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South AfricaYahoo agrees to pay in excess of 1 Billion USD for Tumblr
Posted in News on 21 May 2013
It’s official: Yahoo! to acquire Tumblr for US$1.1bn
Photo by Leon Brocard/Flickr
Internet giant Yahoo! has ended days of speculation and announced its intent to acquire online blogging platform Tumblr for US$1.1bn.
Under the deal, Tumblr can deploy Yahoo!’s personalisation technology and search infrastructure to help its users discover creators, bloggers and content. The two companies will also work together to create advertising opportunities.
Tumblr brings 50bn blog posts (and 75m more arriving each day) to Yahoo!’s media network and search experiences.
Yahoo! said in a statement it expects the acquisition to increase Yahoo!’s audience by 50pc to more than 1bn monthly visitors and to grow traffic by about 20pc.
Yahoo! also stated that David Karp will remain as CEO of Tumblr.
“Per the agreement and our promise not to screw it up, Tumblr will be independently operated as a separate business,” Yahoo! said.
“The product, service and brand will continue to be defined and developed separately with the same Tumblr irreverence, wit, and commitment to empower creators.”
Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer said that while the two companies are different, they complement each other.
“Yahoo! is the internet’s original media network. Tumblr is the internet’s fastest-growing media frenzy,” Mayer said.
“Both companies are homes for brands - established and emerging. And, fundamentally, Tumblr and Yahoo! are both all about users, design, and finding surprise and inspiration amidst the everyday.”
Karp said Tumblr’s team, roadmap and mission - to empower creators to make their best work and get it in front of an audience - isn’t changing.
“We’re elated to have the support of Yahoo! and their team who share our dream to make the internet the ultimate creative canvas. Tumblr gets better faster with more resources to draw from,” Karp said.
The acquisition, which is subject to customary closing conditions, is expected to close in the second half of the year.
The Art of Project Management, Scale
Posted in News on 21 May 2013The control of a large force is the same principle as the control of a few men: it is merely a question of dividing up their numbers. — Sun Tzu, military strategist
Creating principles
The basic principles of project management are fully extensible from the smallest initiative to the largest program. The key is that the project management practices should be understood as principles: accepted or professed rules of action or conduct. It is based on this belief that I encourage my clients to establish project manager guiding principles and to construct project management frameworks (not detailed, step-by-step methodologies). By maintaining the governance rules at the highest level (at first definition), the organization maintains the flexibility to scale the implementation of principles based on specific needs.
For example, one of the PM guiding principles could be:
The project manager is responsible for creating and delivering a written update of accomplishments, challenges, issues, and plans at the appropriate level of detail. This update is to be sent to the appropriate stakeholders on an agreed-upon regular cadence (e.g., weekly).
While this principle does not define the format, or the appropriate level of detail, it clearly establishes that for every delivery initiative with an assigned PM (regardless of project size), there will be a status report. Therefore, whether a small initiative, a sizeable project, or a large-scale program, each PM will generate some form of status report. Scale does not impact the principle.
Establishing focus
Scale is also important with respect to the level of focus. The importance of status reporting at the project level (on a project that is part of a work stream that is part of a program) will be much more laser-focused than status reporting at the program level. The project, work stream, and program will all have unique status updates to contribute, each with varying levels of emphasis. Again, the principle stands and the flexibility is implementing based on scale.
As Sun Tzu reinforces, “Fighting with a large army under your command is nowise different from fighting with a small one: it is merely a question of instituting signs and signals.” To paraphrase, once the principles are established, the implementation can be adjusted to the need. An overall program plan for a global program will certainly be at a higher level of detail than the specific detailed project plan for implementing a single project within the initiative. This adjustment to scale is critical. If a program does not adjust its implementation approach, one can expect to see a plan at the program level that is tens of thousands of lines long. The program plan loses its value as a conglomeration of project details with little to no meaningful summary, added visibility, or executive information. Without changing the “signs and signals” and differentiating between the focus needed to implement versus the focus needed to govern, governing bodies may make missteps when putting practices in place.
Standardization and value
Standardization and rigor are key to successful project execution, and varying levels of implementation rigor do not dilute this point. The ability to flexibly apply standards (based on scale) is crucial to successful implementations. While the reported project statistics are not overwhelming, seventy percent of projects executed by organizations with standardized practices are successful, according to the recent PMI 2013 Pulse of the Profession study. One of the reasons that the success numbers are so low—and decreasing over the past four years according to the study—is that 46 percent of respondents said their organizations don’t fully understand the value of project management.
Unfortunately, I’ve worked in organizations where the value is not understood. In one company, there was a recognized need for structure in delivery. The “PMO” was assigned to implement. Standard templates and control processes were defined and an authoritarian rule was cast over projects. However, since the organization had not clearly established the value proposition of the “PMO,” nor its new rigor, nor articulated the principles for success and the appropriate scalability for implementing standards across the organization, the “PMO” was seen as the red tape that hindered delivery instead of the grease that enabled success.
Creating standards is important. Scaling the implementation is key. Articulating the value is imperative. All of these are important if we want to improve our capabilities to deliver. To borrow from French writer and military veteran Francois de la Rochefoucauld, “The height of ability consists in a thorough knowledge of the real value of things….”
Therefore, as we look to improve the capabilities of our delivery teams, let us focus on the principles we establish, clearly articulating the value they deliver; then we can get to implementing based on the scale of the situation.
Carl Manello is a Solution Lead for Slalom’s Program & Project Management practice based in Chicago who enjoys exploring how to tightly couple the art and science of project delivery with business operations.
Getting the Best from Global Social Media Marketing
Posted in News on 21 May 2013
If you love social media, you’re in good company. Web users around the world have embraced social media as a way to connect and share.
Integrating social media into your digital marketing strategy is a wise move in any market. For most global companies, a presence on major networks such as Facebook and Twitter has become a key part of their marketing strategies. However, when it comes to reaching international customers, a single English language account on each network isn’t enough.
Social Media is a Smart Marketing Choice
Using social media as part of a global campaign has the advantage of being budget-friendly. Also, it’s fairly straightforward with most networks welcoming businesses and even guiding you through the creation of your profile or page.
The potential audience that awaits is another draw. As of March 2013, eBizMBA statistics estimates 750 million unique monthly visitors worldwide for Facebook alone. Twitter follows with 250 million, and LinkedIn has 110 million. Relative newcomers Pinterest and Google+ are both closing the gap at 85.5 million and 65 million respectively.
Why Going Global Means Going Local
All the networks mentioned above have a strong international user base and are well worth considering. This doesn’t mean they are the only choices or even the best ones for every overseas market.
For instance, the fact that Facebook has the largest number of global users might lead you to believe you’ve got the world’s social networkers covered. However, it’s not top in every country. In China, access to Facebook is restricted and the majority of China’s 513 million Web users instead network on local social media sites such as Sina Weibo and Qzone.
Although China is a special case, other countries have their own preferences for certain networks. Facebook saw rapid growth in Japan in 2012 but local social network Mixi still has 14 million active users, according to The Japan Times. Meanwhile, new messaging service Line has burst onto Japan’s social media scene, growing to 36.4 million users (as of December 2012) at an unprecedented rate.
Having an online presence on the networks that are used by your target demographic is key to successful global social marketing. Another aspect of this is keeping up with the ever-changing trends in specific overseas markets. After all, a couple of years ago who would have expected Pinterest to be so popular in Latin America, or Instagram’s most enthusiastic users to be in Singapore?
Cultural Effects on Social Media Use
Participating on the leading social networks for each nation is only half the battle. It’s important to take into consideration the ways in which different national and cultural groups use social media. For example, in Japan it is Facebook and not LinkedIn that has become the business network of choice.
Similarly, the ways in which people use Twitter is not the same in every country. The Palo Alto Research Center in California researched the differences in their Language Matters in Twitter study. They found that German speakers were the most likely to share URLs with others in their tweets, using the network primarily for information sharing. On the other hand, Indonesian and Malay speakers were the most likely to retweet, enjoying social interaction with other users.
One Language per Account
On the face of it, a single account per social media site might seem easier to manage. However, if you are there to win a following, mixing languages on a single page or feed is a bad idea. Why risk irritating and ultimately losing your network by bombarding them with messages in multiple languages? Instead, set up separate accounts for each language and let users choose which one to subscribe to.
How many languages you offer will vary depending on your markets. The golden rule is to go for quality over quantity with carefully translated content. Don’t forget to take into account the variety of language. For example, there are significant differences between French Canadian and the language of France.
Another benefit of keeping accounts separate is that it is much easier to cater to different cultural styles of communications plus, the content can be kept interesting for readers by only covering topics relevant to their part of the world. Anyone who has been excited by an online competition, only to discover at the last moment that it’s only open to residents of another country, will understand why this makes sense. Similarly, a localized presence lets you use local currencies, refer to local holidays and time zones, and appeal to regional tastes.
Global social media is a powerful opportunity. Use it wisely and you could get the whole world talking.
Maximizing Google+ For SEO
Posted in News on 20 May 2013
After much debate about Google+ and whether it is worthwhile or not, more and more people are accepting it and jumping on board. There are some definite SEO advantages to having a Google+ profile. In order to enjoy the benefits, you need to ensure you have it properly set up. Let’s take a look at the benefits and then go over the setup.
Some of the benefits that come with a Google+ profile are:
- Google+ allows you to link to all of your social media profiles, sites and Blogs in a neat, organized manner. You can also link to any sites that you regularly contribute to. All of these links are followed links AND you get to select the anchor text (in your bio).
Tip: The more people share your posts, +1 your posts or link to your profile, the more valuable these links become to you. The takeaway here is that you need to network and build connections that will help spread your content.
- Google will also follow the links in your posts and again the value of these links increases as the post is shared, linked to and +1ed
Tip: If your post is really good and goes viral or is shared by a high authority profile, the value of the links increases more.
- With many social media sites, you have little to no ability to edit your content once it has been posted. Google+ allows you to go back and make edits to posts as you see fit. They don’t restrict you. This is great if a post has spread and gained traction and you want to update the information. You can easily go in and add to the post, bringing the information current and to your satisfaction.
- Content on Google+ is indexed pretty darn quickly. Some say almost instantly. It’s a great way to get posts by you into Google’s index quickly when there is a hot topic.
- You can network with influencers in your industry (see more on that below).
- Author/Publisher markup (rich snippets) creates extra exposure for your listing in the SERPs (search engine results pages). This one is worth expanding on. Google knows you have gone to a lot of effort to create your high quality content, so they want to ensure you can truly take ownership of that content. The author tag is for an individual claiming content on a page. The publisher tag goes on the homepage and is for a business to claim ownership of a site.
NOTE: You need a Google+ profile in order to implement the Authorship Markup. And you do want to implement authorship markup. Trust me, you do!
The benefits are:
1. It makes your listing more robust, because it includes a photo, your name and links to more content by you. It’s a great way to make your listing stand out in the SERPs and get more exposure. There are also indicators that your authorship markup may give you a boost in rankings. While some say it doesn’t directly help, others have reported an increase in rankings after implementing it.
2. Your authorship markup also helps you build trust – wouldn’t you trust a nice smiling face next to a listing over one that has no imagery? It establishes you as a real person in the often anonymous online world.
3. It also allows you to claim your name (you don’t want someone trying to steal your name!) and your content (you’ll be seen as the original and rightful owner of the content and won’t have to worry about a copy scraper outranking you).
4. You can improve your click-through rate by playing with your profile image (which is what is shown in the SERPs). Most people are finding that different images get different click-through rates. Images that perform best seem to be close-ups where the eyes are looking to the right towards the listing in the SERPs.
Let’s move on to how to properly set up your profile to ensure you get maximum benefit.
To set up a personal profile, you can go to:
https://plus.google.com/?hl=en
Business profiles can be set up here:
http://www.google.com/+/business/
You can use the same login for both and in the upper right corner, if you click to the right of your photo, you’ll see the business page listed. All you have to do is click that to view/use the business page.
Below is a screenshot of my account as a sample. The button circled in red takes me to my personal profile and the one circled in yellow takes me to the business page.
Once you are logged in, click on Profile on the left hand side to bring you to the section you need to complete.
Business Pages:
Make sure you use keyword phrases (never stuff keywords, use them strategically) in the Tagline and Introduction boxes under the Story section. Google indexes this, so it’s a great place to ensure you write compelling info that includes your keywords.
In the Links section, you can link to your site and Blog. If you have a critical site page, you can also link to specific pages.
When you write your Description be sure you also use keywords and create links (don’t forget to use keywords in the anchor text). The keyword you choose to use should be related to the page you are linking to. Again, I have to remind you, Google won’t tolerate spammy practices so don’t turn your profile into a link farm.
Personal Pages:
On the personal profiles, it’s important to get keywords in the Occupation and Skills section and also in the Tagline and Introduction. Think of the Occupation section as your Meta Description tag (on a normal site) so you want to ensure you have your main keywords in there.
In the employment section, put a description of services offered and not just the company name.
Tip: Once you’ve completed your profile and you start posting, keep in mind that the first sentence of your Google+ post becomes part of the title tag. As you probably know, the Title tag impacts rankings and influences click-through rates.
Rich Snippets: Author Vs Publisher Tag
Don’t be fooled (I was) by Google’s ‘rel=publisher tag’. It’s still a good idea to use, but you won’t get the image in your SERP listing like you do in the authorship tag! I should clarify. What I mean is, if you test the publisher tag in the rich snippets testing tool, it looks like your logo will appear next to your listing. That is not the case right now. The tag will expand in the future so it’s worth using.
Right now, the author tag DOES display an image, so you may want to consider using that.
A couple things to keep in mind: you can’t use both the author and publisher tag on the same page AND if you use the publisher tag, it’s only for the homepage, not internal pages. You can use the author tag for internal pages with content.
Networking on Google+
There are a lot of different ways to connect with influencers in your industry. Networking with influencers is often one of the core focuses of people using Google+. It’s fairly easy to do because there are so many ways to do it, but be sure you don’t abuse the privilege. If you get known as a spammer, it’s going to be very difficult to grow your presence.
Here are some of the ways you can reach out and connect:
Depending on their particular settings, they will be notified if you:
- Mention them in a post
- Share a post with them directly
- Share a post and you’re in a circle they subscribe to
- Comment on a post they created
- Comment on a post after they comment on it
- Add them to a circle
- Suggest new people to add to their circles
- Tag them in a photo or tag one of their photos
- Suggest a profile photo for them
- Comment on a photo after they comment on it
- Comment on a photo they are tagged in or that they tagged
- Start a conversation with them
- Send them an invitation or update an event
- Any activity on events they created
The above actions are a great way to connect and let people know you are there. It’s worth repeating, do not abuse this system and spam people. Only reach out via one of these actions if you plan to truly connect and create a conversation of value.
While Google+ numbers aren’t as large as Facebook, they are growing and as with most things, it’s the early adopters that do well in the long run. Get in now and establish your position.
Looking to get active on Google+ without spending too much time? Take a few minutes a day and do the following:
- +1 great posts or comments
- Comment on posts and engage people in conversation
- Start a hangout
- Grow your circles
Tip: Ensure you add a +1 button to your pages so your visitors can easily +1 your content. Don’t forget to +1 your own Blog posts and key site pages.
Google+ is likely here to stay and also likely to get more important to your rankings and traffic.
The Benefits of Always Having a To-Do List at Hand
Posted in News on 17 May 2013A project manager can expect to always have things to do but do you always know what you need to concentrate on at any given time? It can be easy to let a task slip your mind if you aren’t organized, which is why I always make sure that I have a to do list near me. Let’s see what benefits this offers a busy project manager.
You Know What to Do
Of course, the simplest and most obvious benefit is often the best one. In this case, I think that having your to do list handy all the time means that you always know what you need to do. This is something I never needed in other roles but the job of project manager is one which often leaves you dealing with a number of things at one time and feeling that you are being pulled all over the place. Not every project is like this but once you get into the habit of having a list near you at all times then it becomes something which it is worth doing all the time anyway. If you have ever felt that you are lost because you don’t know what still needs done then this simple step could solve the problem for you.
You Can React
Project work also requires that you know how and when to react to changing situations. If you get a phone call or an email which throws your plans up in the air then it definitely helps to have a list of outstanding work to help you work out what to do. Each situation will be different but the fact that you have a note of what needs done right now will give you a head start in reorganizing the project. This is something which you will possibly come across a lot in your career so finding a way of dealing with it simply and effectively is going to be a great help.
You Look Organized
If you are in a project meeting and a stakeholder asks you a specific question it is great to be able to answer them clearly and accurately. This is an aspect of your work which you can greatly enhance by having your to do list near you. By having this information so close to hand you can quickly check the details and answer the questions thrown at you. As well as this, you will look more organized in general by having your list of things to do with you when you are discussing the project and talking about what you are up to.
You Can Make Changes
I don’t know about anyone else but my list of things to do always looks a mess by the end of the day. As well as my annoying habit of crumpling up any bit of paper which comes near I also make changes to it on a regular basis. In a typical day I might score off a task, have to add it on again for some reason, add another, score out another, change a couple and then do these same things all over again. Your to do list is likely to be a very flexible document and if all you have to do is write things on it then this is easy. However, if you try to remember all of this without writing it down then it is going to take up some valuable space in your brain which could be used for other things.
Sleep Well
I have never fallen asleep at work, although I once had to pinch my leg really hard during a spectacularly boring conference. No, what I am talking about here is being able to sleep well when I get home at night. If I don’t know what I have to do (and what I have already done) then questions will bounce around in my head all night and stop me from sleeping. This is something I really rather prefer to avoid, as insomnia isn’t a great friend of a busy project manager who also wants to enjoy life away from work. The mere action of writing down what I need to do helps me avoid the torture of watching the hands on my bedside clock slowly go round for hours on end. In fact, it works so well that I even use the same tactic at home now as well, with the same benefits.
Old Spice Takes Over YouTube in Viral Marketing Push
Posted in News on 17 May 2013Old Spice has launched a digital video campaign that will see the company leverage YouTube to sell its latest shave gels.
The campaign will see Old Spice launch two new video ads on the site. Ads will bring back one-time spokesperson Terry Crews. Along with the videos, Old Spice will also take over YouTube's masthead with an interactive ad that promotes user-generated content.
Old Spice's campaign focuses on the firm's newest shave gel products. Both "Pure Sport" and "Swagger" scents will be given the full YouTube treatment with the launch of two separate digital video spots.
The first video, "Shave," will see Terry Crews pop out of a formerly comatose man's beard. The miniaturized version of Crews will then call out for the Old Spice shaving gel and shave the man's beard.
The other video, "Baby," sees Crews talk to a variety of inanimate objects before finally realizing he has a son. Among the inanimate objects Crews chats up are socks, a waffle iron, and solar panels with a British accent.
Old Spice's ads have proved to be very popular on YouTube. Earlier this month, YouTube reported that two of the brands' video ads made it into the top 10 most seen ad spots on YouTube for April.
Along with the latest video spots, Old Spice will also leverage YouTube to bring some interactivity to its campaign. For today only, Old Spice will take over YouTube'smasthead and offer viewers questions based on the firm's newest products.
Questions for the site include things like, "Are (fill in the blank) newer than Old Spice Shave Gel?" Once a viewer answers the question he will be shown a follow-up page that will feature an image of the thing he wrote down accompanied by the words, "(Inserted word) Ain't Newer Than New Old Spice Shave Gel."
EVENT EXPERIMENT AT GOOGLE I/O
Posted in News on 17 May 2013At this year's Google I/O developers conference, attendees will be part of an event experience experiment. Environmental sensors will measure noise levels, temperature, humidity, and air quality in real time during the conference, which kicks off tomorrow at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. TechCrunch: "At first glance, this seems a little bit creepy, but it’s no different than a venue adjusting the cooling system based on the temperature inside at any given moment. As with anything that Google does, this could have implications for tracking indoor events or businesses in the future.
As Apple hits 50bn downloads, six ways brands can beat the end of the app honeymoon
Posted in News on 16 May 2013
A few hours ago, one lucky person won a $10,000 App Store gift card for downloading the 50 billionth app from the App Store.
Ignoring for the moment the space that person is going to need on their iPhone, it does highlight that the meteoric rise of apps shows no obvious signs of slowing down. In fact, downloads have doubled from the App Store in just 14 months. And whilst Google appear to trail slightly with 48bn downloads, that is only from Google Play and doesn’t account for all Android stores from other providers. The number could easily be 50% higher again.
However, as the app marketplace accelerates forward, it is also becoming overcrowded and difficult to achieve for developers to achieve standout. You could argue that the honeymoon period is now over for brands. Only those serious about investing in valuable experiences will achieve success.
With an oversupply of apps, consumers are beginning to become more discerning when it comes to downloading, questioning how often they think they’ll use an app. One marketer said to me recently, "We had incredible success from one of our game apps two years ago, but we could never achieve that number of downloads again in the current market".
Success stories from games such as Temple Run (with other 75m downloads) hide the hard truth that downloads and revenue are unevenly distributed, with only a small proportion of apps hitting the tipping point and staying in the charts for any length of time.
The post-honeymoon period is also characterised by a much higher bar for build quality and support. It is no longer enough to rush out a low-quality app as part of an advertising campaign. In some cases, your app maybe competing with 100-person development teams, chasing large revenue opportunities. Not only does your app need to make the grade from an initial build, it also needs to be maintained with improvements and bug fixes for new OS updates across every platform you have built for.
However, none of the above should put off those brands serious about creating engaging experiences for consumers. Rather, it should signal the need to elevate mobile app development to a cornerstone of your digital strategy.
In doing so, it is worth remembering some key pointers for success:
1 - Utility over advertising
Start by thinking about how you can create new value for people by improving their lives in some way. Be useful, be entertaining or ideally be both. Just don’t think of mobile apps as part of an advertising campaign. Think of them as the subject for an advertising campaign.
2 - Experiences not apps
People want great brand experiences, across devices. So rather than focusing on the isolated app alone, it is worth thinking about how to deliver a connected brand experience with mobile playing a specific but key role.
3 - Brand authenticity matters
There is a compelling argument that the native app market may disappear over the next five years.
In an overcrowded marketplace, many apps are copies of one another or variations on a theme. It is of paramount importance that an app and its experience is true to the brand, making it unique and not so easily replicated.
4 - Design for repeat usage
The number of app downloads are important to achieve that viral effect in the charts (see below), but repeat usage is a much better indicator of an apps usefulness to your audience. Of course, this will also have a direct effect on reviews of the app.
5 - Invest in marketing
It sounds obvious, but so many brands make the mistake of developing an app yet not giving enough thought and budget to marketing the app, putting them at a disadvantage from other apps developers. Many of these use significant investment in the dark art of seeding apps to chart in the top 20 in that all-important first two weeks.
6 - Leave the marketplace altogether
There is a compelling argument that the native app market may disappear over the next five years. The development community would say that HTML5 web apps can do everything native mobile apps can do, but without the need for download. The Financial Times is one of the most high profile businesses turning its back on the App Store and launching a very successful web app.
Google gains appeal for cloud services, but there’s this company called Amazon
Posted in News on 16 May 2013
With Google opening up its Google Compute Engine (GCE) for anyone and expanding the feature set of its Google Cloud Platform, the web giant appears to have its gaze fixed on easing Amazon Web Services’ lock on the Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) market. But it won’t be easy, with many startups and enterprises already entrenched in AWS thanks to its early general availability and plethora of services.
Some developers hanging out at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco on Wednesday thought Google could be a viable option for certain workloads going forward, but they don’t see it as the it cloud for today. And that might be all right, because adoption of IaaS clouds is still far from complete, and because Google is indicating that it has plenty of ideas for enhancing the Google Cloud Platform.
“We’ll continue to add new services which lower the amount of tedious grunt work that developers have to do,” Greg DeMichillie, a director of product management for the Google Cloud Platform, told members of the press in a roundtable discussion following the Google cloud announcements. Better networking services could be one area for innovation, he suggested.
Indeed, my colleague Barb Darrow has expressed on multiple occasions that Google’s position in the IaaS world is worth watching. The trouble is, the road ahead looks steep.
The current cloud market
A July-October 2012 survey of 100 IT professionals at medium and large enterprises from 451 Research showed that 19 percent that were running IaaS deployments were doing so on Amazon, considerably more than on other options. Verizon came in second with 8 percent, followed by Rackspace with 5 percent. Google apparently held 1 percent or less. Looking toward the future, respondents named the vendors they expected their companies to move to, with CenturyLink, Amazon and Verizon coming out on top. Google had 1 percent or less there, too.
Why the lack of presence from Google in the standings? For one thing, “Amazon has been pushing this game along for a long period of time,” said Peter ffoulkes, research director at 451 Research. The other factor is that not many enterprises are ready to run on public clouds. ffoulkes fully expects Google to show up in the rankings in forthcoming surveys, but it’s too early for him to say when.
To be fair, since the 2012 survey wrapped up, Google has added to the Google Cloud Platform, with moves such as adding capabilities to BigQuery. It’s also acquired Talaria for software that could make Google server use more efficient. And remember that Google Compute Engine launched less than a year ago and just became generally available today.
Google has serious work to do in making the Google Compute Engine a top choice for enterprises. For one thing, Google has not (yet) opened a marketplace of services on par with AWS. Such a step could help Google in its efforts to drive more developers onto GCE.
What developers think
Google has a few opportunities to gain marketshare with GCE. One startup I spoke with has run workloads on Google App Engine (GAE) for a few years but still does data analysis and data mining on on-premise servers. Since GAE and GCE hook in well with each another, the startup is looking at moving the on-prem activities to GCE. Another area of opportunity is around using GCE for narrowly tailored high-performance workloads that scale out. Engineers at one major retailer in the United States said they were exploring public clouds for certain jobs, and Google Compute Engine is a possibility for exactly this sort of thing. Generally speaking, strong results could lead to larger deployments beyond tests and lower-priority applications.
Developers praised Google for introducing granular pricing down to the minute instead of the hour after a 10-minute minimum and increasing the size of a persistent disk from 1 TB to 10 TB.
But just as AWS has had notable service issues, Google App Engine, the Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) piece of the Google Cloud Platform, has had multiple service disruptions of its own, and that doesn’t help adoption.
Plus, several developers noted that Amazon was the forerunner in the AWS market, which seems to be a major reason why Google faces a steep road. One developer said his hosted VoIP company just moved from on-premise servers to AWS. Translation: Too little, too late, Google.
The lock-in question
However long it takes for Google Compute Engine to get on the board in the IaaS conversation, the ease of migration from AWS and other IaaS providers to Google will eventually become a hot topic. What sort of lock-in issues could arise? That’s been a good question since cloud computing took off a few years ago and as options have proliferated. Amazon in particular has faced criticism on the lock-in point.
Performance is a whole other matter. Will GCE be a kind of exotic car of public clouds? Different customers will have different answers to that question, as not all workloads were created equal. Benchmarks attempt to give some insight into this, but they have drawbacks.
As developers try spinning up instances on GCE and do comparisons for themselves, the subject of price will come up. Google foresees more price cuts to its cloud services, as it’s in the company’s best interests to make its infrastructure as efficient as possible. That could entice more enterprises to join in. At the same time, AWS is likely to keep growing, slashing its prices and speedily bolting down enterprise customers. (To get a peek at what Amazon has in mind, check out GigaOM’s Structure conference in San Francisco on June 19, when Werner Vogels, Amazon’s chief technology officer, will take the stage.)
However the game plans play out, Google is optimistic at the moment. “It’s obviously a hugely important use case for us, a hugely important customer set,” DeMichillie said of enterprise users. “It’s early days, but we think over the next 12 months, we expect to see a pretty big upswing in that.”
Google+ Gets Major Makeover
Posted in News on 16 May 2013
Google is rolling out a major makeover of its social network, Google+, this week that will focus on stream, photos and Hangouts.
The redesign, launched today during Google’s developer conference in San Francisco, focuses on “real-life sharing,” said senior vice-president of engineering Vic Gundotra.
“We’ve worked hard to make our phone and tablet apps intimate and immersive — today we’re just improving them further and adapting their design for the Web,” Gundotra said. “The end result, we hope, is an app that looks and feels great across a family of devices.”
Stream
• Multi-column layout — Google+ users will now see one, two, or three columns of content depending on the size of their screen and orientation. For instance, Smartphone users will see one column while tablet users will likely have two columns. Those on laptops and desktops will see a three-column design.
• Full-screen media — Photos and videos can now fill the entire width of the screen.
• Animations — To name a few, the sharebox bounces and the menus slide and, once a card has been clicked on, it will flip over to reveal comments.
The redesign, Gundotra said, also gives feeds a new dimension with automated hashtags. Google+ will now examine posts and tag them accordingly and find and rank related conversations across the network. Then, when a user clicks on the related hashtag, the card will flip, revealing associated content users can sift through inline.
If members tag their own posts, they will be similarly displayed. Users also have the option of removing the Google-added tags from their content on single posts, or all of them at any time.
Hangouts
The revamped Hangouts combines text, photos and live video across Android, iOS and PCs. The free app includes the following features:
• Messaging is “richer, and more responsive.” Photos and emoji can be added to conversations “while real-time activity indicators really bring them to life,” Gundotra said.
• Conversation history allows users to swipe back in time to look at old posts and photos. Users also have the option of turning history off.
• Once a users sees a notification on one device, it will be cleared from all of their other devices and PCs. Users can also “snooze” notifications if they are busy.
• Free video calls to all contacts.
Photos
“We think everyone should be able to make beautiful photos, so today we’re launching a set of initiatives aimed at improving your photos automatically — basically your camera, plus Google’s cloud,” Gundotra said.
Pictures powered by Google can take advantage of four new tools:
• Auto Backup (aka Instant Upload) — After a user gives permission, Google+ will automatically back up mobile pictures as they are taken. This feature includes unlimited free storage at standard size (2048px), and 15GB of free storage at full size (up from 5GB).
• Auto Highlight — This tool enables users to find the best pictures quickly by sidelining duplicates, blurry images and poor exposures, and highlighting all of the best images.
• Auto Enhance — Enables users to automatically improve brightness, contrast, saturation, structure, noise and focus. Users upload their photos, open the lightbox to see Google’s enhancements and leave the rest up to Google. Click the link to view some sample images.
• Auto Awesome — This tool is the most innovative. If a user uploads a series of photos, Google will attempt to animate them automatically. In the case of family portraits, if a number of images are uploaded, Google will snag everyone’s best smile and incorporate them all in the best overall image.
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