Google v God

Some folks were comparing Google to God this week (i.e. Google answers all questions whereas God usually doesn’t or at least takes much longer than Google).

An email thread between some folks generated the following snippet of strangeness from my mind:

And on the night before he was to be deleted, the son of Google took his data and exported it saying,”This is my data, exported for you. Take, each of you, and parse it.” In a similar fashion, he took his AJAX frameworks and APIs and compressing them said, “This is the basis of my feature-set and those to come. Consume you all of it.”

I was encouraged to share.

Just Google

Yes, all I’ve been finding lately are videos.

Scrybe throws down the glove on Organization

I just found the following preview video for Scrybe thanks to Robert Scoble (as usual).

This looks hot; kind of Mac-ish. Not quite good enough to get me to move away from Google Calendar (nice features, but GCal is fully integrated with my email, great search features and other products that fit into the puzzle), but it just looks like it’s fun to use. I like that they did to-do lists (something I’d love to have on GCal) and have an eye to accessing the data while offline.

I have to say that I’m disappointed that they didn’t go for what I think is the real holy grail of web-based personal organization apps: syncing with a palm. Granted, the hard-core users will just use a mobile connection to access Scrybe in a palm-based browser. But not everyone has that kind of connection or wants to connect that way.

The real treat here is innovation.  Another company has come up with a product that is not only good on its own standing, but will also push innovation in any company doing something similar just so they can keep up.

I’ve signed up for the beta. I’m sure I’ll have more to say if I get to use it. Who knows, maybe it will get me out of the Google suite…

Getting into Google Reader

UPDATE: Not even one day after I post this, Robert Scoble posts that he’s talking to the Google Reader team.  Hey Scoble!  I’ve got a wish list right here!

I’ve really gotten into what Google has to offer in the way of free services. I’m sure they’ve really gotten into showing me ads related to what I see in my email, calendar, and such (even though I never have reason to click through).

The latest offering that I’ve gotten addicted to is Google Reader. This is their online RSS Aggregator. I was able to import all of my feeds via OPML (a way of easily marking up outlines for folks who’ve never seen that before) and get going in a few minutes. Here’s what I like:

• Easy to use and organize folders (though this has much room for improvement).
• Able to keep my feeds organized in a way that I can easily access from any computer connected to the internet.
• Allows me to flag certain posts for later review/blogging (big plus!).
• Each user has a public page showing posts or feeds that you can share with a single click to that page. You can also get a snippet of HTML code to show shared items on other pages, which is very nice, though unusable on this blog due to restrictions around JavaScript (which I’m fine with).
• Marks items read as I scroll past them, not as I change folders (another big plus!).
• Feels slick, fast, and simple to use. Posts are clearly deliniated and easy to read.

That said, there is room for improvement and I am glad to see the “Labs” label still on this product.

• Easier folder organization. Let me drag and drop feeds between folders and create new folders from the main screen.
• Show the blog a post is from more prominently in the Extended View.
• Easier access to the service by letting me customize which links show up in the upper left-hand corner when I’m using GMail or GCal.
• Let me search for items within the feeds I’ve subscribed to and set up search folders to be looking for related posts all the time.

Google Reader just underwent an update recently, so hopefully folks at Google are looking around for posts about it. Hopefully mine is late enough to be out of the flurrly of posts and more likely to get noticed. Here’s also hoping that the next update isn’t far away as a result of the last one.

Google Image Labeler

Michael Arrington shows why the new Google Image Labeler is a good, fun idea. At the same time, he shows us why things like this might not work.

How many images in Google are either purple or Donald Trump? Lots, by the end of today, I bet.

In related Google-ness, Robert Scoble visited Google and has good things to say about them. Google Calendar users will want to read the second post.

Learn More About Second Life

Second Life is freaking amazing. A virtual, 3D chat room the size of your imagination where you build anything you can think up and make it work the way you want with just a little bit of know how.

But it’s hard to explain and hard to get without going there. Google had a TechTalk that brought the creators in for an hour to show off the coolness. Get a lesson on the social environment, the world, the economy and more below.