New in google :: Google Tests Search Results That Update As You Type

SEO consultant Rob Ousbey has noticed an interesting thing happening to his search results,live updates of results as he types in every letter.

Google has confirmed to TechCrunch that the above video is in fact real. Is this capability imminent? Sources familiar with Google product developments could not say whether imminent productization in the cards.

So basically this guy ran into a pretty significant Google experiment in the wild. Seeing as though only Ousbey has made noise about this so far, it’s safe to assume that it’s being rolled out to only a tiny fraction of users.

From Gabriel Stricker, Google spokesperson:

“At any given time we are running between 50-200 search experiments. You can learn more on our blog.”

It seems very possible limited bandwidth or CPU could slow live search updating interactions and as to what this means for products like Google Ad Words who knows? Perhaps this is why Google is running these tests?

Amazing Walking Table

The engineering and design on display here are impressive. But I’m getting a sort of Silent Hillvibe from this thing. Like I’d hear it stomping around downstairs and then go down there and it would exact retribution for all the tables in my life that I never knew I’d hurt. Its rudimentary but terrifying mobility an analogue to my stunted senses of design and empathy. Oh god!

Hot Potato will be Moved to Facebook

From  Hot Potato Blog :

We’ve Moved to Facebook

By vanessagene

It’s been an exciting year at Hot Potato. Since going live last November, we’ve been inspired and energized by your reaction to the service and people’s appetite for socializing around activities and live events.

Today, we’re thrilled to announce that some of the features and thinking behind Hot Potato are going to be exposed to a much larger audience: We’ve been acquired by Facebook.

This wasn’t an easy decision, especially since we’ve built up a base of dedicated users. If Hot Potato was going to sell to anyone, Facebook was the natural choice. Facebook is still small, moves fast, provides a great supportive environment for people to be entrepreneurial, and most importantly, Facebook builds great products. We’re looking forward to joining their team.

We’ll soon be wrapping up operations at Hot Potato. We will no longer be accepting new user registrations, and we will be offering existing users a way to download their information from the site. To do this, go to: http://hotpotato.com/dashboard/history. In about a month, Hot Potato will close up shop and delete all user data. No user data or account information will be kept by Facebook. We will be sure to keep you posted on this process over the next few weeks.

Finally, we just want to say a big thank you — and give a big spuddie hug! — to all of you for sharing your events on Hot Potato and sending us thoughtful feedback that pushed us to think harder. It’s been real, friendos!

— The Hot Potato Team

T-Mobile G2, LG's WP7-toting C900 surface in spy photos

Two major smartphones have been leaked today from what appears to be the same source. Headlining these is a slip of the T-Mobile G2, the Google-endorsed version of the HTC Vision. Engadget's shots confirm the basic QWERTY slider design and that it will have a 3.7-inch display along with a more upscale metal back.

A second scoop has also shown LG's first Windows Phone 7 device, the C900. What may be called the Pacific has a very rounded, QWERTY slider with the "back" and search as capacitive touch buttons and the Windows key a dedicated, physical button. Not much is known about its feature set, but it's one of the first phones to have conspicuous branding in firmware and has an AT&T home screen tile.

The G2's release is still largely vague, but the C900 may arrive in November along with the Samsung Cetus and could see two WP7 phones shipping to AT&T at the same time.

T-Mobile G2

Gmail for iPad gets stacked card interface

Google has modified the iPad front-end forGmail, adding a new "stacked card" interface for the e-mail service. Previously, two toolbars were on screen to run actions on conversations. One controlled selected conversations, however, while the other handled an open ones, which Google acknowledges was potentially confusing.

Under the card system, the second toolbar has been removed completely. Selected conversations are now stacked in the right-hand panel, where they can be sorted, archived or deleted. Google adds that in designing the new web interface, it has been experimenting with CSS3 transitions, which should make Gmail feel more like a native app. The updated interface is currently available only in US English.

Google Street View Comes to Germany

You can use Google Maps Street View to find the world's most picturesque street. Or to virtually wander around the San Diego Zoo. Or to plan a bike ride through Boulder. What you can't do is use it to view any part of Germany, since privacy watchdogs have been holding up Mountain Views's expansion into the country. There are currently 23 countries with Street View-enabled cities, and exactly none of them are German. All of that is going to change in the coming months, now that the search giant has met the German government's demands for privacy protections. Twenty German cities are slated for addition by the end of the year.

Under the deal, Google will blur out faces and license plates automatically. Homes will of course be included by default, but Google has agreed to blur them out too if owners submit a simple request. Even a fax will work. Reports say that 10,000 Germans have already submitted their requests, which is a huge number of people who don't want pictures of their front yard on the internet.

Google isn't out of the privacy woods yet though. Just as things began to go well in Germany,South Korean police raided Google's local offices. The investigation is ongoing and involves Google's mishaps with collecting private wifi information. Any number of European countries are also set to get involved in the controversy, since the data collection almost certainly violates EU regulations. France, Germany, Italy, and Spain are already in the mix.

All of that said, there's definitely a degree to which people are getting a little bit too paranoid over Google. Example: a Google executive with an interest in aerial robotics recently bought a drone to play with, because—you know—lhe's interested in aerial robotics. Rumors immediately started to spread about how Google was dispatching drones to circle over urban population centers and take pictures for Street View. "Street View fleet could soon take to the air," screamed the Telegraph,moronically.

Flash on Android test shows slowdowns, incompatibility

A test of Flash 10.1 on Android late yesterday has cast doubt on its usefulness in the short term. Using both the Droid 2's preloaded Flash install and the final release on an original Droid, Laptop found that claims of desktop-level access were inaccurate. Most desktop video sites, which Adobe has usually claimed should run, often produced long load times, stuttering or froze any outside input.

Only mobile-optimized sites can reliably work, the magazine found.

Games also underscored the problems of using Flash. Apart from the well-known issues with games that assume the presence of a keyboard, the titles often bog down or become unresponsive even when optimized for touch.

General web browsing is also much slower and less responsive, as the browser has to download Flash content it otherwise would have skipped over and risks the same plugin-related crashes as on the desktop.

While Flash 10.1 potentially works well in situations where the resolution and actions are optimized for a phone, the test supports notions that the plugin is currently a liability for smartphones rather than a help. Apple chief Steve Jobs is well known for having explained the absence of Flash on iOS as amatter of quality since the present implementation isn't as fast and stable as Apple would like for its web experience on the iPad and iPhone. He has instead pressed for HTML5 for at least video; the technology doesn't yet support copy protection or on-the-spot adaptive quality but puts much less performance overhead on the 1GHz or less processors in phones today.

The increasing use of HTML5 inadvertently made the Flash test difficult, as sites like South Park Studios will push Android phones to HTML5 even when they have Adobe's add-on, giving an impression of smooth playback that might not necessarily translate to Flash.