Follow your favorite blogs

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/a/google.com/File?id=c5jdf7p_470dfv63jfr_b" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" id="w_yn" src="https://docs.google.com/a/google.com/File?id=c5jdf7p_470dfv63jfr_b" style="height: 169px; width: 179px;" /></a></div><br />Some people dream of being a rock star, while others just want a few discerning souls to become avid readers of their blogs. Both are noble pursuits, but with some <a href="http://buzz.blogger.com/2008/09/new-stuff-from-picasa-folks.html">good pictures</a>, and a witty turn of phrase or two, building a Blogger fan-base may be a more attainable dream.<br /><br />At Blogger we're passionate about helping communities form around blogs. To further that goal, we've introduced a <a href="http://buzz.blogger.com/2008/08/show-off-your-followers.html">new feature</a> that lets you easily follow your favorite blogs and tell the world that you’re a fan. To follow a blog with the Followers' Gadget, simply click the “Follow This Blog” link. You can show your support for the blog by following it right from your Blogger Dashboard or in Google Reader.<br /><br />Following isn't just for bloggers, it's also designed to make it easier for readers to keep tabs on their favorite blogs. Maybe you're following a <a href="http://broomjumpingbride.blogspot.com/">wedding blog for tips</a>, have <a href="http://plushyou.blogspot.com/">a thing for plush toys</a>, or perhaps you want to keep track of <a href="http://googleforstudents.blogspot.com/">Google's university bus tour</a>.<br /><br />In addition, you can easily check out what blogs other fans are writing and following - you might even find another blog you’ll want to add to your reading list. And by the way, you can follow any blog, even if it isn't hosted on Blogger or doesn't have the Followers gadget. Just go to your Reading List in your <a href="http://www.blogger.com/">Blogger Dashboard</a>, click the “Add” button, and type in the blog’s URL. And you can even import existing subscriptions from <a href="http://reader.google.com/">Google Reader</a>.<br /><br />This feature is currently only available in English, but we plan to make it available in more languages soon. We’re also in the process of integrating with <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/05/friend-connected-web.html">Google Friend Connect</a> to add even more engaging social features to Blogger.<br /><br />So start following. We hope you become a fan.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Mendel Chuang, Product Marketing Manager</span>

Follow your favorite blogs

Some people dream of being a rock star, while others just want a few discerning souls to become avid readers of their blogs. Both are noble ...

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The future of search

<span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" ><blockquote>The Internet has had an enormous impact on people's lives around the world in the 10 years since Google's founding. It has changed politics, entertainment, culture, business, health care, the environment and just about every other topic you can think of. Which got us to thinking, what's going to happen in the next 10 years? How will this phenomenal technology evolve, how will we adapt, and (more importantly) how will it adapt to us? <span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" >We asked ten of our top experts this very question, and during September (our 10th anniversary month) </span>we are presenting their responses. As computer scientist Alan Kay has famously observed, the best way to predict the future is to invent it, so we will be doing our best to make good on our experts' words every day. - Karen Wickre and Alan Eagle, series editors.</blockquote></span>I am a search addict. I’m naturally inquisitive – I’ve always liked finding things out. Plus, I’ve worked at Google on search for the past 9 years and 3 months. Of course I search - a lot. Yet I would guess that on any given day, I only do about 20% of the searches that I could. This past Saturday, I kept track of the things that came up in conversation that I wanted to search for right then but couldn’t:<br /><br />Are "fab," "goy" and "eely" words? (There was a Scrabble game going on.) What time does J.C. Penney open on Saturday? Which school has a team called the Banana Slugs? What is the team mascot for San Jose State? How much power does that hydroelectric dam generate? What do you call a group of turkeys? What time does <span style="font-style: italic;">Tropic Thunder</span> show? What’s the name of that great Irish flute player, first name James? What’s the name of the largest city in Russia after Moscow and St. Petersburg? Which is older, a redwood or a cypress? What’s the oldest living thing and how old is it? Who sings “Queen of Hearts”? What kind of bird is that flying over there? Is the "LF" in San Francisco on Union Square or Union Street? What are the dance steps to the Charleston? What day of the week was <span style="font-style: italic;">The Lawrence Welk Show</span> on? What are the lyrics to “In the Mood”? How does Coumadin differ from aspirin in its blood thinning effects? What was the story behind the naming of the number "googol"?<br /><br />And those are just the ones that I remember. Looking at this list, two things are very clear: (1) I could do <b>a lot more</b> searches and (2) search still has a lot of opportunity for innovation, change, and progress. There are lots of ways that search will need to evolve in order to easily meet user needs. Let’s look at some of my unanswered questions from Saturday and consider how search might change over the next 10 years.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Modes</span><span style="font-size:100%;"><br />First, why couldn’t I do these searches right then, when I needed to? Because search still isn’t accessible enough or easy enough. Search needs to be more mobile – it should be available and easy to use in cell phones and in cars and on handheld, wearable devices that we don’t even have yet. For example, when the topic of the oldest living thing came up during a boat ride, everyone in the conversation was curious about it, but no one wanted to break out an awkward, slow device to do a search. It would be much nicer if we had a device with great connectivity that could do searches without interruption. One far-fetched idea: how about a wearable device that does searches in the background based on the words it picks up from conversations, and then flashes relevant facts?<br /><br />This notion brings up yet another way that “modes” of search will change – voice and natural language search. You should be able to talk to a search engine in your voice. You should also be able to ask questions verbally or by typing them in as natural language expressions. You shouldn’t have to break everything down into keywords.<br /><br />Further, why should a search be words at all? Why can’t I enter my query as a picture of the birds overhead and have the search engine identify what kind of bird it is? Why can’t I capture a snippet of audio and have the search engine identify and analyze it (a song or a stream of conversation) and tell me any relevant information about it? Services that do parts of that are available today, but not in an easy-to-use, integrated way.<br /><br />In the next 10 years, we will see radical advances in modes of search: mobile devices offering us easier search, Internet capabilities deployed in more devices, and different ways of entering and expressing your queries by voice, natural language, picture, or song, just to name a few. It’s clear that while keyword-based searching is incredibly powerful, it’s also incredibly limiting. These new modes will be one of the most sweeping changes in search.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b>Media</b></span><br />Then there’s the media aspect. The 10 blue links offered as results for Internet search can be amazing and even life-changing, but when you are trying to remember the steps to the Charleston, a textual web page isn’t going to be nearly as helpful as a video. The media of the results matters.<br /><br /><a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/05/behind-scenes-with-universal-search.html" id="py-o" title="Universal search">Universal search</a>, which we released last May, was an important first step that included images, videos, news, books, and maps/local information in our main Google search results. Yet our presentation is still very linear (the results are just a list) and even (no one result is more important or larger than the next). What if the results page began to transform radically to really harness these different types of results into something that felt much more like an answer rather than just 10 independent guesses? What if results pages pulled the best media together and laid it out such that the most useful content was not only first but largest? What if we laid out content in columns to use more of the width available on newer, wider screens?<br /><br />We’ve barely scratched the surface with universal search, but it’s an important first step to exploring the full range of what we can do with rich media. For the past year, our goal has been to take advantage of these new types of results and evolve the interface design and user experience in response. You’ll see the fruits of this experimentation in the coming months, but even these changes are just the beginning. The face of search will change dramatically over the next 10 years. Maybe it should contain even more videos and images, maybe it should sharply differentiate the relative weight and accuracy of the results more, maybe it should be more interactive in terms of refinements? We’re not sure yet, but we do know that the one thing that the search experience can’t be - especially in the face of the online media explosion we’re currently experiencing - is stagnant.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Personalization</span></span><br /></span></span><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Search engines 10 years from now will be a lot better than the ones we have now. We know this because Google itself gets a little better each day. We’re constantly writing and revising new notions of search relevance, and we release improvements almost daily. Those improvements add up for us and for other search engines, so it follows that search engines 10 years from now will be markedly better. Therefore, the real question is not <i>will </i>search be better, but rather<i> how</i> will it be better?</span><br /><br />One answer is clear: search engines of the future will be better in part because they will understand more about you, the individual user. Of course, you will be in control of your personal information, and whatever personal information the search engine uses will be with your permission and will be transparent to you. But even with the most rudimentary user information, search engines can and will provide drastically better search results. Maybe the search engines of the future will know where you are located, maybe they will know what you know already or what you learned earlier today, or maybe they will fully understand your preferences because you have chosen to share that information with us. We aren't sure which personal signals will be most valuable, but we're investing in research and experimentation on personalized search now because we think this will be very important later.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">Location </span></span><br />Your location is one potentially useful facet of personalized information. Looking at my questions, the answers to a number of them (What time does J.C. Penney open? How much power does that hydroelectric dam generate? What time does <i>Tropic Thunder</i> play?) require the search engine to know that I was in Yankton, South Dakota and Crofton, Nebraska when I asked. Since location is relevant to a lot of searches, incorporating user location and context will be pivotal in increasing the relevance and ease of search in the future.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >Social</span><br />Another element of personalization is social context. Who am I friends with, and how do I relate to them? How can I harness their knowledge more efficiently? For example, I have a friend who works at a store called LF in Los Angeles (hence, the question about LF in San Francisco). By itself, “LF” is a very ambiguous acronym. According to the first page of search results on Google, it could refer to my friend’s trendy fashion store, but it could also refer to Leapfrog Enterprises, low frequency, Lebhar-Friedman, Li & Fung Investment Group, LF Driscoll Construction Management, large format, or a future concept car design from Lexus. Today, the person typing “LF” has to figure out which is the right result – to “disambiguate” the ambiguous term – but this is something that the search engine needs to get better at. Perhaps we’ll understand the semantics of the question about where LF in San Francisco is, and infer that LF is a store. Or maybe, search could analyze my social graph and realize that one of my friends works at LF, that I saw that friend this weekend, and that in that context “LF” refers to her place of employment. Algorithmic analysis of the user’s social graph to further refine a query or disambiguate it could prove very useful in the future.<br /><br />In addition, there are searches where actually asking a friend helps. I was having a hard time finding out the answer to the question about aspirin versus Coumadin because I was spelling it ‘cumitin’ and Google wasn’t correcting me. A quick email to a doctor friend, and I was back on the right track - equipped with the right spelling and his explanation of the difference, so I could search and learn even more about how these two drugs are used to thin blood. There’s a lot of expertise, knowledge, and context in users’ social graphs, so putting tools in place to make “friend-augmented" search easy could make search more efficient and more relevant.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Language</span><br />The above examples show how modes, media, and various forms of personalization have the potential to vastly improve search – but what about language? We know there are cases where an answer exists on the web, but not in a language you read. This is why Google is investing in machine translation. We want to be able to unlock the power of web search for anyone speaking any language. The basic concept is – if the answer exists online anywhere in any language, we’ll go get it for you, translate it and bring it back in your native tongue. This is an incredibly empowering idea that could really change the way that users experience the web and communicate with each other, particularly in languages where not a lot of native content is available. You can see our early explorations in this space here, by visiting our <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate_s" id="ki0d" title="cross-language information retrieval tool">cross-language information retrieval tool</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Conclusion </span><br />We’re all familiar with 80-20 problems, where the last 20% of the solution is 80% of the work. Search is a 90-10 problem. Today, we have a 90% solution: I could answer all of my unanswered Saturday questions, not ideally or easily, but I could get it done with today’s search tool. (If you’re curious, the answers are below.) However, that remaining 10% of the problem really represents 90% (in fact, more than 90%) of the work. Coming up with elegant, fitting and relevant solutions to meet the challenges of mobility, modes, media, personalization, location, socialization, and language will take decades. Search is a science that will develop and advance over hundreds of years. Think of it like biology and physics in the 1500s or 1600s: it’s a new science where we make big and exciting breakthroughs all the time. However, it could be a hundred years or more before we have microscopes and an understanding of the proverbial molecules and atoms of search. Just like biology and physics several hundred years ago, the biggest advances are yet to come. That’s what makes the field of Internet search so exciting.<br /><br />So what's our straightforward definition of the ideal search engine? Your best friend with instant access to all the world’s facts and a photographic memory of everything you’ve seen and know. That search engine could tailor answers to you based on your preferences, your existing knowledge and the best available information; it could ask for clarification and present the answers in whatever setting or media worked best. That ideal search engine could have easily and elegantly quenched my withdrawal and fueled my addiction on Saturday. I’m very proud that Google in its first 10 years has changed expectations around information and how quickly and easily it should be able to be retrieved. But I’m even more excited about what Google search can achieve in the future.<br /><br />And here, in order, are the answers to my Saturday questions.<br /><br />Are fab, goy, and eely words? Yes, yes, and yes, according to Merriam-Webster:<br />Search: [fab site:m-w.com ]<br />Result: <a href="http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/fab">http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/fab</a><br />Search: [goy site:m-w.com]<br />Result: </span></span><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><a href="http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/goy">http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/goy</a></span></span><br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Search:[eely site:m-w.com ]<br />Result: <a href="http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/eely">http://dev.m-w.com/dictionary/eely</a><br /><br />What time does J.C. Penney open on Saturday? 10 a.m.<br />Search: [jc penney yankton ]<br />Hours on results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=jcpenney+yankton">http://www.google.com/search?q=jcpenney+yankton</a><br /><br />Which school has a team called the Banana Slugs? University of California, Santa Cruz<br />Search: [banana slugs]<br />Result: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California,_Santa_Cruz">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California,_Santa_Cruz</a><br /><br />What is the team mascot for San Jose State? The San Jose State Spartans<br />Search: [san jose state mascot]<br />On results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=san+jose+state+mascot">http://www.google.com/search?q=san+jose+state+mascot</a><br /><br />How much power does that hydroelectric dam generate? $35M of electricity annually<br />Search: [hydroelectric dam crofton yankton]<br />Search: [gavins point dam]<br />Result: <a href="https://www.nwo.usace.army.mil/html/Lake_Proj/gavinspoint/welcome.html">https://www.nwo.usace.army.mil/html/Lake_Proj/gavinspoint/welcome.html</a><br /><br />What do you call a group of turkeys? A rafter of turkeys<br />Search: [group of turkeys]<br />On results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=group+of+turkeys">http://www.google.com/search?q=group+of+turkeys</a><br /><br />What time does <i>Tropic Thunder</i> show? 7 p.m.<br />Search: [movies yankton mall]<br />Result: <a href="http://www.moviefone.com/theater/carmike-cinemas-yankton-mall-5/9346/showtimes">http://www.moviefone.com/theater/carmike-cinemas-yankton-mall-5/9346/showtimes</a><br /><br />What’s the name of that great Irish flute player, first name James? James Galway<br />Search: [irish flute player james]<br />On results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=irish+flute+player+james">http://www.google.com/search?q=irish+flute+player+james</a><br /><br />What’s the name of the largest city in Russia after Moscow and St. Petersburg? </span></span>Novosibirsk<br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;">Search: [largest Russian cities]<br />Result: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_and_towns_in_Russia_by_population">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_and_towns_in_Russia_by_population</a><br /><br />What’s older, a redwood or a cypress? Cypresses (4500 years old is oldest known) are older than redwoods (2200 years old is oldest known)<br />Search: [cypress tree age]<br />Result: <a href="http://www.payvand.com/news/08/apr/1253.html">http://www.payvand.com/news/08/apr/1253.html</a><br />Search: [redwood tree age]<br />Result: <a href="http://www.sempervirens.org/sequoiasemp.htm">http://www.sempervirens.org/sequoiasemp.htm</a><br /><br />What’s the oldest living thing and how old is it? The bristlecone pine, living for 5,000-11,000 years<br />Search: [oldest living thing]<br />Result: <a href="http://waynesword.palomar.edu/ww0601.htm">http://waynesword.palomar.edu/ww0601.htm</a><br /><a href="http://hubpages.com/hub/Oldest_living_thing">http://hubpages.com/hub/Oldest_living_thing</a><br /><br />Who sings “Queen of Hearts”? Juice Newton<br />Search: ["queen of hearts" song]<br />On results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?%20=%22queen+of+hearts%22+song">http://www.google.com/search? =%22queen+of+hearts%22+song</a><br /><br />What kind of bird is that flying over there? A turkey vulture<br />Search: [turkey vulture flying] on Google image search<br />Pictures that match on results page: <a href="http://images.google.com/images?q=turkey%20vulture%20flying">http://images.google.com/images?q=turkey%20vulture%20flying</a><br /><br />Is the LF in San Francisco on Union Square or Union Street? 1870 Union Street<br />Search: [lf san francisco]<br />Address on results page: <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=lf+san+francisco">http://www.google.com/search?q=lf+san+francisco</a><br /><br />What are the dance steps to the Charleston? Show in video below<br />Search : [Charleston dance demonstration]<br />Video result: <a href="http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zzyg7l6qxNQ">http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zzyg7l6qxNQ</a><br /><br />What day of the week was <i>The Lawrence Welk Show </i>on? Saturday<br />Search: [lawrence welk show]<br />Result: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lawrence_Welk_Show">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lawrence_Welk_Show</a><br /><br />What are the lyrics to “In the Mood”?<br />“In the mood, that's what he told me,<br />In the mood, and when he told me,<br />In the mood, my heart was skippin',<br />It didn't take me long to say "I'm in the mood now".”<br />Search: [“in the mood” lyrics]<br />Result: <a href="http://www.lyricsdepot.com/glenn-miller/in-the-mood.html">http://www.lyricsdepot.com/glenn-miller/in-the-mood.html</a><br /><br />How does Coumadin differ from aspirin in its blood thinning effects? Aspirin is an anti-platelet agent that prevents clotting. Coumadin also prevents clotting but the mechanism is different. Both thin the blood, but Coumadin is stronger and much more effective in certain instances like atrial fibrillation.<br />Search: [aspirin Coumadin how different]<br />Result: <a href="http://www.stmaryhealthcare.org/body.cfm?id=250">http://www.stmaryhealthcare.org/body.cfm?id=250</a><br /><br />What was the story behind the naming of the number "googol"?<br />Search: [number googol named]<br />Result: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintillion#The_googol_family">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintillion#The_googol_family</a><br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products & User Experience</span></span></span>

The future of search

The Internet has had an enormous impact on people's lives around the world in the 10 years since Google's founding. It has changed p...

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Appy trails

A few weeks ago <a href="http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2008/07/enterprise-blog-post-announcing-bus.html" id="j2gy" target="_blank" title="we announced">we announced</a> our adventurous (some call it crazy) plan to drive across the US in an eco-friendly retrofitted 1970s bus, visiting ten college campuses that have deployed <a href="http://google.com/a/edu" id="jk41" title="Google Apps Education Edition">Google Apps Education Edition</a>. Well, we just hit the street, and starting this week we will be visiting thousands of college students across the country to hear how Google Apps is helping them to <a href="http://google.com/apps/students" id="n1.-" target="_blank" title="bring learning into the cloud">bring learning into the cloud</a>. You can keep up with the bus at <a href="http://www.google.com/apps/bus" id="bulk" target="_blank" title="www.google.com/apps/bus">www.google.com/apps/bus</a> through maps, photos, videos, and live blog posts on our recently launched the <a href="http://googleforstudents.blogspot.com/" id="p0ds" target="_blank" title="Google for Students blog">Google Students blog</a>.<br /><br />In addition to the bus, a few other things are getting us excited, like the <a href="http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2008/09/google-bus-goes-app-to-school.html" id="n_jw">17 new schools</a> that have chosen Google Apps in the last few weeks, taking us to over two million active users. And then there's a new feature to celebrate: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWzwLGJ0BIo" id="v2tk" target="_blank" title="Google Video for Education">Google Video for Apps</a>, which enables schools to securely share videos of recorded classes, lectures, school events, and more.<br /><br />With these developments, I guess it's "so long" to summer. It really is time for us to head <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfSw7EUP0VE" id="rb9r">App to School</a>...<br /><br /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf" flashvars="host=picasaweb.google.com&RGB=0x000000&feed=http%3A%2F%2Fpicasaweb.google.com%2Fdata%2Ffeed%2Fapi%2Fuser%2FApptoSchool%2Falbumid%2F5243782232803070769%3Fkind%3Dphoto%26alt%3Drss" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" width="288" height="192"></embed><br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Miriam Schneider, Associate Product Marketing Manager</span>

Appy trails

A few weeks ago we announced our adventurous (some call it crazy) plan to drive across the US in an eco-friendly retrofitted 1970s bus, vis...

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More eye candy for iGoogle

In case you're looking for some more personality to add to your iGoogle page, we've just launched a fresh collection of iGoogle artist themes -- an ongoing project we launched in April for which we invited world-class artists to design dynamic themes for your iGoogle homepage.<br /><br />The new collection features designs from 28 leading artists from the worlds of fashion and music. This group is amazing, spanning a wide range of styles and genres: <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/radiohead.html" id="w.x3" title="Radiohead">Radiohead</a> and <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/barkley.html" id="m4cc" title="Gnarls Barkley">Gnarls Barkley</a> used radiant colors; <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/gucci.html" id="hfiz" title="Gucci">Gucci</a>, <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/burberry.html" id="f_ek" title="Burberry">Burberry</a>, and <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/wang.html" id="p_uy" title="Vera Wang">Vera Wang</a> illustrated beautiful patterns; and <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/dylan.html" id="h3o:" title="Bob Dylan">Bob Dylan</a> and <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/artists/dion.html" id="q4os" title="Celine Dion">Celine Dion</a> created an iconic look (of course). So depending on what you're interested in, there's lots of great art to choose from to suit your personality, taste or mood.<br /><br />Why did we focus on musicians and fashion designers this round? It's often the clothes we wear and the music we listen to that help express our personality and style. And when we first unveiled iGoogle artist themes, we heard that many of you wanted even more themes in these areas. We hope this new collection gives you more choices so that your iGoogle page reflects your personal style.<br /><br />So check out the <a href="http://www.google.com/help/ig/art/" id="oko5" title="new collection of themes">new collection of themes</a> and pick one that appeals to you. Changing it up is easy and requires only a few clicks. If you have a hard time selecting just one, add the <a href="http://www.google.com/ig/directory?type=themes&sort=popular&url=skins/sampler.xml" id="pu_l" title="sampler theme">sampler theme</a>, which displays a different artist every day.<br /><br />Stay tuned as we continue to collaborate with more artists from around the world.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqY5Z3N30t0zkYLwsv9OxZO1n-Z7VMbQFvGlxr68rY616QzdFqBuVEbuCphA1sKVtKCuH_KkJ_mkijUOTIHX1VwwOBAMbJ2pjS36w31ocXFoRifV-uGYECWMsreWXRhyjOJuUujwB9LxQ4/s1600-h/BlogImage.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5244193384303668290" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqY5Z3N30t0zkYLwsv9OxZO1n-Z7VMbQFvGlxr68rY616QzdFqBuVEbuCphA1sKVtKCuH_KkJ_mkijUOTIHX1VwwOBAMbJ2pjS36w31ocXFoRifV-uGYECWMsreWXRhyjOJuUujwB9LxQ4/s320/BlogImage.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a><br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products & User Experience and Michaela Prescott, Product Marketing Manager </span>

More eye candy for iGoogle

In case you're looking for some more personality to add to your iGoogle page, we've just launched a fresh collection of iGoogle arti...

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At the Republican Convention: Politics in the cloud and on the ground

After <a href="http://www.google.com/gustav_sept08.html">Hurricane Gustav</a> blew through and Americans started <a href="http://www.google.com/trends?q=sarah+palin&date=mtd&geo=usa&ctab=0&sort=0&sa=N">searching for Sarah Palin</a>, the Google and YouTube teams got down to business at the Republican Convention.<br /><br />A large part of Google's work with the convention lived in the clouds. Delegates registered and stayed informed through a <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10031540-38.html">cloud-based system</a> that combined SalesForce and Google technology. The new system means simpler, faster communication with delegates when it mattered most - as the convention had to quickly inform large delegations about the latest updates on Hurricane Gustav.<br /><br />Members of the media were able to search schedules, speeches, releases, bios and video put out by the Convention on their <a href="http://portal.gopconvention2008.com/">News and Media Portal System powered by Google</a>. The site put a range of Google tools to use - from Picasa to Calendar to Site Search - to give reporters fast access to information coming out of the Xcel Center.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFEZ3kn-bsLhKAk5p8EQfUTovVCZ5FxNGfwX_wAensmL4tMjAznWENHPZn0ntnvIwrhnGx-vZ6zMTIlz9kGx1BpvsuFaoRFXF-PtdjsiWiAfRjFsUSPLFaeWZ2OOKH7sUgJxCH351be1GI/s1600-h/Picture+1.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5244158863994124370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFEZ3kn-bsLhKAk5p8EQfUTovVCZ5FxNGfwX_wAensmL4tMjAznWENHPZn0ntnvIwrhnGx-vZ6zMTIlz9kGx1BpvsuFaoRFXF-PtdjsiWiAfRjFsUSPLFaeWZ2OOKH7sUgJxCH351be1GI/s320/Picture+1.png" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a>Google hosted two blogger brunches with <a href="http://www.redstate.com/">RedState.com</a>. At the first, Fred Thompson gave a rousing talk the morning of his convention speech about the changes that needed to be made in Washington, conservative values and strengths of both Senator McCain and Governor Palin. At the second, Google CEO Eric Schmidt emphasized the importance of conservative bloggers and rise of new media this election cycle.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the YouTube team was quite busy collecting videos throughout the week. At upload booths stationed in the Xcel Energy Center, and on a mobile camera roving through the Convention hall, nearly 500 RNC attendees took the opportunity to post their thoughts onto YouTube. Among those to upload from the Convention were actor <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl6MhewYuLk">Jon Voight</a>, former congressman <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9InmUZRsyI">Tom Delay</a>, and former House Speaker <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KW_novhtDqo">Dennis Hastert</a>, CNN's <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_vG1cK30l8">Jon King</a>, and former Virginia <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-bc3mtj_d0">Senator George Allen</a>:<br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/y-bc3mtj_d0&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/y-bc3mtj_d0&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />In addition, the GOP staff uploaded all of the major <a href="http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=E26B7114760B5BA0">speeches</a> from the Convention to their <a href="http://www.youtube.com/gopconvention">YouTube Channel</a>, including both <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrlkcMOMhrQ">McCain</a> and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKgNrb3baNM">Palin's</a> acceptance speeches, as well as <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm_v804KtRQ">behind-the-scenes footage</a> and videos from <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAv5XaqYDgk">events</a> around the Convention center.<br /><br />To celebrate the closing night of the convention, <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/anneschroeder/0908/The_Last_Party.html?showall">we partnered with Vanity Fair to throw a party</a> for press, celebrities, political leaders and executives in attendance. Guests grabbed a few treats from the open candy bar and enjoyed catering from Wolfgang Puck at the Walker Art Center.<br /><br />If both conventions were any indication of the general election, the Republicans and Democrats will go head to head in their use of technology and the Internet to reach voters, spread their message and bring more Americans into the election. You can stay up to date on the Google's election efforts on our <a href="http://www.google.com/2008election/">US Election page</a>.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Niki Fenwick and Jake Parillo, Republican Convention Team</span>

At the Republican Convention: Politics in the cloud and on the ground

After Hurricane Gustav blew through and Americans started searching for Sarah Palin , the Google and YouTube teams got down to business at ...

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Update to Google Suggest

There's been quite a bit of comment in the last few days about Google Suggest, particularly how it's used in Google Chrome. Google Suggest is actually built into a number of different products including Google Search, Google Toolbar, browsers like Google Chrome and Firefox, and the Google Search application on the iPhone.<br /><br />But what is <a href="http://www.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=106230&hl=en">Google Suggest</a>? It's a feature designed to make searching both faster and easier. Whether you are typing into the search box on Google Toolbar or Google.com, or the Omnibox in Google Chrome, Google Suggest guesses what you're typing and offers suggestions in real time. So for example, if you type "bass," Google Suggest might offer a list of refinements that include "bass fishing" or "bass guitar." Similarly, if you type in only part of a word, like "prog," Google Suggest might offer you refinements such as "programming," "programming languages," "progesterone," or "progressive." Again, these suggestions allow you to enter your searches faster, but also in a way that will more likely get you the results you're looking for.<br /><br />That's what occurs on the surface of Google Suggest. Here's what happens under the hood. To provide its recommendations Google Suggest needs to know what you've already typed, so these partial queries are sent to Google. For 98% of these requests, we don't log any data at all and simply return the suggestions. For the remaining 2% of cases (which we select randomly), we do log data, like IP addresses, in order to monitor and improve the service.<br /><br />However, given the concerns that have been raised about Google storing this information -- and its limited potential use -- we decided that we will anonymize it within about 24 hours (basically, as soon as we practically can) in the 2% of Google Suggest requests we use. This will take a little time to implement, but we expect it to be in place before the end of the month.<br /><br />All data retention is a balance between user privacy and trust on the one hand, and security and innovation on the other. In the case of Google Suggest we decided it's possible to provide a great service while anonymizing data almost immediately. But in other cases - such as our core web search - storing data like IP addresses for a time is crucial to make <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/making-search-better-in-catalonia.html" target="_blank" title="improvements to search quality">improvements to search quality</a>, <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-log-data-to-help-keep-you-safe.html" target="_blank" title="improve security">improve security</a>, <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-data-to-help-prevent-fraud.html" target="_blank" title="fight fraud">fight fraud</a> and <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/using-data-to-fight-webspam.html" target="_blank" title="reduce spam">reduce spam</a>.<br /><br />You can read more about our privacy policies on the <a href="http://www.google.com/privacy.html" target="_blank" title="Google Privacy Center">Google Privacy Center</a>, check out the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLgJYBRzUXY" style="font-style: italic;" target="_blank" title="Google Search Privacy: Plain and Simple">Google Search Privacy: Plain and Simple</a> video for more information about how our server logs work.<br /><br /><b><span style="font-style: italic;">Update</span> May 21, 2013: </b>We have updated our Autocomplete (formerly known as Suggest) and Instant logging policies. For the most recent information about these policies, see the <a href="http://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/browser/privacy/whitepaper.html">Chrome Privacy Whitepaper</a>.<br /><br /><b><span style="font-style: italic;">Update</span> October 5, 2010: </b>We launched Google Instant last month, and we now store Google Instant's partial query data for up to two weeks in unanonymized form, at which time we will delete 100 percent of it. These data retention changes apply only to queries made when Google Instant is active.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Urs Hölzle, Senior Vice President, Operations</span>

Update to Google Suggest

There's been quite a bit of comment in the last few days about Google Suggest, particularly how it's used in Google Chrome. Google S...

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Another step to protect user privacy

Today, we're announcing a new logs retention policy: we'll anonymize IP addresses on our server logs after 9 months. We're significantly shortening our previous 18-month retention policy to address regulatory concerns and to take another step to improve privacy for our users.<br /><br />Back in March 2007, Google became the first leading search engine to <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/03/taking-steps-to-further-improve-our.html" id="v087" title="announce">announce</a> a policy to anonymize our search server logs in the interests of privacy. And many others in the industry quickly followed our lead. Although that was good for privacy, it was a difficult decision because the routine server log data we collect has always been a critical ingredient of innovation. We have published a <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-data-matters.html" id="ven6" title="series">series</a> of blog posts explaining how we use logs data for the benefit of our users: to make <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/making-search-better-in-catalonia.html" id="ixci" title="improvements to search quality">improvements to search quality</a>, <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-log-data-to-help-keep-you-safe.html" id="pq9f" title="improve security">improve security</a>, <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-data-to-help-prevent-fraud.html" id="d3kn" title="fight fraud">fight fraud</a> and <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/using-data-to-fight-webspam.html" id="vksr" title="reduce spam">reduce spam</a>. <br /><br />Over the last two years, policymakers and regulators -- especially in Europe and the U.S. -- have continued to ask us (and others in the industry) to explain and justify this shortened logs retention policy. We responded by <a href="http://services.google.com/blog_resources/Google_response_Working_Party_06_2007.pdf" id="u8i6" title="open letter">open letter</a> to explain how we were trying to strike the right balance between sometimes conflicting factors like privacy, security, and innovation. Some in the community of EU data protection regulators continued to be skeptical of the legitimacy of logs retention and <a href="http://www.cbpweb.nl/downloads_int/Opinie%20WP29%20zoekmachines.pdf" id="gtak" title="demanded detailed justifications">demanded detailed justifications</a> for this retention. Many of these privacy leaders also highlighted the risks of litigants using court-ordered discovery to gain access to logs, as in the recent Viacom suit.<br /><br />Today, we are filing <a href="http://services.google.com/blog_resources/Google_response_Working_Party_06_2007.pdf">this response</a> (PDF file) to the EU privacy regulators. Since we announced our original logs anonymization policy, we have had literally hundreds of discussions with data protection officials, government leaders and privacy advocates around the world to explain our privacy practices and to work together to develop ways to improve privacy. When we began anonymizing after 18 months, we knew it meant sacrifices in future innovations in all of these areas. We believed further reducing the period before anonymizing would degrade the utility of the data too much and outweigh the incremental privacy benefit for users.<br /><br />We didn't stop working on this computer science problem, though. The problem is difficult to solve because the characteristics of the data that make it useful to prevent fraud, for example, are the very characteristics that also introduce some privacy risk. After months of work our engineers developed methods for preserving more of the data's utility while also anonymizing IP addresses sooner. We haven't sorted out all of the implementation details, and we may not be able to use precisely the same methods for anonymizing as we do after 18 months, but we are committed to making it work.<br /><br />While we're glad that this will bring some additional improvement in privacy, we're also concerned about the potential loss of security, quality, and innovation that may result from having less data. As the period prior to anonymization gets shorter, the added privacy benefits are less significant and the utility lost from the data grows. So, it's difficult to find the perfect equilibrium between privacy on the one hand, and other factors, such as innovation and security, on the other. Technology will certainly evolve, and we will always be working on ways to improve privacy for our users, seeking new innovations, and also finding the right balance between the benefits of data and advancement of privacy.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Peter Fleischer, Global Privacy Counsel; Jane Horvath, Senior Privacy Counsel; and Alma Whitten, Software Engineer</span>

Another step to protect user privacy

Today, we're announcing a new logs retention policy: we'll anonymize IP addresses on our server logs after 9 months. We're signi...

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