Slashdot Mirror
Google Opens U.K. Cybercafe and Testing Lab
sebFlyte writes "Google has launched a new venture in England to go with its London offices. They've set up a free Web cafe style affair at London's Heathrow airport to help travelers claw back some of the many hours they spend aimlessly wandering round airport lounges. They're not doing it entirely selflessly though: they admit the main reason they're doing it is to get as wide and as large a cross section of people through the centre as they can so that they can then watch them interact with Google's Web applications. ZDNet has photos, too."
I'm still waiting for a spot to open on there moon base......any second now they'll call me and tell me I'm hired..
Perhaps it's also to promote Firefox as well? I noticed that the browser used in the screenshots was Firefox. I wonder if Firefox is the only thing installed, or if Internet Explorer is also on there?
It's ideas like this that make people not mind when google wants a lot of information about you. All those people who will cry "If this was microsoft you would hate it" - microsoft collates it's data surrepticiously, every webpage you visit or email you write. offereing a free web cafe and saying "but we will watch you" in public no less, is a good thing. I can hardly see anyone looking up anything they wouldn't want anybody to know about anyway at a public terminal
I read this a while back and I still don't get it. Is this some area where you can basically surf whereever/whatever you want to do ... or are you restricted to only using Google Applications so they can see how you interact with them? The later makes more sense from a Google User Interface point of view ... but if I were a traveler, I just want a (fast/open/free) wireless connection to do what I want to do - I'm confused how observing that could be so useful to Google. And heck, they track me anyway with their cookies! ;-)
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Not complaining about slashdot, per se, but did anyone else notice the marketing in those pics?
Must be nice to be a company as big as google, you don't even have to pay to advertise any more. Just do something cool and people eat it up.
9 hours a year... Yeesh.
Makes me glad I don't fly.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
From TFA, 3rd Picture Caption
The 10 Samsung laptops in the temporary installation will be manned from 0700 to 1900 by Google employees from across the organisation, with some flown in especially to help out.
--
It would appear that Google has been flying in their more attractive employees. (Or maybe if I worked for Google I'd look like that too.)
The 10 Samsung laptops in the temporary installation will be manned from 0700 to 1900 by Google employees from across the organisation, with some flown in especially to help out.
Take a look at this photo and all the sudden it makes sense...
To save Slashdot readers some time in the future in all Google related News Stories. Let me provide a universal Table of Contents to summarize the posts that will inevitably follow:
Introduction of our Overlord:
- How many Google News Stories will we see today?
- "I am tired of hearing about Google!"
- I, for one, welcome our Google (topic) overlords
Chapter 1 Obligatory:
- Imagine a Beowulf Cluster of (topic)
- Does (topic) run Linux
- Step1: (topic), Step2: ???, Step3: Profit
Chapter 2 Conspiracy:
- Google = New Microsoft??
- Google = Skynet
- Is Google only friendly on the outside?
- Case Study: a guy who knows a guy that works at some company claiming Google as the next biggest competitor!!!
- Google Fight claims that all of the above are true!
Chapter 3 Downfall
- Is Google too big?
- Does Google have enough funding to branch out so much?
Conclusion Finale:
- Is Google going to be hit by a flying chair?
- Future of Google, such as GoogleOS and Google Condoms
You all know that it is true.
As a freelance software engineer, I routinely run into the same problem: I write software to address a niche need - but have no idea what the needs of the users actually are.
Towards this end, it's typical for me to spend 25% of my time on the phone to various people, asking loads of questions, just so I can understand what the expectations are of the end users. What do they think when they see a button titled "Expand"?
I never cease to be amazed at how much difference it can make to end users to change a button or link from "Reports" to "Export", or from "Course" to "Class". Putting a "Save" button at the right location can make the difference between happy customer and pissed off, irate enemy. .
Getting UI stuff rght is much tougher than you'd think. I remember reading about the intense amount of time and money spent making the iPod nano "perfect".
PS: I LOVE the iPod nano - why can't they get the software right? I hvae a rather large MP3 collection on a network drive, and trying to get the iPod to work with the MP3 collection has been very, very, very frustrating... I have a song on a network drive. I can play said song. I double-click, and I hear the song I like. It's in a playlist, and when I double-click the playlist, I still hear said song.
I synchronize the iPod, and I don't get the song. No message explaining why, no errors noted anywhere, I can't drag/drop the file, even though I get a flash when I drag said file over the iPod icon. WTF?!?!
I love the nano - but the software for it SUCKS REAL BAD.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
This is just a temporary booth that will run for only two months with only ten computers. Any one of dozens of other companies could have done something similar promoting music, cars, books, mobiles, even candy bars, etc, etc., instead of the internet. This Google venture comes over as a rather tacky and ephermeral trade/marketing stand and the Slashdot headline is completely misleading, imho.
The place is awash with stories about Google taking over the world and putting the fear of god into corporate behemoths everywhere. But take a hard look at what Google is actually doing rather than what analysts are saying. Google is a not very large company which runs the world's best search/advertising engine and has a number of frankly rather modest beta projects going. And that is all. In many ways, Google has yet to prove itself. Sooner or later, the Google boys and girls are going to have to come out with some aggressive killer moves or folks might just conclude that the story is a soap opera about California cool with, alas, little more substance than a completely crazy stock price.
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tournoun pas maï
Heathrow T1 is heavily covered by commercial hot-spots. I can't imagine anyone (except the passengers) being happy if Google offered free coverage. There were people there, but they were hardly queueing for seats (there was a couple of spaces free when I had my look). However some ten metres away people were happily using a pay-hotspot organised by T-mobile. They could use their own PCs (big advantage). Hey, if the company is paying, where is the problem?
As a frequent flyer, I have access to a lounge. Although the lounge has only pay-hot-spots, they have a free internet cafe and being an airline lounge, free drinks and munchies. There having been a number of delayed flights earlier, the munchies were limited but at least I could sit there with a free orange juice.