Google with some cool things for you to play around.

Okay, so with the winter setting in (or has it already?) - its kind of tough to predict the outcome of flu - especially the infamous H1N1 - better known as Swine Flu.

Google has come out with another wonderful stuff - places where you can get your flu shot - maybe minutes of walking from your home.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/11/finding-flu-vaccine-information-in-one.html - your treasure bag to flu shot centers.

As their research (?) goes on, they are adding in more places. I wonder what is to research in there than to just enquire and find out the places that DO HAVE flu shot centers.

Here is where I got this news from - Flu Shots Vaccine Info On Google Blog

And yes, there is another feature that G has for you. I am really amazed to see this option - of course I think this would really help most parents to let their wards browse happily on the net. Why? Because the Safesearch option that is available on the internet really works such that  even if you are logged out of your account the Safesearch thingy works.

Well what is exactly Safesearch? While you use Google it helps you (your ward) from viewing unwanted porn or adult related websites where the material is considered not suitable of children below permissible age.

Here is the link for locking your SafeSearch

Google Friend Connect

I have seen this being used in blogs. From what I think, it would actually help like minded people (and that is the reason why they would connect on to a blog?) to help share ideas amongst themselves. With the advent of the use of languages - or atleast a part of it in Orkut where you can scrap in languages other than English or OpenSocial which has begun adopting native languages (See the official Google Blog for more)

What makes me think is - does this actually help spread information? What kind of information can be passed on from one user to another? Is this going to be a begining of the use of a language convertor of sorts? (I've seen that being used in various world meets where the representative of a nation is unable to converse in English.) 

Does this also mean - one would have to begin using multi-language keyboard as in India where you can find a user easily conversant with atleast 3 different languages! Or for that matter the Chinese, Japanese and the widely spread Arabic speaking countries. 

Time to get some coffee. 

Google Reader - how good can it be?

I heard a lot about Google Reader and was wondering aloud what the heck could it be? Until I thought I must Google it to find out exactly what it is. So, i got down to business and searched for Google Reader. 

Yes, I found it was (yet another?) invention of the big G. So, what does this reader do for you? Well, it certainly does not read the morning newspaper for you (or does it?). 

This is the best way to keep yourself updated about the latest happenings through blogs of your interest. You can actually go create an account in Google and you are done. Find out blogs of your interest and you can get fresh news from them, everyday. 

Now, isn't that great? 

I thought it was, until I realised that I was not getting exactly what I wanted. Okay, I intended to start the Google Reader only for the purpose of receiving news and feeds related to SEO, PPC and Internet Marketing. But, I realised that I had been mindlessly following so many other bloggers and there was one who had subscribed to the reader. Unfortunately, I fell a victim to the crap load she was posting. 

My concern is: how do I remove the blog from my reader? I have not subscribed to her blog though. 

Another thing I wonder is why does the post not go up (like a scrolling text) slowly so that I am saved of the ignominy of pressing the left mouse button continously? Or you know, like the flash screen, display each post for say 5 minutes and then flash up the next one. Cool idea?

Labels however is a cool feature. I am yet to explore that option. Though I do feel that it helps a lot. 

Then of course, as Google would always want (to gather as much sh*t it can), you have the reader where you can subscribe to feeds, share your feeds and post notes, just in case the writer's bug got the better of you. 

So, here goes another post - just like anybody else would have written, into the cyberspace.

Have a good week ahead. 

Microsoft Bing - will it really zing?

Well, I just gave a search in the newly created baby of Microsoft - Bing. The same I gave it in our trusted ol' Google.

This is what I gave. I wanted to search for cable tv retailers or outlets in Cochin and I gave just this "cable tv cochin"


What Bing gave me is this. Pretty handy I must say as I got a list of the local cable tv operators in Cochin at the very top. This was of course followed by the top cable operators list in the yellow pages.

What I did notice is that it picked up the tag / keyword from the description area. I found the title pretty much different from each other, unlike the Google, where if you look at closely, you would find that even the title (link) would contain keywords picked up.

Does this mean that Bing is more result-centric than Google? Just because it returned me the results with a list of local cable operators?

I don't appreciate much of what Microsoft has done so far. Bing though, it seems to have (or will slowly) make its mark.

Here is what Google returned for me for the same set of keywords "cable tv cochin".

Well, as you can see, I just got a list of ads where the keywords "cable" "tv" and importantly "cochin" were added at the very first title line. Of course, irrelevant ads were also displayed here.

For example, there was an ad from a well known hotel here displayed in the list.

Which makes me ask "Will Google come out with a search which understands what we want to type or search?". Or has it already come out with such a search?

Time will tell, how Bing copes up in this big race to be the best search engine against the BIG giant G.

I will come out with more search examples later in some other post. Till then, happy weekend.