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It looks like Deutschland has a bee in its bonnet about Google. Apparently it is using the dreaded M word “monopol” which, according to Google’s own translation tool is the German form of the English word monopoly. The Germans are concerned that Google is looking like Microsoft and they are not happy. Somebody needs to get in their Mercedes and take a ride on the Autobahn to cool off, maybe? We learned of the Reuters report from Search Engine Land . Apparently the German justice minister is upset that Google isn’t transparent enough. I thought monopolies are about cornering markets and not transparency but maybe I am missing something in the translation. Here’s her thoughts from Reuters In an interview with weekly magazine Der Spiegel, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger said she was concerned the firm was accruing too much power and information about citizens via programmes like Google Earth and Google Books. “All in all, what’s taking shape there to a large extent is a giant monopoly, similar to Microsoft,” the minister said. “My initial response is not to ban something or stop something. But I do want to create more transparency and ensure that users know what is going on with their data,” she added. “I think the companies have an obligation here, and a lot of things ought to be improved. If that doesn’t happen soon we may have to take action as legislators.” Once again I have to ask the question does Google actually monopolize anything? According to Dictionary.com monopoly is: a board game in which a player attempts to gain a monopoly of real estate by advancing around the board and purchasing property, acquiring capital by collecting rent from other players whose pieces land on that property. Oooops. Wrong one. Here’s the one that works for our purposes here: 1. exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices. 2. the market condition that exists when there is only one seller. I think this is where people are getting confused. Microsoft and the desktop smelled of monopoly because no one else could play. Google, on the other hand, is not the only player in nearly everything it has its tentacles in. It just does things bigger and, most times, better than the rest. That’s called cleaning the competition’s clock, not a monopoly. I am sure there will be plenty of arguments that Google is a monopoly and I welcome all of them here. Just be sure that when you are using Google and monopoly in the same sentence you are not just complaining that Google does more things and they do them better. They have to prevent competition from taking place to be a real monopoly and I don’t see that like others might. Did you hear Google cry that Lycos, AltaVista and Yahoo were “monopolies” when it was in its infancy and seen as the new kid on the block with the goofy name? Nope. They went out and did things the old fashioned way: they innovated and gave the public what they wanted and in the process laid waste to things that didn’t work as well as they did. If that’s a monopoly then I’m all for it.

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Germany Cries Monopoly and Doesn’t Even Collect $200

While Google’s CEO is experimenting with the wonders of Twitter (which by the way has been switched to @ericschmidt and has over 10k followers so adjust accordingly) the mothership, Google, is announcing some new search additions that are, well, timely. Today Google made the announcements from the Computer History Museum in Mountain view. The official Google blog tells us Be sure to check out the video there as well. First, we’re introducing new features that bring your search results to life with a dynamic stream of real-time content from across the web. Now, immediately after conducting a search, you can see live updates from people on popular sites like Twitter and FriendFeed, as well as headlines from news and blog posts published just seconds before. When they are relevant, we’ll rank these latest results to show the freshest information right on the search results page. Wow, this has been a rough day for SEO’s for sure. First, personalization is made the norm by Google for all users and now more front page real estate is threatened by the real time search offer. Of course, this type of offering will be more useful in some areas since searches like “injection die mold” won’t have much current activity around it (or will it?). There is a lot to digest with this new offering and it looks pretty comprehensive. I think it’s better for Google to tell you so here you are. Click on “Latest results” or select “Latest” from the search options menu to view a full page of live tweets, blogs, news and other web content scrolling right on Google. You can also filter your results to see only “Updates” from micro-blogs like Twitter, FriendFeed, Jaiku and others. Latest results and the new search options are also designed for iPhone and Android devices when you need them on the go, be it a quick glance at changing information like ski conditions or opening night chatter about a new movie — right when you’re in line to buy tickets. And, as part of our launch of real-time on Google search, we’ve added “hot topics” to Google Trends to show the most common topics people are publishing to the web in real-time. With this improvement and a series of other interface enhancements, Google Trends is graduating from Labs. Our real-time search features are based on more than a dozen new search technologies that enable us to monitor more than a billion documents and process hundreds of millions of real-time changes each day. Of course, none of this would be possible without the support of our new partners that we’re announcing today: Facebook, MySpace, FriendFeed, Jaiku and Identi.ca — along with Twitter, which we announced a few weeks ago. You can go to Google Trends and click on a hot topic to test out these new features which will be available in English over the next few days. This addition to Trends also marks its graduation from Google Labs. Sniff, sniff, our little application is growing up so fast sob, sob. So as to try to out do themselves, Google also announced mobile search changes as well. We have also made some new strides with mobile search. Today’s sensor-rich smartphones are redefining what “query” means. Beyond text, you can now search by a number of new modes including voice, location and sight — all from a mobile device. So we’ve been working to improve technology that takes advantage of these capabilities. Well, today could prove to be a watershed day in search as Google is now changing the game in a way that only Google can. What does this mean to the way you do business? How to you see these changes impacting your SEO practice? Is this a true game-changer or just another step along the way? Let’s hear your thoughts.

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Google Announces New Offerings in Real-Time, Mobile and Social Search

A few days ago my father emailed me the above video. It’s from a project called the The Fun Theory . The Fun Theory is basically a group that is using various crowd sourcing techniques to help brainstorm ideas that make common everyday tasks fun–in an effort to change people’s behavior for the better. It can be for the betterment of the environment, your neighborhood, or yourself. I like the concept because they ask one of the most important questions, that is often times left out of the equation, “is it fun?” Before I started my own business, I was the IT guy at a real estate company. One of my tasks while there, was to develop an internal lead management system that we could use to evaluate incoming leads. The primary person responsible for using this system was a woman that had just returned to work after suffering the tragic loss of her teenage daughter in a car accident. From experience I knew that data entry is a very dismal task even for someone that hadn’t suffered a devastating life change. Therefore, I decided to code this system a little bit differently. After she had input a new lead into the system, the application would literally tell her a joke. All of the jokes were very corny and most were scraped from stupid websites, but despite that it worked! She loved the system, and it ended up being one of the tasks she would complete first during her day. The system was not only functional, but also fun. OK so don’t worry, despite the fact that I have already admitted to being a hippie. I am not going to force you to sing kum bi ya and hold hands. No, I have not forgotten, this is a marketing blog and we need to talk about money. Is fun profitable? I don’t have any numbers to support this theory (give me a break I am a snarky blogger, not a scientist), but I am willing to bet that fun can be extremely profitable! Let’s take a look at a few examples: Google Image Labeler – This is a cool little game , developed by Google, where the user is paired up with another and both must try to guess the same tags of an image shown. It’s incredibility addicting, and if you are as geeky as I am, fun too! However, “fun” isn’t the function. Every time you add a tag to the image you are inadvertently helping Google tag and organize all of the images in its index, thus improving Google’s Image Search feature. Funny USB Drives – You know those little key chain sized USB drives? Well, some companies have started to develop them in the shape of all sorts of things. Take a look at this one and tell me that isn’t fun! Disney – In this example “fun” is the function! Pretty much everything that Disney does is entertainment centered. When “fun” is the function, the rules change a bit because we aren’t marketing the product through a fun experience, rather we are creating a fun experience only. Volkswagen – So the most obvious example of fun from Volkswagen would be its classic Beetle . If you talk to anyone that owns one of those they will tell you that they absolutely love it. But if you want a more recent example of how Volkswagen is using fun, go back to The Fun Theory that we discussed above and you will notice that Volkswagen is the project’s chief sponsor. Um, why would Volkswagen sponsor a silly project like that? Because, it helps them continue their brand as the feel good, fun loving company that hippies love! And, because it gets them exposure! Remember when I said that my dad sent me that video? Well, when I say video, I mean it! He didn’t send me the YouTube link. He sent me a 7MB video file, attached!! He took the time to figure out how to do that (I have no idea who taught him) because he wanted to make damn sure I got it! That type of brand exposure is extremely powerful! All of the above are examples of Experience Marketing ( via ). Experience Marketing is a tactic that puts the consumers’ experience at the forefront of the design and development process. For folks that dabble in Experience Marketing, function isn’t the only end use. Details such as aesthetics, design, and concept also play a crucial role. These products are meant to be “experienced” just as much (if not more) as they are meant to be “used”. So, if you want to try out Experience Marketing for yourself, take a look at your products and ask yourself, “are they fun?”

Link:
Cup of Joe: Naughty USB Drives, Mickey Mouse, & Volkswagen all Teach a Lesson in Fun!