John Lamansky

This has to be the funniest Google April Fool’s Day joke yet:

Google TiSP (BETA) is a fully functional, end-to-end system that provides in-home wireless access [...] via fiber-optic cable strung through your local municipal sewage lines.

[...]

With professional installation service, you can also have your Google Checkout purchases delivered directly through the sewage network into your bathroom.

[...]

We’re actively developing a higher-performance version of TiSP specifically tailored to small and medium-sized businesses, including 24-hour, on-site technical support in the event of backup problems, brownouts and data wipes.

Hilarious!

They even, uh, use the location of this WiFi access to provide uncanny monitoring:

Your FREE TiSP service includes a Google Toolbar-based analysis of your dietary habits and genetic predispositions, along with recommendations for healthier living.

[...]

To offset the cost of providing the TiSP service, we use information gathered by discreet DNA sequencing of your personal bodily output to display online ads that are contextually relevant to your culinary preferences, current health status and likelihood of developing particular medical conditions going forward.

Read more at Google TiSP (haven’t figured out what it stands for yet…).

Update: it appears that TiSP stands for “Toilet Internet Service Provider.” Makes sense.

Google announced yesterday that its free email service is now open for registration. From a post on the Official Google Blog:

Gmail sign-ups are now open worldwide! No more waiting for someone to invite you—just create an account directly at www.gmail.com

Read more, or go to Gmail.com to register.

I realize this news is a couple weeks old, but I just found out that you can now use Google to search for patents. Very cool!

According to a post on the Official Google Blog:

Google is a company fueled by innovation, which to us means trying lots of new things all the time — and sometimes it means reconsidering our goals for a product. Later this week, we will stop accepting new questions in Google Answers, the very first project we worked on here.

They don’t give a specific reason, but from what I’ve read across the Internet it seems to be at least in part because of the explosive popularity of Yahoo! Answers.

It’ll be somewhat sad to see this product go. But it’s kind of like a floppy drive: you have a peace of mind knowing you have one in case you really need it, but you almost never end up using it.

Looks like Yahoo’s Widget Engine (previously known as Konfabulator) is going to get some competition: version 4 of Google Desktop now features Google Gadgets.

Here’s Google’s description of what’s new in version 4:

Want a clock on your desktop? How about a calendar, a WiFi indicator, a TV, or anything else you can dream up? Say hello to Google Gadgets. These interactive mini-applications can be anything from games to search tools to media players, and they can be any shape and size – use a weather globe to show you the latest forecast. We’ve got a lot of ready-made gadgets to get you started, but they’re so easy to create that you can probably figure out how to build your own.

You can also save your gadget content and settings online to protect your info from computer crashes and be able to access it from your other computers by logging into your Google Account with Google Desktop. For instance, you can now ‘synch’ the To Do list on both your laptop and your desktop.

Google Desktop will recommend new gadgets and can also automatically create a personalized Google homepage for you based on the subjects you’re most interested in. For instance, if you’re constantly doing searches on new movies, Google Desktop can automatically recommend a movies gadget to add to your desktop.

We’ve also integrated Google Desktop more fully with the rest of Google. For instance, you can now add Google Gadgets from your personalized homepage into your Sidebar, or anywhere else on your desktop You can also view upcoming birthdays with the orkut gadget, see what’s popular on Google Videos, or access your Google Calendar right from your desktop.

This sounds really cool! I’ll definately consider replacing my trusty Yahoo Widget Engine.

Oh, lookee there… I think I’m still running Google Desktop version 2. Definitely time to upgrade!

As you might know, I’ve tried Google AdSense on this blog several times before. For those who aren’t familiar with AdSense, it is a Google service that lets you put ads on your site (the same kind you see on Google search results). When people click ads on your site, you get a portion of the what the advertiser pays Google. Here’s an example:

I’m not sure how relevant the above ads will be, but every time that I’ve tried AdSense I’ve removed it because I have not been happy with what ads have been displayed.

For example, after I published the post Mr. Monopoly vs. The Deet, in which I described how some deet-containing bug spray ate the ink off my grandma’s Monopoly board, then my AdSense ads started showing advertisements for, guess what?, deet-containing bug spray.

About a month later I published a post called What is Bug Control?, in which I attempted to present a pun concerning the fact that a dead mosquito landed on the Ctrl key on my keyboard. But AdSense started showing ads for bug control, mosquito repellant, and pest removal. Even though my post contained the words “bug,” “mosquito,” and “control,” the ads displayed weren’t exactly relevant.

Then apparently, the AdSense algorithms saw the words “John” and “Catholic” and decided to put up an ad for John Kerry.

Frankly, that was the last straw. I removed those AdSense ads and haven’t put them back up since.

Until Google can increase the relevance of AdSense ads, or until I get enough traffic to the point that I’ll get clicks regardless of ad relevance, I probably won’t be trying to use AdSense again. Maybe lack of relevance is just a risk that advertisers have to take. But in addition, I didn’t get a single click throughout my entire site during the entire time I was displaying AdSense ads.

So in summary, I’ve decided that for now, AdSense for me doesn’t really make sense… or cents.

Earlier this month, Google released a free collection of software known as the Google Pack. It is intended to help with setting up a new computer, or enhancing an existing one, by providing a one-installer package of “essential software.” On the Google Pack website, you can customize what software is included in your pack. There are many options:

• Google Earth
• Picasa
• Google Pack Screensaver (photo screensaver)
• Google Desktop
• Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer
• Mozilla Firefox with Google Toolbar
• Norton Antivirus 2005 Special Edition (with free 6-month subscription)
• Ad-Aware SE Personal
• Adobe Reader 7
• Google Talk
• GalleryPlayer HD Images
• RealPlayer
• Trillian

Any software that you choose to download will be kept up-to-date by an application called the Google Updater.

However, according to a SuperSite for Windows review, the security software is sorely out of date, not all of the programs included are at their latest versions, the Start Menu and notification area are expectably cluttered, and RealPlayer will prompt users to upgrade to a paid version.

Though I don’t think the SuperSite for Windows review makes clear enough the fact that you can customize which applications you download in the pack, so, thankfully, you can just download the “good programs.”

Google has recently published their 2005 end-of-year Zeitgeist. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Google’s Zeitgeists, they are fun analyses of Google searches made over a certain time period. Quite interesting. However, something that might be cool to see in a Google Zeitgeist is a list of the top 10 searches, period. And not just top 10 searches in certain categories.

Google has released a special data layer for Google Earth that supposedly uses a Santa Radar to track the location of Santa Claus and his fleet of aerodynamic reindeer.

To use the radar, first you’ll need to download Google Earth if you don’t have it already. Then you’ll need to download and open the Santa Radar data layer. Have fun!

I noticed today that Google has started another one of their holiday Doodles. A Google Doodle is a series of Google logos that generally tell a story, with new logos appearing each day. Keep checking back at their Doodle #10 page to see how the Doodle progresses.