Googland

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• [G] Confirm your Buzz settings
• [G] Webinar recordings now available online
• [G] Collaborative mapping for major disasters
• [G] Dito's Journey as a Google Apps Reseller: screaming "Yeeeehaa" the whole way
• [G] Ten times more albums
• [G] More Than Code, It's a Community Too!
• [G] Three ways to control your AdWords costs
• [G] Powering consumers with information about their energy use
• [G] Beyond email: simple ways to get more out of Google Apps

[G] Confirm your Buzz settings Posted: 05 Apr 2010 04:25 PM PDT Official Gmail Blog: Confirm your Buzz settings Posted by Todd Jackson, Product Manager Shortly after launching Google Buzz, we quickly realized we didn't get everything right and moved as fast as possible to improve the Buzz experience. We made a number of changes to the getting started experience based on your feedback, the most significant of which was replacing auto-following with suggestions for people to follow. Rather than automatically setting you up to follow the people you email and chat with most, Google Buzz now suggests people for you to follow instead. This way, Buzz is still simple to set up (no one wants to peck out an entire social network from scratch) but you aren't set up to follow anyone until you choose to do so. But many of you started using Google Buzz before we made these changes, and we want to help you ensure that Buzz is set up the way you want. Offering everyone who uses our products transparency and control is very important to us, so if you started using Google Buzz before we changed the start-up experience, you'll see the following confirmation page the next time you click into the Buzz tab: This page highlights your current Buzz settings and makes it easy to change anything you want. You can view and edit the people you're following and the people following you, elect whether you want those lists appearing on your public Google profile, and modify any of the sites you have connected to Google Buzz, like Picasa, Google Reader, or Twitter. If everything looks good, you can confirm your Buzz set-up with a single click. And remember, you can always change who you're following by clicking "Following XX people" from the Buzz tab or modify your preferences from the Buzz section of Gmail Settings. To keep up to date with all of the improvements we're making to Google Buzz and provide your feedback, follow our team's Google Buzz account. For tips and tricks on using Google Buzz, check out the videos on our new YouTube channel: youtube.com/googlebuzz. URL: http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/confirm-your-buzz-settings.html

[G] Webinar recordings now available online Posted: 05 Apr 2010 04:25 PM PDT Inside AdSense: Webinar recordings now available online A few weeks ago, we held a few webinars focused on topics such as increasing your revenue with AdSense and taking advantage of another publisher monetization platform, DFP Small Business, to manage the ad space you sell directly. If you missed the live webinars, you can now view this series of optimization webinars through our Help Center, to help you make the most of your AdSense account. If you are interested in viewing additional webinars, you'll find last year's recordings in our Help Center. Posted by Caroline Halpin - AdSense Optimization Team URL: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/04/webinar-recordings-now-available-online.html

[G] Collaborative mapping for major disasters Posted: 05 Apr 2010 04:25 PM PDT Official Google Enterprise Blog: Collaborative mapping for major disasters Editor's Note: Today's guest author is A.J. Clark, President of Thermopylae Sciences and Technology, which helps developers build new applications with the Google Earth browser plug-in on Google Earth Enterprise through the iSpatial framework. A.J. works on the visualization, analysis, and dissemination of disaster/post-conflict data with a focus on emerging technologies that support participatory, collaborative approaches to spatial content creation and infrastructure development. In the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake, an urgent need for geospatial data sharing arose. As aid organizations and governments rushed to help, the collection and sharing of large amounts of geographic information among many sources and users presented a daunting challenge. In response, the United States Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM) made information and tools available through an interactive mapping website which they call a User Defined Operational Picture (UDOP), built on the Google Earth Enterprise platform to make visualizing the map and overlaid data easy and clear. Public sites are now available both for the Haiti earthquake and the Chile earthquake, where thousands of users can view, create, and edit spatial data (please note that you will be prompted to download the Google Earth plugin to view this data through these links.) The system was rapidly deployed using an enterprise geospatial framework called iSpatial, which provides an open platform for the integration of dynamic data and the development of interactive applications. The data is displayed using the Google Earth browser plug-in and API, which enables the visualization of geographic data layers in the rich, 3D Google Earth environment, on any web page. The breadth of data sources and content producers contributing to and making use of the UDOP reflected the global community supporting the relief effort. The combination of participatory geospatial content, the collaborative nature of the UDOP and the ability to integrate mobile applications as direct content producers is available for ongoing relief efforts. This is an evolving capability within SOUTHCOM as we break new ground in providing collaborative tools for humanitarian aid and disaster relief efforts. Note: to see imagery and maps in Google Earth, you can also download the Google Crisis Response KML files for Haiti and Chile. Posted by Jeff Martin, Google Crisis Response team URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2010/04/collaborative-mapping-for-major.html

[G] Dito's Journey as a Google Apps Reseller: screaming "Yeeeehaa" the whole way Posted: 05 Apr 2010 01:12 PM PDT Official Google Enterprise Blog: Dito's Journey as a Google Apps Reseller: screaming "Yeeeehaa" the whole way Editor's Note: Today's guest blogger is Jim McNelis, co-founder of Dito, a Google Apps Authorized Reseller and vendor in the Google Apps Marketplace. Did you know that a little over 100 years ago, before the electrical grid existed, businesses had their own power plants to generate electricity? As Nicolas Carr points out in his book, The Big Switch, factories used to produce their own electricity and manage those huge generators themselves, rather than outsource to a power company. So not only did companies need to be an expert at manufacturing thing-a-ma-jigs, they also needed to understand and manage their own power plant. Well, my friends, the cloud is the electrical grid and your in-house server is your power plant. The cloud has become a viable alternative to expensive, on-site hardware that needs constant tender love and care to stay current. Stop staffing IT to keep your systems from breaking. Instead, enable your IT staff to work on new and innovative initiatives that will drive your business forward by freeing them from the chains of the on-site server. I've been excited about Google Apps since the day I discovered the service. I was an early Gmail beta tester, and, like many, have been faithful to the awesome service since 2004. When I saw there was such thing as Gmail for your business, I thought to myself, "This is innovative. This is going to change things." Three years later and Google Apps is changing things. It's a lot of fun to participate in a paradigm shift as a reseller, rather than standing by and watching it happen. My brother Dan and I started Dito in 2007 in order to help small and medium businesses transition to the cloud. Even back then, before the Google Apps Authorized Reseller Program existed, we were providing services around Google Apps. When we were invited to take part in the reseller pilot program, accepting the offer was a logical progression for our business. Joining the Google Apps Authorized Reseller Program has been a great experience for Dito all around. We've received extensive training, guidance and support from a variety of highly skilled and knowledgeable Google folks. Today, with a growing team of subject matter and Six Sigma experts, Google Apps trainers, and developers, we're able to perform to the high standard of service that our customers have come to expect. And the team is as passionate about Google Apps as I am. As users ourselves, we "dogfood" all new Google Apps features, growing our knowledge of the product and improving our own business processes. Almost everyday, Dito helps a new customer move from a legacy system into Google Apps. Why are most of them moving? Businesses are moving to Google Apps Premier Edition for many different reasons, but there are a few that resonate across the board: cost, usability, and innovation. Put simply, businesses want to cut current costs while providing employees with a service that is easy to use and is constantly improving. Google Apps fits that bill. When people ask where we see Dito in the future, I like to use the analogy that we are strapped to a rocket ship (Google Apps) that is taking off into the stratosphere, and we are screaming "yeeehaa" the whole way. We are just really excited about what we do. Dito is committed to providing the best services and solutions for businesses and organizations using Google Apps for years to come. We will continue to evolve with Google Apps and develop custom solutions, like Dito Directory that is available in the new Google Apps Marketplace, that fit the needs of the Google Apps user base. Find reseller case studies and learn more about the Google Apps Authorized Reseller Program. Posted by Jeff Ragusa, Google Apps Channel team URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2010/04/ditos-journey-as-google-apps-reseller.html

[G] Ten times more albums Posted: 05 Apr 2010 01:12 PM PDT Google Photos Blog: Ten times more albums Posted by Evan Tsang and Tammy McLeod, Software Engineers We want Picasa Web Albums to be a place you can share and store all your digital photos, regardless of how many you have. We recently made extra storage really affordable, but until now, Picasa Web accounts have been limited to a maximum of 1,000 albums. We heard that you needed more room, and because we want you to keep sharing your photos and posting them to Buzz, we've worked hard to now raise this limit to 10,000 albums. Since we want the Picasa Web experience to be really fast, the default view still only shows a hundred albums. If you have more than a hundred albums, you'll see two links at the bottom of your screen that let you to load the rest. URL: http://googlephotos.blogspot.com/2010/04/ten-times-more-albums.html

[G] More Than Code, It's a Community Too! Posted: 05 Apr 2010 01:12 PM PDT Google Open Source Blog: More Than Code, It's a Community Too! Google Summer of Code alums John Britton and Robin Anil at Google's Bangalore office My name is John Britton, and in 2008 I was a participant in the Google Summer of Code™ program where I worked on a web based localization server for Gallery. In addition to marking my first commit to an open source project, Google Summer of Code helped steer me down a path of Openness. Since my completion of the program, I've gone on to organize two Open Everything events (Hong Kong and New York) and started a career in Open Education. Thanks Google! Open source software communities are global, and Google Summer of Code is no exception. I'll be frank, I'm addicted to travel. I've been to 30+ countries in the past three years and have no intention of slowing down. This is a story of the cross between my love of travel and the global reach of the Google Summer of Code community. In February I took a trip to India, and prior to my departure I sent an email announcing my travel to the Google-SOC-Meetups mailing list. The Meetups mailing list is usually reserved for announcing and planning FLOSS events. In my case, I just wanted some travel recommendations and the possibility of meeting a few Google Summer of Code alums in India. To my surprise the response I received was overwhelmingly positive. Former participants from all around the country (and neighboring countries) invited me with open arms to their cities, campuses, and homes. Unfortunately I didn't have time to visit everyone who offered to meet, but I did get a chance to visit a few. In Bangalore, I met two fellow Google Summer of Code alums: Robin Anil (2008 & 2009, Apache Mahout) and Rajan Vaish (2009, Open Street Map). They both welcomed me to their city and were happy to share tips on how to get around and what I should do. Both Robin and Rajan are still active contributors to the projects they worked on during Google Summer of Code and were very passionate about sharing. Needless to say, we geeked out quite a bit as we talked about the intricate details of our respective projects. They brought me up to speed on upcoming cultural events like Holi. I shared my recent work at Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU) and got feedback and input on my totally open and free course Mashing Up the Open Web. Robin is now an engineer at Google's Bangalore office working on Google Map Maker. He was kind enough to invite me to the office for a tour, free lunch, and a chance to talk tech with some other Googlers. I don't know what I was expecting when I sent that email to the Meetups list, but I'm happy I did. I plan to continue meeting Google Summer of Code participants as I travel around the world and hope to welcome fellow participants traveling to New York City. We're a very strong community and I proud to be a part of it. By John Britton, 2008 Google Summer of Code Alum Editor's Note: Reminder! The deadline for 2010 Google Summer of Code Student Applications is this Friday, April 9th. URL: http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2010/04/more-than-code-its-community-too.html

[G] Three ways to control your AdWords costs Posted: 05 Apr 2010 01:12 PM PDT Inside AdWords: Three ways to control your AdWords costs As an AdWords advertiser, you're in complete control of your advertising costs. Today, we'd like to highlight some tools and strategies that you can use to make sure that you're spending effectively. For example, you can focus your budget on what gets you the best results by raising the CPC bid for your most successful keywords and lowering it for less successful terms. What's more, there are simple, free tools in your account with the information you need to make these decisions. The video below will walk you through three simple ways to make your budget work better for you. (click to view video) Did you find this video useful? Let us know. For more information on controlling your AdWords costs, visit the AdWords Help Center. Posted by Emily Williams, Inside AdWords crew URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com/2010/04/three-ways-to-control-your-adwords.html

[G] Powering consumers with information about their energy use Posted: 05 Apr 2010 01:12 PM PDT Google Public Policy Blog: Powering consumers with information about their energy use Posted by Michael Terrell, Energy Policy Counsel We all receive an electricity bill once a month that is hard to decipher besides the total amount due. What if we instead had access to more useful and actionable information about our energy consumption? What if consumers could use this information to automatically adjust appliances, lights, and other equipment to save money and cut energy use? That's what a group of over 45 major companies and organizations said today in a letter to President Obama. Signers include companies like AT&T, General Electric and Intel and NGOs like The Climate Group, NRDC and the Alliance to Save Energy. The group also includes start ups, smart grid companies, venture firms and trade organizations. This diverse group shares a common vision: giving consumers the ability to monitor and manage their power use will save them energy and money. It will also unleash innovation in homes and businesses as new energy saving technologies and apps are developed. This group will continue to look for ways to offer ideas to policymakers on how to empower consumers with energy saving tools and information. Join the discussion tomorrow at an event in Washington, DC co-hosted by Google and The Climate Group. If you can make it, RSVP here. URL: http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2010/04/powering-consumers-with-information.html

[G] Beyond email: simple ways to get more out of Google Apps Posted: 05 Apr 2010 09:07 AM PDT Official Google Enterprise Blog: Beyond email: simple ways to get more out of Google Apps Editor's note: Today's guest blogger is Jeremy Lawrence, CIO of The Mind Research Network (MRN), an organization dedicated to the discovery and advancement of clinical solutions for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of mental illness and other brain disorders. By switching from hosted Microsoft® Exchange to Google Apps, Lawrence spared his IT team from the grind of maintenance, upgrades and patches – all while providing users with a more advanced solution. Beyond mail, Jeremy deployed Google's online documents, video, archiving, and encryption apps to help his 200+ research scientists and staff improve collaboration, boost productivity and enhance security. Jeremy will be speaking this Thursday, April 8, on a live webcast. Register here. Several years ago the situation at MRN could not have been more complex. The organization had grown with very little standardization and centralization. For email, we had a blend of email clients – Microsoft Outlook®, Outlook Express®, Apple® Mail, Pine, Elm, Semaphore, Morse – need I go on? There was such a proliferation of email accounts with varying reliability that people kept saying "Send it to my home account, because I never check this one." We also had growing needs in calendaring and document sharing. We determined that we needed a single mail domain, mailing lists, a company directory, a shared calendar, as well as shared documents and project websites – something our employees weren't really aware of at the time. We thought about running Microsoft Exchange in-house, switching to another on-site platform, or a hosted model. Over a fair period of time, we calculated the costs of several solutions and analyzed all the reliability and collaboration factors. Google won hands-down in a feature/cost comparison. We opted for a Big Bang conversion and got over the conversion hump in about a week's time. Import of email was flawless across 104 mailboxes – and we've now grown to nearly 300. We also did up-front preparation with weekly FAQ emails and bulk account creation in advance. We set up a hotline and printed instructions for users. We also conducted help sessions in the lobby. Post-migration, we provided "tip of the day" messages for 14 days. Beyond mail, we deployed Google's online documents and video, as well as additional archiving and encryption features by Google Postini Services to help our 200+ research scientists and staff improve collaboration, boost productivity, and enhance security. Most of all, we learned that Google Apps provides capabilities far beyond our expectations and provides a platform for us to easily add on additional web apps. It's this additional extensibility and flexibility beyond just email that's a big value add for an organization of our size – and we're just scratching the surface. We learned many tips and tricks for making users happy and we can share five (and more!) simple ways to get more out of Google Apps. Please join me for a live webcast to learn more. Five Simple Ways To Get More Out of Google Apps Thursday, April 8, 2010 11:00 a.m. PDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT / 6:00 p.m. GMT Posted by Serena Satyasai, Google Apps team Find customer stories and research product information on our resource sites for current users of Microsoft® Exchange and Lotus Notes®/Domino®. URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2010/04/beyond-email-simple-ways-to-get-more.html

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