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October 20, 2006
IT Blog #4
Delicious Tip #1
Over the past few weeks, Bret, Li, and I have each looked into seperate information technology news stories. This week, instead of looking at simply another entry, we thought it would be productive to go through an interesting and fun way to uncover breaking news stories (IT and not-IT related) within delicious.
One thing we all found to be incredibly cool and fun to play with was an "unofficial" Delicious visualization tool called:
Del.icio.us network explorer (click to link).
Essentially what this tool does is visually shows your available delicious network connections. You are then able to explore through the network and see how your network is connected.
For example, if I wanted to find a tag of someone who is in both my BIT professor's and my delicious network, I could use the network explorer to find an individual who is connected to both of us. From there I could click on the person's bubble, and select "visit at delicious.com" at the top of the screen. This would take me to that individual's delicious screen, and thus I can search through their links. This tool could be very effective if you do not know the name of other individuals you are looking for, or are trying to keep your links within a certain group of people.
There are, however, negatives to this network as well. It is very limited in the information immediately available. It would also take a large base of people within your network for this to work to its full extent. It also requires java to be able to run effectively.
Stay tuned for another helpful internet searching tip in the upcoming weeks
For more "neat unofficial tools" on Delicious, visit the website at http://del.icio.us/help/thirdpartytools
Posted by grantrob at 03:47 PM | Comments (1)
October 15, 2006
IT Blog #3
Google launches literacy project
In the media world, search engines are king. Looking at the blogs from the past two weeks, it is evident that search engine giants Yahoo and Google have no bounds to their expansion. The most recent step forward in Google’s plan for world domination is the launch of a new website. The website, google.com/literacy, is a collection of resources that can be used to help combat illiteracy.
Google is teaming up with the United Nations and a literacy campaign organized by the Frankfurt Book Fair in hopes of cutting down the more than 1 billion people in the world over the age of 15 that are illiterate. The project will utilize Google’s video, mapping and blogging services. Google’s massive project of scanning all the world’s books into their system will also be a part of the literacy program. The website will help to provide teachers, educators and other members of academia with an organized set of educational resources to eliminate illiteracy. Google is requesting that other organizations contribute to their project by donating media that helps demonstrate various teaching techniques.
Grant, Li and I all agree that it’s great to see a company as renowned as Google take such a huge step forward in giving back to the world. By searching and finding out that many people in this world are illiterate, we all agreed that we, as Ross Students, are taking things for granted. When you look at the valuable education we are receiving and the numerous children in Africa who couldn't even understand a single word, there is no comparison as to how lucky we are. Knowing this issue, it feels as if we are obliged to use our "fortunate" education to help these unfortunate individuals.
So it is really good to hear that Google is doing that already. As Google’s vice president of European operations, Nikesh Arora says, “Google’s business was born out of a desire to help people find information. We hope this site will serve as a bridge to even greater communication and access to important information about literacy problems.”
For a first-hand look at the project, look here: Google Literacy Project
Posted by eath at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
October 07, 2006
IT Blog #2
Google Hunting Down YouTube
Just as sports teams try to acquire top athletes, search giants such as Google and Yahoo are currently in the race to acquire popular and growing online sites. Google is currently neogotiating with top executives of You-Tube, only to purchase the leading online-video site for 1.6 billion dollars.
Last week, Grant, Brett, and I shared the thought of Yahoo wanting to buy Facebook for 1 billion dollars. As Facebook users, we all thought that this amount is quite ridiculous; yes, a lot people do use Facebook. Yes, Facebook is very popular. But, what is the factor that makes these sites worth so much. In the BILLIONS!!!
We have all been on You-tube. However, we did not know that You-tube commanded 46% of visits to U.S. online-video sites in September while Google online video only has about 11%. If Google do land this deal in buying You-Tube, then the search giant would be the dominant leader in online-video.
The You-tube acquisition could mean so much to Google. First of all, Google can enhance You-tube's search engine making videos easier and more accessible to viewers. Secondly, Google can extend its profit-making ad strategy and bring lucrative cash flow from You-tube's ads. Finally, as the current dominant search engine, Google will expand and soon become the dominant "online video" provider. This all will prove very valuable to Google. Considering a market cap of over $150 billion, the $1.5 billion paid for You-tube may be a worthy acquisition in the long run.
Yet, as Grant, Brett, and I have discussed, the billions of dollars spent in acquisitions is unimaginable for a simple URL.
Posted by lisun at 12:41 PM | Comments (1)