Google Streetview in Germany, some thoughts
A little while ago I wrote a little rant about the fake Streetview Google had launched in Germany, an odd Google Maps & Panoramio hybrid. Eventually that’s about to change: Google Streetview is coming to Germany for real. And boy, are people in Germany going crazy over this. On the one hand you have those [...]
Presentation: The Real Life Social Network
Paul Adams is a Senior UX Researcher at Google. In the slides below he shares some findings from his research, focusing on what’s important to keep in mind when designing for the social web. It’s chock-full with insights on how relationships work online and offline. It’s a fantastic presentation. Must read. The Real Life Social [...]
Google Collaboratory Report #1
It’s done! Over the course of the last few months I’ve been part of the German Google Collaboratory “Internet & Society”. The expert group is part of Google’s effort to reach out to multiple stakeholder groups and discuss with experts the challenges and opportunities our society faces. We discussed a whole range of topics from [...]
Google Streetview Germany: Worst of Both Worlds
So after seemingly endless debates, moving launch dates and massive protests by privacy groups and – worth noticing – Ilse Aigner, the minister of of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection, it looks like Google just pretty silently launched Streetview in Germany. Kind of. Kind of because it’s not the real Streetview, but a slightly different [...]
Google Collaboratory Internet & Society
Recently I was invited to join the Collaboratory on Internet & Society, and we’ve started a survey. Since it’s conducted in German, here’s the official announcement in German, too. (Full disclosure: After being invited as a regular member of the Collaboratory, I was also hired to help out with organizing the survey. I’ve also worked [...]
Google, Privacy, Germany
We’ve been discussing the unholy trinity of GPG – Google, Privacy, Germany – a lot recently. And by “we”, I mean in one swoop all the web scene, Germany and the media here as a whole, but also my friends and I. (One of those friends works at Google, so we can bounce ideas off [...]
Tech year 2009 wrap up: cloud computing, Android, privacy discussions
A couple of days ago I’ve given a short look back at the year 2009 from a personal point of view. Right after, I realized there were a couple more things with a wider tech perspective that I’d like to include – again, more for personal documentation than anything else. So here goes. Everything went [...]
Two Takes On The Future of Media: Rubert Murdoch and Clay Shirky
Today I happened upon these two videos in which two experts share their take on (among many other things) the future of the media. The two experts are old-school media magnate Rupert Murdoch, often called one of the most influential people in the media industry; and NYU professor Clay Shirky, who I think is one [...]
Hamburg Declaration: Google Embarrasses Whiny Euro Publishers
Publishers are throwing a tantrum International publishers [list of names, PDF] recently signed the Hamburg Declaration (full text PDF, summary), a ridiculous, whiny document stating that content may not be freely available on the internet through the likes of Google News. It’s rather sad, really, as it shows so clearly just how badly prepared these [...]
Is Google making us stupid? (No.)
The Atlantic just ran an article asking “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” which two friends forwarded independently – always a clear indicator that it might be a good idea to actually read the article. (Thanks Puja, thanks Burkhardt!) And The Atlantic author Nicholas Carr does raise some important points. Carr’s key argument is that the [...]
