One Map To Rule Them All.

So this is pretty sweet. About a year ago I was in the Caribbean. It was nice. Then sometime after I got back Google launched something called "Map Maker". Its basically a copy of Google maps that people can edit in certain regions, wiki-style. One of those not mapped was Grand Cayman, which I had limited but first-hand knowledge of. So I went to town making little roads and buildings, trying to match up the satellite image with my memory and photos I'd taken. After a little searching I even found a scanned tourist map of the area that told me road names and points of interest. I digitized as much as made sense and promptly forgot about it. My knowledge was pretty much exhausted after 21.9 km of roads and 22 business listings, hey, I was only there for a few hours.

As of today, my account is 337 days old and Google is announcing that they're rolling Map Maker changes into real Google Maps for those newly updated areas.

• Google LatLong: Map Maker Graduation: Part II

A quick comparison shows that, yup, maps looks pretty much the same as the user generated map Maker version. But more importantly is how much detail is found on Grand Cayman now. There was literally nothing there when I started. (actually the island polygon was .5 km west of the satellite imagery) And random people with personal experience filled in the gaps. Other people helped with formatting and bam, all of a sudden there's a useful reference tool online.

• Map Maker

I guess I find this interesting because its what I though they were going for when they started the project and it actually worked. To try crowd sourcing obscure information. People don't really want compensation, they just want to collaborate, and maybe hope that people who know something they don't will share too.

I Got It!

After getting so pumped up about google voice I had to sit and simmer till it was my turn to get upgraded. But the time finally came and it looks pretty snazzy. My google contacts are all there instead of my grandcentral ones, which is great because i never put much effort into my GC list. Also on the great list is the "call presentation" option. This is the message that's played when you answer a call from grandcentral. Your caller Id will give the caller's number, but when you answer a voice tells you who's calling and lists options to answer, send to voicemail, or listen in. This is a nice feature when you're not sure who's calling, but kind of a pain when I thought I was answering a call from a friend and have to hit 1 to actually talk to them. So now I can set either by group or individual whether I want to hear that prompt of just immediately answer when I pick up. Pretty sweet. The only downside is that if they do go to voicemail, it'll be my phone's vm, which won't transcribe and email me. Anyway, I'm still testing it out, but so far it looks pretty well thought out and the new SMS feature totally works. So your GV number now works like you'd expect a phone number would.

Here's a widget that'll let you leave me a voicemail:

(keep it clean)

Talk Googly To Me.

Sweet! Looks like Google is finally ready to transition Grand Central into a grown-up Google app. Its gonna be called Google Voice and is open to everyone who already has a grand central account. What? You didn't sign up when I told you to? Oh, well then you'll just have to wait like a sucker till it gets rolled out to the plebes. I guess you can take a look to see what you're missing.

• Google Voice-Features

So, most excitingly, there's a voice mail transcripts feature. Which I assume will just plunk peoples' VM into your gmail inbox with all the other messages you care about. Which seems pretty cool and even more exciting when you imagine the kind of Android implementation this service will get. So it looks like someone's realized that messaging is messaging, and I don't care what medium is used. The less places I have to check for new communications the better. Throw them all in the same inbox and use filters to sort if necessary.

It'll also be nice when they integrate my gmail contacts list with the Grand Central list that I never maintained all that well. Google, keeping your informations sorted and updated and happy.

• Official Google Blog: Here comes Google Voice

P.S. What's up with the sample video? "I left the secret plans on your desk?" Sounds a little shady... Are they finally ready to launch that space laser?

P.P.S. Still waiting on my upgrade link in Grand Central, apparently it could take days for the roll-out to finish. Why did I get so excited this morning?

• google voice blog

The System Is Down.

Now this is nice. I like more of an explanation than "the service was out; now its not" and the incident report gives a bit more detail. Although its a little vague about exactly what happened, you get the jist that they had a bug in their server load sharing algorithm, so when one was taken off-line for maintenance, too many people were redirected to another. The "multiple downstream overload conditions" sounds like a neat cascading system of propagating errors. But maybe I'm a big dork.

• Apps Status Dashboard

P.S. The System Is Down is a nice beat for all your lightswitch rave needs.

P.S.S. I totally didn't notice this outtage and I'm on the gmails like all effing day.

Touch Me Twice.

I could see Apple being the type of company that restricts users and intellectual "property" to keep them tethered to its own devices. Which is what most lends credence to this rumor of Apple asking Google to remove multi-touch from its Android OS. And that's what it looks like happened, the feature was implemented and then commented out of the release. Although its not that big a deal if you really care about it. Android is open source, just uncomment the feature and run your own build. The real question is whether Android developers will anticipate an audience of "hacked" multi-touch users and include functions to take advantage.

Some people raise flags that Apple could seemingly command partner Google, and rather than risk the fickle reprisals in which Apple is known to engage. Yeah, that's kinda silly, but I'd rather keep my Google brand iPod apps and the G1 not be tied up in litigation, so I'm fine with Google's decision. I think the real problem is that Apple thinks it owns multi-touch to begin with. Folks have been working on multi-touch since 1982, and sure, Apple brought a device to maket with the technology after buying up a company that made then since 1999. But come on, using more than one finger to interact with a device? How in the hell is that not obvious? Hmmm... I've made a touch screen that responds when I touch it with my finger... I have ten fingers... I guess I'm all done here.

And even if you are an Apple fanboy, this shouldn't seem cool because now instead of dreaming up that next great feature, Apple can sit around on the multi-touch hill, making sure no one else tries to climb it.

• Did Google Leave Multi-Touch Out Of Android At Apple's Behest? | Techdirt

All Growed Up.

That was fast.  I feel like 100 days is some kind of record for a Google product coming out of beta. (gmail is still beta 4 and a half years later)  But the switch has been flipped and Chrome is now no longer one of the many undercooked (half-baked?) ideas simmering in the Google Labs.  Make sure to click "wrench -> about" to check for the latest version. (1.0.154.36)  Hopefully there'll be support for extensions soon to take care of those ads.

• Official Google Blog: Google Chrome (BETA)

At Long Freaking Last!

Wow, I was beginning to think this day would never come. A day of hope and enlightenment for all. Real change in the way business gets done in DC. Yes, today Google released Street View Data for Washington DC and Baltimore! Let the people pour from their buildings and dance in the streets! Hooray!

• GOOGLE Lat Long BLog: Street View Elects DC, Baltimore and Seattle

and holy crap is there a lot of coverage.

Drunk Dialing Is So 2003.

I dunno if you're familiar with your "labs" tab in gmail (I'm assuming you have gmail because everyone who's anyone does) but there are some interesting little alpha customizations you can enable there.  Take, for example, this one I saw today.

Now, I know they don't exactly come out and say it, but this tool is obviously designed to keep you from belligerently drunk emailing inappropriate things to your less understanding friends / coworkers.  Just enter the days and times you're likely to be plastered and google's got your back.  Too bad I can also send gmails from my phone though...

Oh Billy!

Brace yourself to be overwhelmed by a flood of communications. (Actually just me cause you losers don't have Helios. I'm just bragging.) When I first got my Ocean it had POP email access to my gmail account. Then Google added in IMAP support so that my inbox online was synced with the inbox in my pocket. Pretty sweet, but it wasn't push. That is, I had to check for new mail by hand. Like a barbarian. Well those days are spent cause Helio just rolled out push email to all its devices. I'm not really sure how that works (isn't it gmail that pushes to Helio?) but I'm not gonna start rocking the boat. My gmails and jmails show up on the alerts menu like SMSes, missed calls and voicemails. Of course anyone who reads this will be all over those "oh, I haven't checked my email" excuses like rasberry jam on a hot, buttered english muffin. Crannies, nooks, whatever. So bring on the information glut in full 3G fashion. I hope I don't drown.

• Heliocity: Gmail gets Push

Oh, and check out this video about SMSing. Its got an amusing main character who you might recognize from the pictures above.
Heliocity: texting your way to love

Street View Club.

You're never gonna come and do this in DC are you? I'd hoped you were up for trying to cover important parts of major cities. I mean, how kickass are the street views in DC? You can't walk half a block without finding a memorial or statue or iconic building. But no, you seem to only be interested in cities where you can document a good segment of streets without getting abducted and waterboarded by the federal government. Its all part of the experience! Oh, hey, if we ever actually get that state voting rights deal we should replace "Taxation without representation" on our license plates with "I'll waterboard you motherf*&ker".

12 more cities added to the street view list, none of them useful to me.

* Albany and Schenectady, NY
* Boise, ID
* Juneau, AK
* Kansas City, MO (home of the railway station!)
* Manchester, NH
* Milwaukee, WI
* Research Triangle Park (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill), NC
* San Antonio, TX
* Salt Lake City, UT

• Google LatLong: A dozen more cities in Street View

I Don't Call 411

Not cause it costs money, but because I don't like to talk to people on the phone.  Ok, yeah, I also don't call cause it costs money.  But now there's Google Voice Local Search, which eliminates both those problems.

You know how Google started connecting you to businesses via Google Maps a while ago with Click To Call?  And you also probably know about Google SMS, where you get specific search results by sending SMSes to GOOGLE.  Well mash those two up and throw in a dash of voice recognition and you've got GVLS.  Its not a very catchy name, but very descriptive.

Check it out, pretty cool if not completely functional.
1-800-466-4411 (1-800-GOOG-411)

• Google Voice Local Search

Snap.

Well, I pulled the trigger (or maybe I should say shutter release) on a new camera.  I've been thinking about it for a while now.  You may recall that I was debating buying a camera or a TV the year before I bought my TV.  Anyway, I did my taxes this week and decided it was time to get all up ons with a DSLR.  For those of you who don't know, that means 'fancy camera box'.  I went into the project thinking that I'd just spend my tax refund on it, but that's not gonna cut it.  Although it is cheaper than my TV was.  So far.  See, I went for the XTi kit which is the body with a 18-55mm lens included (so I don't have to shop around right away) for about a benjamin more.  All the reviews said it was an ok lens, worth about the hundred, but you get what you pay for.  So I will eventually want to get another lens, which at 300-500 for a reasonable one will boost me up beyond flat TV range.  But I figure I'll feel better about myself going out and taking pictures than sitting around watching movies.

Anyway, I hope to share a few nicer shots here once in a while, but don't worry, I'll still thrown down the angry diatribe now and then too.  It won't be a camera blag.  (Oh btw if you're lookin for a camera blag, DPS seems pretty cool.  I'm gonna look to do their weekly assignments if I can.  The first rule of photography club is 'don't talk about photography club')

Speaking of angry... I checked out my Picasa Web Albums the other day (clearing out space for all the great pictures I'm gonna have) and I noticed a new unlisted album called Daily Placebo.  It was a listing of all the images I'd uploaded to Blogger's servers since December.  There weren't an excessive amount cause I've been slacking a bit in the visual aid department, but there were about 50.  I did a little checking around and found this entry over at Blogger explaining what's up. They're commingling services so its easier to keep track of images you have hosted online.  Which is true, it was always tricky keeping track or managing uploaded content.  But I also see that they detract from the (granted, recently expanded) free space your account is allowed at Picasa Web.  And they're working to transfer all the images I've ever uploaded to Blogger into that account.  Whoa there boys.  I always liked that you could upload whatever to Blogger and have it hosted in perpetuity with no discernible limits.  I'm not really chomping at the bit to pay 25 bucks a year to host the trivial pictures that sometimes accompany posts on DP.  And I'm pretty afraid I'll fill up that 1 Gig of free space right quick.  I mean, I just bough a 2 Gig card and I think I may need another.

So I guess I'm not really angry, just surprised.  It would have been nice if they'd provided this as an opt-in kinda program.  I know that it'll take a while for 2k images to overtake my gig of free storage, but I'm a disk space scrooge.  ( Just picture me diving into a money vault of free disk space.  Oh man, I need to buy some Duck Tales)  I think its also a little off putting that I have three times the space for email as I do for pictures and I know for a fact I can shoot a gig of pictures in about three hours.

Like Giving My Toys Away To The Neighborhood Kids.

So I thought I was all cool with my Pocket PC version of Google Maps that came out at the beginning of February.  Its a nice little app that runs from the google maps services without the need for flash or java.  But the real sweet part was the real time traffic overlay that wasn't available in full-out google maps.  I guess it couldn't last forever, and Google put an end to my oneups-manship by releasing traffic for normal maps.  Damn, now I've got to think of some other esoteric technology that I can lord over you.  Ummm... how about OpenId?  Its getting big and I'll be you're not on the train yet.

• Download Squad: Real Time Traffic Updates on Google Maps

Go Get Your Thinkin Cap.

Wow, I thought I was up to date with all the cool Google Betas out there. But check out GapMinder, its a nice flash implementation of various world statistics by country over time. There's both chart and map views along with temporal animations. You can highlight nations to track over time, select color and size symbology and zoom in on interesting trends. Lots of options make for lots of interesting results. Go play.

• Goolgle: GapMinder

Google Update.

I'll try and get this out of the way as quickly as possible for you non-fanboys.

Extremely premature speculation about a Google branded phone. Hell yeah; I believe I suggested this when I spazzed out about apple in September of 2005. Anyway, there are rumors that they're talking with Orange and HTC to get their mobile search on. I can't freakin wait. But I will, because unlike some companies, I expect Google to do this right.

• The Google phone - coming soon? - Download Squad

I pretty much only use Google Maps to find the locations of stuff online. (was talking with a friend on the phone last week and he said "hang on, let me Google Map it" which made me smile, cause the standard used to be Map Quest or some other service that I can't even remember now.) Anyway, Google Maps has been getting better and better. (the call feature, the my locations feature) But now they're getting around to adding things that everyone has been asking for. Like directions to multiple locations. Yahoo! maps had this a while ago, and I nearly switched over for it. Luckily now I can stop at a liquor store on my way to wherever I'm headed and I don't have to use a Yahoo! product to find it.

• Google Maps multiple destinations - Lifehacker

Patents are becoming more important, especially since there's a kind of cold war going on. Companies snatching up all the patents they can, and making them as broad as they can, so that when (yeah I said when) they get sued for patent infringement they can threaten a counter-suit with a just as frivolously vague patent on some other technology. I can't wait for the first three way patent escalation litigation. Well, Google's tapped into the US patent system so you can see if your idea for a hood mounted turtle slingshot has already been claimed. Or I spose you could use it to get your hopes up about new Apple products that'll never be released.

• Official Google Blog: Now you can search for U.S. patents

Beta Is Better?

Well I've made the switch to Blogger Beta. I'm not exactly sure why, except that they wanted me to. Sure there are a bunch of new features like WYSIWYG template editors and labels. But apparently you have to choose a Beta template to take advantage of any of that. So now I have to reimplement all my customizations in the new system to get anything out of it. Also some of the formatting is a little screwed up through the transition. There's a white space just south of the banner that shouldn't be. Oh and the blogger nav bar doesn't hide any more, so I need to move my logo. I thought that was a nice compromise, hiding the bar. But apparently I've got some work ahead of me to get back to normalcy.

Update
Maybe I can do labels without switching templates...

Update Too
Oh wow, no more publishing. If you've never bloggered, you don't care. But for the rest of you there's no 45 second - 5 minute loading screen after you write a post. They're stored in a database and the pages are rendered on the fly as readers request them, not pre-published when the changes are made. Now there's the kind of bad-ass improvement I'd expect when Google takes over.

Oh. Poop.

From Slashdot:

"Isaac Garcia from Central Desktop Blog writes, 'How much does Google pay *itself* to claim the top ad position for searches relevant to its own products? Google holds the top advertisement (Adword) slot for the following key words: intranet, spreadsheet, documents, calendar, word processor, email, video, instant messenger, blog, photo sharing, online groups, maps, start page, restaurants, dining, and books... ...if you are trying to advertise a product that is competitive to Google, then you'll never be able to receive the Top Ad Position, no matter how much money you bid and spend. How different is it than MSFT placing its products (Internet Explorer) in a premium marketing position (embedded in the OS)?'"

Crap. I think they're right. I don't really know how adwords work (who does) or how the rankings are determined but it does seem like Google may inflate their services to stay on top of other advertisements. Hang on let me go turn the advertisements on in FireFox...

Yeah, Google services turn up as sponsored links for all those searches. Sometimes with a competitor, sometimes alone. So now the question is if someone could out-bit Google for those spots. I'm thinking that they can't; but that's just a guess.

But its alright. I've got a work around. Just take away the "sponsored link" text and return it as a suggestion. Kinda like the answer to life the universe and everything or how you get a link to Google maps when you search for Phoenix, AZ. They're not sponsored and not part of the adwords system, they're just links to other Google services.

• Slashdot | Google's Silent Monopoly

Don't Hack My Junx. Please.

Google Earth is sweet. It's a standard piece of software using technology that, while once innovative, is becoming very standard in the uses of GIS. Maybe I have a little more experience with this than some people but its not really the software that makes Google Earth noteworthy. Sure, the program combines services into a fairly seamless and performance based output; but its the services that are the godsend. Services are hosted data gathered by content providers. They may include: aerial photography, satellite imagery, ground coverage, elevation, topology, land use, lidar, utilities, roads, boundaries, etc. Getting this data from Tele Atlas or the other publishing companies isn't cheap. That's why the original Google Earth software company, Keyhole, was a subscription based utility.

So when Google started absorbing that cost (obviously supplementing themselves in some other way) it was a great leap towards bringing GIS to the everyman. So when I read the first part of this article about Gaia, an effort to reverse engineer Google Earth to make open development efforts, I was skeptical. Its not really cool to sponge off Google's subscriptions to services just because you want to. They're providing free access to pay-content with a decent application. Reading further down the paragraph, that's what Google told these developers:

they do not own the data, and neither does Google. It is licensed to Google on the restriction that it is not to be accessed or used outside Google's client software.

Yep, that's pretty much the situation. If you guys are interested in 3D GIS you can work on lots of different projects, you just have to get your own content. Check out ArcGIS Explorer from ESRI. Its like Google Earth but you add your own services, or ones that you have legal access to. That's the kind of program you should be interested in releasing to the public; not one with someone else's services hard coded in. ESRI even provides some free services (mostly from Tele Atlas) to get you started.

• Open source Google Earth clone canceled - Download Squad

I Haven't Talked About Web 2.0 In A While.

Some updates from Google Reader, nice little tweaks to improve performance and interface. But the part I really liked was:

When an unread count has changed, it will flash yellow for a split-second to help you find it. This yellow fade made our Web 2.0 meter that we have in our office move up a tick.

They have a web 2.0 meter in the office. Nice. I've tried to estimate the TwoPointOhNess of dailyplacebo, but maybe I need a meter to keep track like the Google Reader team. That way I wouldn't need to worry about a numeric designation, just an area of OhNess. But then I'd have to go and buy a whiteboard... And markers... Maybe even a eraser. Whew, I just talked myself out of it.

• Official Google Reader Blog: We made it (a little bit) better

Solidify The Empire.

Check me out. I'm using Google Docs and Spreadsheets to write a blog post. Integration of services much?

This may come perilously close to a post all about how I love Google so much, but I'll try to keep it in perspective. There are so many services out there under the Google name its almost overwhelming. Let me see how many I can name off the top of my head.

gmail
docs and spreadsheets
picasa with picasa web
desktop
domain services
pages
video

Whew, that's quite a few here are the ones I missed that I also have access to:

google/ig
analytics
maps
base
checkout
notebook
calendar (duh)
blogger
browser sync
co-op
personalized search
reader
talk
webmaster tools

Alright, I'll stop listing things off. But those are all user services, like you log-in and have an account. There are still plenty of general services like sets, trends, and scholar. And those are just the ones I know about, there must me a bunch of super-secret ones lurking in the shadows.

I've come to the revelation that I like all this stuff because I'm willing to spend the time to figure it out. I enjoy using them because I do use them. I was trying to use YouTube last night and had a less than superior time with it. Yes, I mean actually uploading videos; contrary to my previous declaration. Mind you, its not that I have an overwhelming desire to have content there, I just figured I'd see what the deal was. Personal edification, all that. I got it done and it didn't take me 10 hours or anything, but it didn't make sense. I don't know what a channel is and I kept going to the home page, which is different from the user page which is different from the videos page. It took 3 clicks to get back to uploading after I finished the previous one.

Now, I'm not saying that YouTube sucks. And I'm not saying I'm not smart enough to figure it out. I'm saying I don't want to spend enough time to do it. I don't want to have a 'channel' that holds my favorite videos (or whatever a channel does). I want a site to host my video and easily categorize them like Picasa does for my pictures.

So maybe its not that Google is so great, but that I'm willing to figure out all the different services and learn what is what. I bought tickets for Casino Royale yesterday, and I did three web searches (each time landing on a yahoo movies page ) before I went to my IG page and clicked into the Google movies listing. I'm just more comfortable with Google because I use Google. I'm sure Yahoo! is great for Yahoo! people, but I don't want a Yahoo! Id or an MSN id or an AOL id. With so many competing companies, I'd rather stick to the one with the most useful and widespread products. And that's what Google has been doing, scooping up services, making their users wonder why people use anything else.

Wikipedia- List of Google Services