As Google grows in its ever increasing quest to make knowledge easily available and free to people, it has rolled out yet another big time project, Google Knols. Google Knols, which says a knol is a unit of knowledge, is rubbing shoulders with the likes of Wikipedia in order to try and create a network of user-written articles to create a knowledge base. To quote the brainchild of Google Knols, Udi Manber, a knol is, “meant to be the first thing someone who searches for this topic for the first time will want to read.”The project, which is still in its beta stages, was released on July 23^rd of this year and hopes to eventually cover a wide range of topics.

There are a lot of pretty neat uses and probably even some pretty warranted fears of this whole project. To be able to feel like you are a competent enough person to author an article about a subject is a fairly powerful tool. Google Knols with some time and momentum could become as popular a thing as blogging, considering the desirability factors of being able to speak your mind and give your opinions about a subject you believe you are an “expert” in. The flip side to this being, of course, that it could also become less of an information hub in the sense that Wikipedia is because it could very well end up just a series of personal essays. With the ability for authors to review changes or additions made to their articles, it could be easy for authors to simply never want to take criticism or correction. This could then also branch into a lack of vitality in any kind of reviewing community because people will just start writing their own knols instead of wanting to take the time to critique someone who might just ignore what they have to say. I personally would like to imagine that wouldn’t be the case, but it isn’t always so easy to predict the way with which people will view the system.

It’s also safe to assume that all the normal questions of biases are being thrown out there. Will Google keep their end of the bargain and not let knols unfairly climb the natural search rankings? Let’s hope so, but it’s easy to imagine not. If a knol is their version of a unit of knowledge, and they write the search algorithms dictating search variables and relativity, it seems like anything could happen. Maybe nothing will be hard coded that biases Google Knols, but if a system favors information presented in a certain format, these biases might happen naturally, and Google will be able to claim it’s not intentional but a product of the system.

I know that I am personally excited about this though. I think there are going to be a lot of niche uses for something like Google Knols and I eagerly wait for it to grow in popularity. There could be some extremely fascinating knols one day about even things as small as discussions about cult movies and things that at conception, people probably haven’t thought about even using the knol system for. The opportunities are endless with the system Google envisions and I have no doubts in their ability to follow through.

Save this Post!

Hide Sites

These days it seems as if asking a stranger on the street simply if they have the time is a gross underutilization of the potential for information accumulation—why not have someone tell you who pitched the final game for the American League team in the 1948 World Series at a seemingly small increase in cost over checking their watch or phone for the time (a quick Google search tells me that the answer is right-hander Bob Lemon for Cleveland Indians).

In the last decade or so, the “improvements” made on devices that formerly held only one function have momentously increased the amount of information that we can literally bring to our fingertips. Nevertheless, the novelty and wonder attached to any statement about the “great ease of access” of information today is far less novel and wondrous to anyone who is conscious of the fact that they are living in the ostentatiously titled “Information Age.” However, when you take into account where we have come from regarding technology ownership and where we are now, the proportion of easily available information and the number of devices that can provide this information begs the question: how much is too much?

So many devices, so few hands...

It has been recently published that what scientists are calling an ancient “computer” may have been used to set the dates for Olympic games as 776 BC. The device used an “intricate set of bronze gearwheels, dials, and inscriptions” to calculate the dates for the ceremonial Greek games. Today, some people may struggle to accept this device as any sort of “computer” considering you can’t even email with it, let alone check baseball stats. Now, these features are available on things like wristwatches and pens when traditionally wristwatches were made for telling time and pens were made for writing.

In 2007, it has been independently reported that 80% of Americans own personal computers and 82% of Americans own cell phones. While it is certainly not the case that computers and cell phones provide the same features, it’s becoming increasingly more difficult to find a phone that just makes phone calls (and doesn’t allow text or instant messaging, music playback, or email and internet browsing), neither of those statistics take into account iPod and other MP3 player ownership, or iPhone ownership statistics (a device that combines computer/internet access, MP3 player capabilities, and telecommunication into one handheld device). If someone is sitting at home with a PC (“for work and school”), an iPhone (“for talking”), an iPod nano (“for exercise”), a wristwatch (“for telling time”), and a slide-rule (“for nostalgia”), what do they use to tell the time? To calculate taxes? To communicate with friends? To listen to music? To check the news?

So many devices can provide the same types of information that the utility of owning a personal, multi-media device could soon reach its saturation point. Sure, you can do a lot more than ask someone for the time if you want to know more, but for multi-device owners there may be an excess of informational opportunity when thinking about the necessity for all of their devices in economic terms. A device like the ancient Olympic-date-deciding-computer may seem like such an antiquated, highly useless object to someone today when you can easily perform the same function with a calendar and a calculator or an internet-capable computer. But when someone may own 4 or 5 different devices that could also do the job just as efficiently, what’s one more “portable” piece of rusted gears and metal to add to your collection to do just another job.

The multi-functional, multi-media, multi-everything devices that flood a buyer’s technological market may seem at first like a gift among gifts to anyone who thinks they appreciate an “insert number here”-for-1 bargain. However, what is really happening is that this diffusion of specific operations across many gadgets is not only perpetuating a cultural motion of conspicuous consumption and wanton necessity, but is also confusing and diluting the previously clearly drawn lines of technological specialization.

While it may make things easier for people to have access to all sorts of information and operations in one “convenient” place, people will tend to favor certain uses of a device over others which can lead to a general phasing out of certain functions, like replacing phone calls with text messages and instant messaging. Therefore, by increasingly relying on or favoring very particular operations in favor of others, when a plethora of alternatives are available, we may see negative effects on certain things (like phone calls or even email communication) that we may not be ready to give up.

As we reach the point when wristwatches are no longer relevant and have effectively been phased out of common usage, it’s interesting to see how formally dressed men are adapting, and whether watches will completely become a nostalgic, symbol of fashion or whether they’ll soon be replaced with fashionably-constructed iPhones or Bob Lemon baseball cards.

*Photograph courtesy of http://regmedia.co.uk/

Save this Post!

Hide Sites

If you’re done joining them, beat them?

It doesn’t exactly roll of the tongue, but that appears to be the motto over at Cuil* (pronounced “cool”), a new search engine conceived by Stanford University professor Tom Costello and his wife and former Google architect, Anna Patterson as well as two other former Googlers. Cuil, which launches today, makes such herculean claims as being bigger, better and faster than the mighty Google.

Cuil seems to offer the biggest departures from traditional search in three major ways:

1. By being biggest, better and faster and searching much more of the web. Okay, well, we’ll see about that. Even if this is true, it’s not clear whether searching more of the Internet is a good way to add value, whether Cuil’s definition of “better” will jibe with yours, and exactly what they mean by “faster,” as there are many ways to define speed.

2. Through true, multimedia search results, rather than the text results that we are used to. True, Google has been very slowly pursuing universal search**, which stood to display similarly diverse results, it seems that Cuil may have beat them to the punch.

3. By tabbing out popular categories of results. In the video below, we can see that a search for “Harry” is likely to be a search for one of the two most important Harrys in history: Harry Potter or Harry, Prince of Wales. These results, as well as other famous Harrys, are available for you in what will result as additional pages of multimedia information.

Let us put the “bigger, better, faster” argument aside for the moment, as these claims would require thorough and long term scrutiny. The multimedia results are interesting, but old news for those who have been following Google’s on again, off again courtship of universal search. The tabbed, categorized results, though, seem groundbreaking, albeit unproven. Watch the video for a demonstration, as well as a bizarre pronunciation of the word “garage,” which Mr. Costello somehow manages to make rhyme with the word “badge.”

Currently, Cuil’s site is down. This is either very good news or very bad news for the fledgling search engine. It may seem crazy to believe that any company, especially an upstart like Cuil, could seriously challenge Google for supremacy, but you have to hand it to Mr. Costello: the only constant throughout history is change. Google wasn’t always the beast that it is today and they had to usurp a bigger, badder company at one point. You could even make an argument that Microsoft, the biggest, baddest beast of them all, thought to be invincible for so many years, is now being actively challenged and, in at least some areas, finds itself losing ground to Google.

Nothing is impossible and choice will always benefit the consumer. With Cuil’s fresh new approach to search and their vow to uphold user privacy, don’t count them out just yet.

* FYI, “cuil” is apparently Gaelic for “knowledge” and “hazel,” which sounds more like something a tattoo artist would tell an 18-year-old Spring Breaker in Daytona Beach than a great name for a search engine, although you could probably find fault in the name “Google” as well.

** Note that the date of article is May 16, 2007. Google’s search has certainly evolved, but I wouldn’t consider that they have even made significant inroads in achieving the goals purported in the article by SearchEngineLand.com on May 16. A relevant question that begs asking, though, isn’t what slowed Google down, but why Google chose to slow their pursuit. If only we had the time or the knowledge to address that question now. If only…

Save this Post!

Hide Sites

If so, it’s no walk in the park like some marketers would like you to believe. In fact, unless you are flat out lucky you’re in for a very bumpy ride.

However, if you have a creative mind and the discipline to fight your way through failures and let downs you might have a shot at success.

Think of it like the stock market, every good trader will tell you it’s about being level headed through the ups and the downs. Level out your expectations and expect to work very hard!

To help you along the way I will share some sites that keep me motivated and in the loop.

Dock their feeds in your favorite rss reader and dedicate some time to these sites, stay disciplined and keep it to less than an hour a day though. Passive learning is no substitute for action which is the ONLY thing that will lead you closer to the lifestyle you’re dreaming of.

Forums:

http://www.abestweb.com
http://www.wickedfire.com

Blogs:

http://www.diorex.com
http://www.uberaffiliate.com
http://affiliate-blogs.5staraffiliateprograms.com
http://oooff.com/php-affiliate-seo-blog
http://blog.mindvalleylabs.com
http://www.punditx.com
http://www.cdfnetworks.com

To your success,

Scott

Save this Post!

Hide Sites