Aug
12th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google & Verizon Net Neutrality Policy Proposal

Posted by Adam D on August 12, 2010 at 3:13 pm

The issue surrounding net neutrality reminds me of the early days of America. The country was truly an untamed land of opportunity. Business men, oil barons, railroad tycoons and capitalists alike came from all around to pursue the American dream. For a time, some became very wealthy, while many others became slaves.

It wasn’t until government regulators got involved that the wealth began to spread to more than just a few lucky ones. The profit motive in America, aka capitalism, has been a driving force in our economy for a long time. And because of this, you can count on big business to do whatever it takes to ensure they remain the lucky ones at the top. When big businesses begin taking advantage of people, the hope is that the government will step in and bring balance. After all, the only power us little guys have is the ballot. Big businesses hold the rest of the cards.

Well, here we are again. The internet is the Wild West, and everyone has rushed in to take advantage of the many opportunities this tool presents. But this time, it was the little guy who was given the power, and not just big business. We’ve seen internet campaigns win presidencies, change policy and allow voices to be heard (especially those that would otherwise have been drowned out). This is largely in part due to the internet not being controlled by big business—at least not yet.

This video was released a few years back, but explains net neutrality pretty well.

In a confusing move by Google (confusing because their pledge is to not be evil), the company released their “policy framework”. To further explain, Huffington Post’s Craig Aaron describes Net Neutrality below:

Real Net Neutrality means that Internet service providers can’t discriminate between different kinds of online content and applications. It guarantees a level playing field for all Web sites and Internet technologies. It’s what makes sure the next Google, out there in a garage somewhere, has just as good a chance as any giant corporate behemoth to find its audience and thrive online. What Google and Verizon are proposing is fake Net Neutrality. You can read their framework for yourself here or go here to see Google twisting itself in knots about this suddenly “thorny issue.”

So here’s the bottom line folks—if the little guy doesn’t stand up to the big companies, by encouraging the FCC to stop big business from abolishing Net Neutrality, then the future looks pretty dim. Click this link to see a possible world without Net Neutrality. (Oops, wrong mental picture, sorry!) Try the one below instead.

So what can you do to get your voice heard? Well, you can start by joining the campaign at SaveTheInternet.com. And continue to do what the little guy has always done: use the channels that are available to get your voice heard (and hope that the FCC listens). Use these channels my friends… use them while you still can.

Google and Verizon’s Net Neutrality policy…

Oneupweb: Thumbs Down

What are your thoughts concerning Google’s recent policy? Let us know by commenting below.

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May
5th

Oneupweb Reviews: The New Google

Posted by Adam D on May 5, 2010 at 3:51 pm

Over the past few weeks you may have noticed a different look and feel to Google’s search page. The reason being is that Google has been testing out a new and “improved” look, and today officially launched this new design. Let’s take a peek.

Besides the new look – the drop shadow and trademark symbol are no longer on the Google logo, the biggest change that Google has made is the sidebar.

There are several new filter options listed in the navigation. My favorite of these is the Timeline. Users can narrow down search results by specifying a date range.

Take a look at the Google-produced intro video below to get an overview of these changes.

Although the new look is a little childlike for me, overall the changes are a welcomed way to narrow down and filter search results. It takes time to become accustom to change, but I think users will embrace this new look with open arms.

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

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May
3rd

Oneupweb Reviews: The New Google Places

Posted by Adam D on May 3, 2010 at 2:59 pm

Although Facebook is rising in popularity it isn’t the only place a business can build an online presence. Google Places (formerly known as Place Pages) has been around for a while now, but just recently added new features that make it worth a second look.

Google’s blog says that the new Google Places will be introducing the following features:

Service areas: If you travel to serve customers, you can now show which geographic areas you serve. And if you run a business without a storefront or office location, you can now make your address private.
A new, simple way to advertise: For just $25 per month, businesses in select cities can make their listings stand out on Google.com and Google Maps with Tags. As of today, we’re rolling out Tags to three new cities — Austin, Atlanta and Washington, D.C. — in addition to ongoing availability in Houston and San Jose, CA. In the coming weeks we’ll also be introducing Tags in Chicago, San Diego, Seattle, Boulder and San Francisco.
Business photo shoots: In addition to uploading their own photos, businesses in select cities can now request a free photo shoot of the interior of their business which we’ll use to supplement existing photos of businesses on Place Pages. We’ve been experimenting with this over the past few months, and now have created a site for businesses to learn more and express their interest in participating.
Customized QR codes: From the dashboard page of Google Places, businesses in the U.S. can download a QR code that’s unique to their business, directly from their dashboard page. QR codes can be placed on business cards or other marketing materials, and customers can scan them with certain smartphones to be taken directly to the mobile version of the Place Page for that business.
Favorite Places: We’re doing a second round of our Favorite Places program, and are mailing window decals to 50,000 businesses around the U.S. These decals include a QR code that can be scanned with a smartphone to directly view the mobile Place Page for the business to learn more about their great offerings.

Business owners can also navigate to the Google Places (Formerly Local Business Center) where, once a listing is claimed and verified, they can get access to all kinds of helpful data:

Impressions: The number of times the business listing appeared as a result on a Google.com search or Google Maps search in a given period.
Actions: The number of times people interacted with the listing; for example, the number of times they clicked through to the business’ website or requested driving directions to the business.
Top search queries: Which queries led customers to the business listing; for example, are they finding the listing for a cafe by searching for “tea” or “coffee”?
Zip codes where driving directions come from: Which zip codes customers are coming from when they request directions to your location.

Google is continuing to make itself a strong option for businesses. With the addition of several new features, Google is showing that it’s evolving with the changing trends. The new and improved Dashboard gives businesses more options to track traffic and help increase sales.

Official Oneupweb review: Thumbs Up

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Apr
15th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google Follow Finder

Posted by Adam D on April 15, 2010 at 12:55 pm

How cool is this? Google recently updated its live search results with a new feature called Google Replay, and now you can find people to follow on Twitter through Google! Enter Google Follow Finder.

Just type a username in the search field, to find people you want to follow. Below is an example of the results you will receive using Oneupweb.

Follow Finder generates two lists based on your follower and following lists. Below Google explains the two lists:

Tweeps you might like: We start with the list of people you follow, find others with similar lists, and then identify accounts you might also want to follow. If people with similar lists tend to follow accounts that aren’t in your list, we’ll recommend those additional accounts to you. For example, if you follow CNN and the New York Times on Twitter, and most people who follow CNN and the New York Times also tend to follow TIME, we’ll suggest TIME as a user to follow.
Tweeps with similar followers: We find people with similar public lists of followers to yours. For example, if ten people are following you, and the same ten people are following a second user, we’ll include the second user in this list. You may already be following some of these people.

This all seemed great, and I couldn’t wait to start expanding my 230 closest followers. But when I clicked follow, I received this error.

NOOO! I tried this on several browsers, using different Twitter account logins, but to no avail. I received the same error for each. Google you were doing so well.

I guess they are still working out the kinks. Until this is fixed it does us no good, and for that we give Google’s Follow Finder an…

Official Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Down

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Apr
14th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google Updates Twitter Search

Posted by Adam D on April 14, 2010 at 1:33 pm

In a blog post earlier today, Google introduced an update to its Twitter search functionality. Now not only can you view the most recent tweets on a topic, but you can view when something was tweeted, as seen below:

You can choose a range of time you would like to see Tweets from.

Once selected, the tweets that were posted within that time frame will be displayed. If there were no tweets at that exact time chosen, the tweets made closest to that time will be displayed.

This update looks very familiar to what we saw during the Olympics called the Olympic Tracker, only not as cool. But hey it’s definitely an improvement to the Google live search results.

Official Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up!

You can try out Google’s live search results update here.

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Mar
4th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google Stars

Posted by Adam D on March 4, 2010 at 1:33 pm

Have you ever wished you could reach out into the search universe, grab your favorite sites, and easily organize them for later viewing? The people at Google thought you might say yes, and that’s why they created stars.

Yesterday Google announced that in the next few days it would be releasing stars, which the search engine touts as a new way to make search more relevant and fun. Today let’s take a look at Google’s latest release to see if it soars, or goes super nova.

According to yesterday’s post on the Official Google Blog:

“With stars, you can simply click the star marker on any search result or map and the next time you perform a search, that item will appear in a special list right at the top of your results when relevant. That means if you star the official websites for your favorite football teams, you might see those results right at the top of your next search for [nfl]. Here’s what the new ‘Starred results’ feature looks like:”

Are Google stars really necessary? Adding a site to your favorites, or bookmarking, is obviously something you can already do to save the sites you like best for easy recall. You can even display your favorite sites on a browser toolbar, and it’s located much higher up than Google stars. (Maybe they should have called them satellites instead.) And you can do both of these without having to be logged into your Google account, like you do with stars.

Official Oneupweb Review:Oneup-Thumbs-Sideways

I won’t give this feature a thumbs down because I appreciate a clean browser interface, and you could replace your bookmarks toolbar with stars. Once you get too many bookmarks, they can be difficult to keep track of, or easily forgotten. But with stars, these forgotten bookmarks will be at the top of your search results.

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Feb
25th

Oneupweb Reviews: Facebook Page Content in Google Real-Time Search Results

Posted by Adam D on February 25, 2010 at 4:18 pm

Google’s real-time search has been implemented for a couple months now but as of today this feature will include Facebook Page status updates in search results, as well as content from MySpace, FriendFeed, Jaiku and Identi.ca.

Today we will introduce you to Google real-time search and review the newly added status updates from Facebook Pages.

If you are unfamiliar with Google’s real-time search, it’s basically search results that include content pulled from sites such as Twitter, FriendFeed, and now Facebook, as well as headlines from news sites and blog posts published just seconds before. This means the search results represent “real time,” more so than a website that is only updated once a month.

In order to view these real-time search results you will need to take a few steps.

First, go to Google and type in your desired search term:

When you receive your search results click + Show options…

Next, select Latest under Any time and you will begin to see real-time search results.

As you can see below you will get search results from Facebook as they become available.

Official Oneupweb Review: Oneup-Thumbs-Up

If you are an information addict like most of us at Oneupweb then you will love this feature. And since Google is now including content from Facebook, MySpace and other social networks, this feature just became a whole lot more comprehensive. Choose any subject you’re interested in and from there you can keep up on what’s happening in real time.

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Feb
11th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google Buzz

Posted by Keirsun on February 11, 2010 at 2:10 pm

Prepare to be buzzed. I haven’t heard those words spoken since my Dad took me to the barber for my post 4th grade summer crew cut / lowering of the ears.

But they were the first words to come to mind when I logged into my Gmail account last night and discovered this new addition to my navigation.

Google announced the release of Buzz on Tuesday, but expected it to take a couple of days to roll out to all Gmail users.

So What Is Buzz?

Google Buzz is the search company’s most recent attempt to get its foot in the social networking door. Sure, Google has Orkut, its social network popular in South America, and Google Wave, which requires some getting used to, but I get the feeling that neither has been the social success that Google desires.

Enter Google Buzz. Integrated into Gmail, Google has side-stepped the process of getting users to signup for a new social media tool. With the click of a link, millions of Gmail users can access Buzz.

Buzz Benefits

The first thing I notice about Buzz is its simplicity.

I’m presented with a blank text box, the option to insert a link or photo, and the option to make my post Public or Private. That’s it. If you’re one of the 400 million Facebook users then you’ll easily get a handle on Buzz.

(And yes my profile photo is a pic of David Soul of Starsky & Hutch fame. Or at least at one time it was – not exactly sure where Buzz is pulling that photo from, so there’s one gripe.)

You can easily buzz content by telling Google Buzz to pull content from other Google properties you utilize, such as Picasa (photos), Google Reader (links and articles), Blogspot (blog posts) and YouTube (videos), in addition to non-Google sites like Twitter and Flickr.

Here’s a buzzed post that I shared via my Google Reader account:

Notice the Expand this post link which allows for your followers to read full articles you share on Buzz. The same goes for the photos you share.

Click on any photo’s thumbnail and it’s quickly expanded to nearly full screen. This is a big benefit over photos shared on Facebook.

Keep in mind that everything you share on Buzz can be seen by anyone that’s following you, as long as you didn’t set the post to private. And this all happens right from Gmail so of course you can add people to follow from your contacts or by searching their name and/or email.

Also, Google Buzz for mobile is already available for your iPhone or Android phone.

Buzz Bombs

One element that’s sorely missing from Google Buzz is an embeddable buzz button that content creators can slap on their web pages for content consumers to easily share the content via their Buzz accounts. Seeing the potential of “buzzed” content, popular tech blogs Mashable and TechCrunch have already taken the initiative to create their own Buzz buttons.

Official Oneupweb Review: Oneup-Thumbs-Up

In addition to ease of use, Google Buzz gets an automatic thumbs up for speed. “Buzz lightning” could be used to describe the speed at which this social networking tool operates.

Of course, the more people I have in my Buzz following/followers lists, the more useful Google Buzz will become. But that’s the heart of the issue. Will Buzz replace the need for people to log into their Facebook accounts? Buzz may provide enough incentive for Gmail users but I don’t see the average Facebook user abandoning their existing social network to catch a new buzz.

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