Technology for Enterprise Security to Consider
June 29, 2016
For all the effort enterprises go to in securing data through technological solutions, there are also other variables to consider: employees. Business Insider released an article, 1 in 5 employees are willing to hand over their work passwords for money, that shares survey research from SailPoint. 20 percent of 1,000 respondents, from organizations with over 1,000 employees, would be willing to sell their work passwords. US employees win the “most likely” award with 27 percent followed by Netherlands with 20 percent, and then UK and France at 16 percent. The article tells us,
“Some employees were willing to sell their passwords for as little as $55 (£38) but most people wanted considerably more, with $82,000 (£56,000) being the global average amount required,according to figures cited by Quartz that weren’t in the report. Unauthorised access to a company’s internal systems could provide a treasure trove of valuable data for criminals. They may be targeting individual user accounts, or they could be after intellectual property, or corporate strategy data.”
Undoubtedly, search and/or cybertheft is easier with a password. While the survey reports findings that may be alarming to organizations, we are left with the question, ‘why’. It may be easy to say morality is the dividing line, but I think this article wrestling with the morality question is on the right track pointing to considering sociological implications, for example, employee engagement and satisfaction cannot be discounted as factors in a decision to sell a password.
Megan Feil, June 29, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Google Results Now Include Animal Noise Audio
June 27, 2016
Ever wonder about the difference in the noise a bowhead whale makes versus a humpback whale? This is yet another query Google can answer. Tech Insider informed us that Google Search has a secret feature that shouts animal noises at you. This feature allows users to listen to 20 different animal sounds, but according to the article, it is not a well-known service yet. Available on mobile devices as well, this feature appears with a simply query of “what noise does an elephant make?” The post tells us,
“Ever wondered what noise a cow makes? Or a sheep? Or an elephant? No, of course you haven’t because you’re a normal adult with some grasp of reality. You know what noise a sheep makes. But let’s assume for a minute that you don’t. Well, not to worry: Google has got your back. That’s because as well as being a calculator, a tool for researching coworkers, and a portal for all the world’s information, Google has another, little-known feature … It’s capable of making animal noises. Lots of them.”
I don’t know if we would call 20 animal noises “a lot” considering the entirety of the animal kingdom, but it’s definitely a good start. As the article alludes to, the usefulness of this feature is questionable for adults, but perhaps it could be educational for kids or of some novelty interest to animal lovers of all ages. Search is always searching to deliver more.
Megan Feil, June 27, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Self Driving Bicycle Prank Points to Wider Arena
June 24, 2016
Technology companies are no stranger to making April Fools’ pranks in the form of media releases. This year, The Inspiration Room shared an article highlighting the Google Self Driving Bicycle, which was of course developed by the Dutch and launched in the Netherlands. The aspect of this story that is not fiction is how often the Dutch cycle. This short post briefs us on the media release,
“Google is introducing the Google Self Driving Bicycle in Amsterdam, the world’s premier cycling city. The Dutch cycle more than any other nation in the world, almost 900 kilometres per year per person, amounting to over 15 billion kilometres annually. The self-driving bicycle enables safe navigation through the city for Amsterdam residents, and furthers Google’s ambition to improve urban mobility with technology. Google Netherlands takes enormous pride in the fact that a Dutch team worked on this innovation that will have great impact in their home country.”
If there’s one truth this article points to, it’s that the field of search seems to be encompassing nearly everything. It is humorous how Google continues to grow new tentacles tackling more and more arenas that have seemingly little to do with search. Despite the fact this self-driving bicycle does not exist yet, it’s clearly no stretch of the imagination — if a company were to make such a product, would there be any other contenders for who would make it?
Megan Feil, June 24, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Microsoft Makes Fresh Effort to Position Bing
June 21, 2016
Microsoft is gearing up for a fresh challenge to Google, with a Bing rebranding effort centered on the new “Bing Network.” This marks a different approach to leveraging the MS search platform, we learn from the piece, “Microsoft Rebrands Bing, Challenges Google” at SearchMarketingDaily. The incorporation of Yahoo has a lot to do with it. Reporter Laurie Sullivan writes:
“Microsoft’s message says the network pulls together in-the-moment data from across its mobile, global and local partners to support products that people use daily. And that network continues to grow. With the transition of all U.S. accounts, people and account management from Yahoo to Bing, the network represents an expanding set of partnerships such as AOL, and The Wall Street Journal, which adds more searches and clicks to the network daily, wrote Stephen Sirich, GM of advertising and consumer monetization group at Microsoft, in a post.”
Sullivan later reminds us:
“The shift in brand strategy also marks an end to the Yahoo-Bing Network. The renegotiated search deal between Microsoft and Yahoo in April 2015, five years into the 10-year deal, has ad sales and account management returning to their respective companies.”
The article discusses reasons Microsoft has struggled so to position Bing as an alternative to Google. For example, says one professional, Bing should not have tried to change the model Google had set up, and users had grown accustomed to, for Internet search. Also, Bing’s brand recognition has always lagged behind that of Google. Perhaps that is about to change with this renewed effort. See the article for some more background and stats on Bing’s performance.
Cynthia Murrell, June 21, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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