A team of khaki-clad Google engineers, calling itself the Data Liberation Front, has taken up the cause of freeing your data from the restrictive confines of El Goog’s servers. Google Takeout, as the program has been billed, rips your various stashes of data from Buzz, Circles, Picasa, Contacts, and your Google Profile, and quickly bundles them in a zip file for download. The resulting booty is yours to do with as you choose. Takeout was announced the same day Google’s latest social initiative sprung to life, offering an alternative to the notoriously hard to transfer data of its obvious competitor. But we’re sure that was just a coincidence. Right? A hilariously nerdy promo video awaits you after the break.
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Google Takeout promises radical left wing-themed data extraction for Circles, more (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 Jul 2011 03:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The Landing Page Robot was started up by Trey Smith from infomillionaire.com. It was first released in a small form in October 2010. However, since that time, the product was pushed back for re-development. While the product has no official release date as a result, it is estimated to return in summer 2011.
The Landing Page Robot specializes in producing a strong landing page for a website. Type any keyword into a search engine and browse through the first hits it comes up with. It is far from coincidence that these websites are at the top of the search results. They most accurately match the keyword typed into the search engine and consequently have received the most clicks. Building a website to achieve all of this uses a technique known as search engine optimization, or SEO. For that specific reason, this product aims to improve SEO.
Any website which benefits from increased page views can benefit. Sites ranging from review sites to ad agency sites and even blogs can benefit from what this robot can offer. A pay-per-click website that has been optimized effectively has probably the most to gain from such techniques. Compared to a site with little traffic coming through it, a lot of money can be made from a site which receives many internet page views.
Overall, the benefit of a good landing page is more page views. More profits are possible with more page views. The robot can be used to raise your chances of profits with well optimized websites for the search engines. This tool will practically pay for itself as long as it is used correctly.
Website templates are also provided by the Landing Page Robot. They are very easy to complete. Most are fill-in-the-blank sheets, though other types are available too. Just enter the keywords that relate to your website or product and the robot will handle the rest. This robot is a reasonable cost difference, as it’s far quicker than optimizing a website from scratch. Half-decent landing pages templates are not easy to get, but these templates have been designed in brilliant fashion. The developers clearly knew what goes into making a strong SEO robot and it shows in their product.
After much rumor and speculation about a new Google social feature of some kind, the Internet giant finally unveiled what it calls its “+1″ service today. The service — as Om explained in his post on the launch — is an attempt to add “social validation” to search, via Google’s version of the Facebook “like” button. While these kinds of social cues may help improve search, however, the move also appears to be the latest attempt to jump-start some kind of Google-oriented social network, something that seems to have substantially less likelihood of success, at least as it’s currently configured. Why? Because people don’t go to Google to be social.
As Om describes in his post, and as Search Engine Land lays out in more detail, the main feature of the +1 system is that it allows users to vote on search results or ads. Their vote is then displayed next to the result for anyone in their Google-based social network.
And what is that Google network? Good question. At this point, it’s people in your Gmail contacts, people you have agreed to connect to through Google Talk, people you subscribe to through the company’s RSS reader, and people you follow on the Buzz social network (you can see your social circle here).
At this point, Google tries to glue together all these different sources of contacts, friends and follows through your Google Profile — and it’s no coincidence that when you enable the +1 features, one of the first things the company tries to get you to do is either set up a profile, if you don’t already have one, or update your profile, if you do have one. The biggest problem, as with so much of what Google has tried to do with social features and services so far (yes, I’m looking at you, Buzz) is that Google profiles aren’t really connected to anything in any real way.
Yes, I can link my Twitter account and my Facebook page to my Google profile, but it’s just a simple HTML link that someone could click — assuming someone actually visited my Google profile page, which as far as I can tell no one ever does. The reality is that nothing I do within the network of Google services affects or is connected to anything I do elsewhere in any real way, and that includes the places where I spend a lot of time, such as blogs and Twitter and Facebook. And that’s a big part of the problem.
So yes, it’s good that Google is adding social signals to search — that’s a smart thing to do. And like Om, I am kind of wondering why they didn’t do it a lot sooner, since search is still 90 percent of what Google does (from a financial sense, at least). But that focus is part of the problem: everything the company does is still seen through the lens of search, which is why it has so much trouble understanding how social features work (see Buzz) and sees social as something that can be “bolted on” to its existing services.
Search may be interesting to Google, and useful to millions of people, but it’s useful in a purely utilitarian sort of way — not in any kind of social way. In some ways, in fact, those two purposes are completely antithetical to each other, which is why no one thinks of Google as a social destination. And I could be wrong, but I don’t think that improving search results in some kind of theoretical way is enough motivation to get people to play in Google’s version of a social network. Not yet, at least.
The company says it is considering adding links and connections to Twitter and other services in future iterations of the +1 service, and I hope it does so soon, because in its current incarnation, the Google social network is profoundly uninteresting. The company’s introductory video is embedded below.
Related content from GigaOM Pro (subscription req’d):
The Near-Term Evolution of Social Commerce
What Groupon Can Teach Us About Shopping and the Web
The World’s video game press gathered in New York on Tuesday for the world premiere of Crysis 2, the sequel to the game whose memory lives in on the question, “Yeah, but does it run Crysis?” It’s no coincidence that Crtyek, the game’s developers, and EA, the game’s publisher, chose New York to show off the game, with Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli calling the city “symbolic of the pride of mankind.” Clearly he hasn’t been to the more rubbish sections of Queens. Yes, you’re in an altogether different type of jungle this go-round.
Tuesday was a glorious day, not least of which because it was sunny and warm in New York (and Barcelona beat Arsenal), and that I essentially took a half day—fancy video game launches don’t cover themselves. I did, in fact, get to see Crysis 2 in the small movie theater inside the Tribeca Grand. In the lobby where EA had us all corralled, you could hear Russian, French, and British English spoken; it wasn’t merely a U.S. affair.
But enough of that scene-setting, let’s talk about the game.
Crytek played the Xbox 360 version of the game in front of the press, the first such demonstration of its kind. (Press didn’t get to actually play the game that day, so don’t be too jealous.) The very fact that Crytek was able to develop to the game for the 360, which turns five years old this fall, is a testament to their talents as developers. The original Crysis, first released in 2007, still gives many of today’s PCs a tough time. Turn on anti-aliasing and play at any sort of “high” resolution and you’d better be using a proper video card. I was able to play the game on my ATI Radeon 5850 on Very High settings provided I knocked the anti-aliasing to 2X, and it still wasn’t a solid 60 fps. This is an Intel Core i7 860 (OD’d to 3.8GHz) system—reasonably powerful, yes.
The point is, a reasonably brand new (built around Christmastime) system still had a difficult time running the first game, but Crytek has the game running flawlessly on the ol’ 360. Well done, chaps.
Some of you may be thinking, “So, I guess the PC version is garbage then, right?” Not according to Crytek, who told me they made “no compromises” to the integrity of the PC game despite the fact that they were concurrently developing the PC and console version. (Development on the second game started almost immediately after the first game shipped.) Please don’t think Crytek, seeing the large install base of the 360 and PS3, decided to give PC gamers the shaft. When the game comes out this holiday season, you can expect the question to become, “Yeah, but does it run Crysis 2?”
Probably not, no.
The game takes place in New York City, and once again puts you inside The Suit. (I’m capitalizing The Suit because it looks cool, and because Crytek said The Suit will become “a new IP.” I fully expect Suit lunchboxes and Slurpee cups in the near future.) You have to fend off some sort of alien invasion while simultaneously battling these other guys who don’t like you for whatever reason. The story—one of the only things criticized in the first game—has been written by Richard Morgan, a British science fiction author who won the Arthur C. Clarke award in 2008. If that doesn’t instill you with confidence, I don’t know what to tell you. The very fact that Crytek went out and hired a proper novelist should ensure that the story isn’t typical FPS nonsense.
It’s Crysis all right. You’re a man in The Suit, and you go around shooting other men (and… things) who aren’t wearing The Suit. There’s big guns and big explosions, and a stirring “Oh, dear, this is important” soundtrack accompanies you along the way. Are you basically Gruff Military Man shooting bad guys? Yeah, but it never seems as silly or overbearing as, say, Gears of War did. Oh, look at me, I have big muscles and I talk like I’m gargling rocks, and I shoot first and ask questions later.” Just shut up already, stupid cliché.
There was no mention of any sort of multi-player mode.
We weren’t allowed to take photos or video of the game as Crytek played it. Thems the rules.
I can say it took place in downtown New York, right around Wall Street, and The Suit was put through its paces. Maximum Power-assisted big jumps—the same disembodied robotic voice announces “Maximum Power” as in the first game—and Maximum Armor keeps you safe and sound from the bad guys.
New York looks amazing. I asked someone at Crytek if they expected comparisons to GTA IV, and they gave me a puzzled look. I don’t know why, seeing as though that was a complement. Two years ago, GTA IV’s Liberty City was the most authentic version of New York yet seen in video games. Crysis 2’s looks better, more “real.” The entire demo took place within Manhattan, and it’s unknown if the outer boroughs of New York will make an appearance. Other landmarks you’ll get to see include Madison Square Garden, Grand Central Terminal, Times Square, and Federal Hall (which instantly reminded me of Metal Gear Solid 2’s wacky ending).
I guess that’s it. It’s Crysis, but set in New York. I fully expect it to be the biggest game of the holiday season. You know damn well that Microsoft will be promoting it like crazy… “Look what the Xbox 360 can do~!”
I, of course, like a true geek, will be getting the PC version. It’s game like Crysis 2 worth sinking hundreds of dollars into a gaming PC worthwhile.
The iPad isn’t the only upcoming slate computer. Archos has the 7 Home Tablet coming real soon as well. The 7-inch Android tablet doesn’t have an official release date as of yet, but a German retailer states that it will be shipping in a week. Why the iPad launches on April 3rd? Coincidence? We think not.
Another German retailer states it will be available soon somewhat confirming its impeading launch. Of course Archos hasn’t announced US availability just yet, but that should stop an enterprising buyer from importing it from Euroland whenever it turns up. [geizhals via SlashGear]
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