Google posts

Things were looking good for Google Plus when it first launched almost two years ago. Even while it was still in its testing phase, millions of people were clamoring to sign up for Google’s social networking service. Invites had to be suspended for the invite-only field test because of the insane demand for new accounts. It only took two weeks for ten million people to create accounts on the new service. Hopes were high and it looked like a real competitor had finally arisen to take on Facebook. But even as the number of users increased, users and journalists began criticizing the service. More…

Wednesday morning, Twitter users flocked to the social media site to complain that Google Apps weren’t working. The problems started with Gmail and Google Drive before spreading to Google Documents, Google Spreadsheets, and Google Presentations. Google quickly addressed the situation and users were advised to check the Apps Status Dashboard for updates as they investigated the case. We are often inconvenienced by crashing servers or website maintenance, but Google? We take it for granted that giants like Google will be able to run their services smoothly, constantly. When they can’t,…

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been over 9 years since Gmail was opened up in beta. When it was first launched, many thought it was an April Fool’s Day joke because it was launched April 1, 2004. Some joke, eh? The funny part is that it stayed in beta for over five years, so if that qualifies as a joke, then good on Google. Here’s an infographic that shows the timeline. Are you on Gmail? …

President Barack Obama’s team is very active on social media. The Facebook page that carries his name has new posts twice a day on average with a mix of hopeful messages, political statements, and personalized views into life at the White House. On Twitter, they post several times a day with links, pictures, and quotes from the President. Google+ is a different story. It was only mildly active during the election campaign. After a peak of 19 posts in August, 2012, it started falling off quickly. In September, there were 11 posts followed by 5 in October. November, the month of the election, saw two…

Oh, those pranksters up in Mountain View, CA. Every year they roll out several April Fool’s Day jokes. Last year’s included being able to change the weather and an exceptional one that made many locations on Google Maps 8-bit. This year’s first one focuses on YouTube. The site was apparently started in 2005 as a contest to find the best video ever. Entries close at midnight and then the decade-long process of identifying the best video ever will begin. They’ll have 30,000 technicians watching videos over the next decade with a panel of judges that include film critics, YouTube celebrities, and…

Every time a social network makes a change to their layout, design firms around the world groan about how they now have to redo a ton of different artwork. Social media is big business and companies will pay big bucks to look just right on their pages and profiles. Google had a change of their own recently on Google+, including one major change to profile and page layouts that made the cover photo extremely large. This added a new wrinkle to the mix because now pages had different through which they had to operate. The whole cover image isn’t immediately visible when people visit the page, so there are…

With all the attention Google Glass is getting before it’s even launched, one would think it was an Apple product. It’s not, but it has the buzz level of the new Corvette Stingray. Now, it’s making news by doing something that other tech companies have avoided for a while. They’re going to have Foxconn build Glass in the United States. Foxconn is a Taiwan company that has been associated with Apple products as well as other tech giants. For Glass, they’ll be operating out of a plant in Santa Clara, California. This isn’t the first domestic move. Apple CEO Tim Cook announced that certain Macs were going…

This isn’t a big deal. It’s nothing new from a retail perspective and most will wonder what took Google so long to take advantage of their size and reach to take business from formerly-non-competitor Amazon and other online sales and delivery services. What most won’t realize is that this is another step towards world domination that should have investors betting even higher on Google and that should tell everyone that Google’s ownership of the world wide web is moving into ownership of the world wide real word. Google is now testing Google Shopping Express in the San Francisco area. Beta testers…

It’s a good thing that Google is building a driverless car because lawmakers are already sending shots across the bow to stop Google Glass from being used while driving. For a device that hasn’t even been released to the public yet, it’s certainly getting a lot of attention. The legislation, introduced in West Virginia by Republican Gary G. Howell, would add Google Glass to current laws regarding texting while driving. While some will argue that Google Glass will actually help prevent the more dangerous handheld device texting by allowing the driver to continue to look at the road and use voice…

There’s a saying in online marketing that has been around for a while. “Content is king.” The truth is this – before the last year, it really wasn’t. Content has always been important, but it wasn’t until recent updates in Google and Facebook that content took a huge leap from being a portion of search and social marketing to become the actual hub through which search and social marketing flow. Today, marketing starts from content and works its way down versus recent years where content was simply a tool in the marketing strategy. Google, Facebook, Bing, and Twitter are getting smarter every day….