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Google Releases Chrome 2.0 Pre-Beta
Nick Fletcher writes "Just a few short months after the initial release, Google has released a pre-beta version of Google Chrome 2.0. It sports a few new features including form auto-completion, full-page zoom, 'profiles,' and Greasemonkey support. It seems the only notable feature would be profiles, which allows users to separate out their homepage, history, and bookmarks on a per user or category basis. It seems Google is still playing catch-up but they're definitely moving at a pace unknown to some of their competition. The full list of new features is available in the release notes."
I totally agree in the context of family members sharing a computer, but I find profiles useful because I'm a web developer and I don't want lots of toolbars taking up screen space and development extensions running when I'm just surfing the web normally as opposed to working on a site.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Gecko is large and unwieldy compared to Webkit. When Apple decided to build a browser, they hired ex-Mozilla developers, who promptly turned around and used KHTML because it was so much leaner and better designed, despite their extensive experience with Gecko.
It's far from obvious that Firefox is ahead in the technology stakes. It trails in many ways and seems like a far less agile project compared with Webkit and Opera. It does have a few areas where it is ahead, but the downsides seem like an albatross to me.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Hey, I know! We can have the email program have profiles too! And the photo editor, and the instant messaging client! Perhaps one day someone will come up with a unified way to have them synchronize, so that I don't have to create and manage a set of profiles on every application. It could also unify password management, and give each profile its own common place to put files.
Or, I don't know, we could actually use the user system that exists. Poorly reimplementing users in every single program is a horrible idea.
That said, there are uses for profiles that aren't just crippled reimplementations of the user concept. But they have more to do with wanting a different, well, profile of settings for different tasks -- things like the private browsing mode. Or, for example, I use a different Firefox profile for browsing Freenet (there are both performance and security reasons for that).
As my full time job I write fake blog entries. I do a bit of other stuff too but that takes most of the time. There are about four dozen blogs I take care of myself, posting one to two entries to each every week. They are mostly reviews of products, services, etc... Though not all, it can't become too clear what the true purpose of those blogs it.
It becomes bad when you realize how many people actually read what you write and take it all as the truth. When single parent mothers comment my blog about family life (thinking I am a father of two young boys) and not realizing that they were recommended all those products because I am paid to recommend them sometimes sucks.
However, I am happy I haven't investing related blogs as a colleague of mine has. "The most horrible thing is when they email me asking how to best finally invest all the money they have been saving for years and I would just like to answer 'I don't have any idea about it.' but instead I give them advice that pretty certainly makes them lose it all."
Well, believe it or not, I still sleep my nights peacefully. You can also choose whether to believe my post or not. Which ever you choose, just remember that not nearly all of the reviews you see online are honest and the most honest ads you are ever likely to see are the clear and annoying ones that you instantly recognize.
that's an overly simplistic view of advertising.
it's true that most internet ads are hyperlinks to sites where you can directly purchase a product or service. but advertising has been in use long before the advent of the web. the primary purpose of an ad is to promote a product through increased exposure/visibility. a billboard doesn't sell you a product or service directly; you can't click on magazine or newspaper ads; nor do TV commercials take you to a retailer where you can purchase the advertised product. but companies still spend billions of dollars every year on marketing and advertising to passively promote their products. a superbowl ad that won't result in any click-through sales is still worth far more money than a linked banner ad that actually takes people to a retail site. that's because advertising/marketing is all about mind share & branding. it's about influencing consumers subconsciously.
advertising is a form of passive persuasion. we're bombarded with ads everyday, and most people claim that this has absolutely no effect on them. but the numbers tell a completely different story. that's what makes advertising so insidious. it has practically become a science that can influence consumers in consistently predictable ways by exploiting known psychological quirks and human behavioral patterns. yet this unconscious influence makes us think that we're the ones who are choosing to buy this product or use that service. free will is just an illusion. oftentimes we make subconscious decisions due to external influences and then rationalize the decision only after the choice has been made, giving us the impression that it was a spontaneous choice made autonomously. this is demonstrated most clearly in a study conducted on the effect that music has on wine shoppers.
basically, some researchers played different types of music at a supermarket on different days and found that this had a noticeable influence on the purchase decisions of the wine shoppers--French music sold French wine and German music sold German wine. despite the indisputable statistical correlation, only 1 in 44 surveyed customers acknowledged the store's ambient music as having an influence on their wine choice. this shows that people often fail to realize why they make their purchases, and will even make up reasons for "choosing" a particular product when in reality it was chosen for them by external influences.
so it's not just clickthroughs that advertisers are after. even if nobody clicks on the ads on a webpage, they are still fulfilling their purpose and influencing future purchase decisions. no one is immune to advertising, and especially not if you don't even recognize the power they have over you. time and time again studies have shown that consumers make purchase decisions based on irrational impulses instilled through advertising--like equating large vehicles to safety, or purchasing familiar brands that are a poorer value.