The user chooses whether to turn on "enhanced features," but Edelman argues that it's much too easy for a user to do so without completely realizing the consequences. The toolbar's standard installation routine launches a "bubble message" that pushes readers to turn on the features, he says, and it's less than clear about what data is being transmitted.
"The feature is described as 'enhanced' and 'helpful,' and Google chooses to tout it with a prominence that indicates Google views the feature as important," Edelman writes. "Moreover, the accept button features bold type plus a jumbo size (more than twice as large as the button to decline). And the accept button has the focus - so merely pressing Space or Enter (easy to do accidentally) serves to activate Enhanced Features without any further confirmation."
Yes, he continues, the message points out that the toolbar "tells us what site you're visiting by sending Google the url." But he argues this stops short of explaining that it collects everything from directories, filenames, and URL parameters to search keywords.
What's more, Edelman says, turning off "enhanced features" is more difficult than turning them on - especially for the average Joe. It appears that the features can't be turned off unless you uninstall the entire toolbar. Or "disable" it. But that doesn't always work. Or at least it didn't until Edelman noticed it didn't.
That is the most largest reason. And the fact that Google pushes it along with every piece of freeware and shareware out there and pays a commission for the installs. There's a clear incentive for software authors to try to push as many Chrome installs as they can because they get money for it. It's like the new Bonzi Buddy.
That's completely false. Bing didn't copy any result from Google. Bing's toolbar just captured (if they had opted in) what users searched on any site of the internet and where they go next. It's a good assumption too - if user searches for something and then chooses that site over something else, there's a good change it's relevant. However, it was only small part of Bing's algorithm but since Google's engineers used made up words, there wasn't any other page to compete with those words. This resulted in Bing assigning those made-up keywords to those sites.
You could get the same effect in Google by bombing it with links that have some made up word as anchor text.
No one suggested the failure was because of the version numbering, it was just another thing that has been stupid with Firefox recently.
And yes, Firefox's memory usage has always been horrible, along with the general slow feel that XUL gives the UI.
I'd rather not use a search engine that literally has to reward users to even get them to use it.
Just pointing out that Microsoft isn't actually losing money when they do that. It's just clever marketing and Microsoft is actually profiting by rewarding users. There are many such reward sites on the internet whose owners also get money by offering rewards to users. The catch is, advertisers want to sell something or offer a service. They pay the publisher (in this case Microsoft) for getting those users. But instead of taking the whole payment to themselves, they reward some percentage of it back to user. In the end, Microsoft actually profits from it and users want to use Bing because they get free/almost-free stuff. Very clever.
It wouldn't be lump sum of $100 million, it would be percentage from ad clicks like with Google. So any way you look at it, it's only favorable for Microsoft. Their revenue per click would be less if they negotiate better deals with Mozilla, but they also get to grow their market share further. On the other hand Google doesn't really like paying Mozilla now that their own browser is becoming so popular - they're giving a large share of the profits they could have from ads to support a competing browser.
It's not limited only to your company - this means employees in other services can snoop all they want too. This is why you should never trust cloud services. Hell, even Google employees are secretly snooping your personal emails, XMPP chat logs, Google Voice calls and search queries. And yet even most Slashdotters think it's perfectly fine to trust everything you have with Google - your search queries, your personal emails, your calls, your contacts, your social network, what you watch on YouTube, what you listen to, where you walk and go (Android) and everything else. Screw the law enforcement requests for info, they can't even keep their own personnel from snooping your personal stuff.
It's why I will never trust my personal files on the likes of Dropbox and other backup services. People misuse their privileges whenever they can, that's human nature.
I have to disagree with CakePHP too. It's a horrible mess. I looked into the subject earlier, and there are many better PHP frameworks. I went for CodeIgniter because it was fast to pick up and I would never use anything else for PHP again. I used my own framework for years, but it's much better this way.
Saying that immaterial things like movies or "data" shouldn't have copyrights, but then at the same time saying that you shouldn't charge for downloading such immaterial things made by others (even if they would be without copyright now) kind of contradicts itself, don't you think?
US is just scared of rest of the world going forward while they're still lacking in last century. They should know - blatant violation of European copyrights was how US got its power and industry where it is to begin with.
Exactly this, and even if it's a few GB. It's just too small amount to bother about. Besides, you never know which one you may want or need later. Even the ones you snobbishly think as uninteresting now.
It was US that violated Iran's airspace. They have every right to shoot it down. It happens frequently with my country too and they never do anything about it - they just go "yes, we will demand answers from the this time, honestly we promise!". Kudos to Iran for taking a stance.
You're still free to use any other framework or do your own. Hell, if we make that argument then Linux would be walled garden too. But in both cases you are still free to do what you want, if you want. In true walled garden (like iOS) you are not.
Isn't it interesting that the only OS that sent the info out by default was Android? iPhone didn't. While they were there too, Carrier IQ was disabled by default.
And after all, Carrier IQ was just Google Analytics to mobiles. I can just hope that people start the same kind of uproar once they realize how much Google is spying them. If it's not allowed on mobiles, I don't see why it should be allowed on our computers and internet. Maybe there's still some hope in humankind.
Is an pay-per-click search advertising company and doesn't have a search engine. Why is it on the list?
lycos.com
Finally we had one that actually runs their own search engine apart from Google and Bing!
search.netscape.com
Redirects to AOL, uses Google back-end.
dmoz.org
Directory, not a search engine.
duckduckgo.com
Uses Bing back-end.
dogpile.com
Oh second!
I think that it is safe to say, if Google went out of business tomorrow, I could still search the intartubez, without relying on Microsoft.
Yeah right. Your "impressive" list came to pretty much nothing after removing the sites that use either Google or Bing as back-end or didn't have anything to do with search engines. In fact, you probably have used Microsoft's products without even knowing it.
But what matters here is that Google is actively working to destroy competition, by forbidding their advertisers from using the same ads in competing advertising places. This leaves worse revenue stream for competing services, and no finances to compete against Google. Bing is only capable of it because Microsoft can back it from separate revenue sources, and yet Google is still actively trying to prevent advertisers from moving to their services. Other companies just don't have any change. That is pure abuse of monopoly.
And at 32% market share in the US, I would say Bing is a really successful product
Bing is losing more than a billion a quarter. Highly successful, if it was a government project.
Which just shows how committed Microsoft is to think long-term and keep that market share. And do you honestly want Microsoft to pull out? That leaves no other search provider in the US. Google will be only one you can go to.
Slashdot Mirror
The user chooses whether to turn on "enhanced features," but Edelman argues that it's much too easy for a user to do so without completely realizing the consequences. The toolbar's standard installation routine launches a "bubble message" that pushes readers to turn on the features, he says, and it's less than clear about what data is being transmitted. "The feature is described as 'enhanced' and 'helpful,' and Google chooses to tout it with a prominence that indicates Google views the feature as important," Edelman writes. "Moreover, the accept button features bold type plus a jumbo size (more than twice as large as the button to decline). And the accept button has the focus - so merely pressing Space or Enter (easy to do accidentally) serves to activate Enhanced Features without any further confirmation." Yes, he continues, the message points out that the toolbar "tells us what site you're visiting by sending Google the url." But he argues this stops short of explaining that it collects everything from directories, filenames, and URL parameters to search keywords. What's more, Edelman says, turning off "enhanced features" is more difficult than turning them on - especially for the average Joe. It appears that the features can't be turned off unless you uninstall the entire toolbar. Or "disable" it. But that doesn't always work. Or at least it didn't until Edelman noticed it didn't.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/27/google_toolbar_caught_transmitting_data_when_disabled/
That is the most largest reason. And the fact that Google pushes it along with every piece of freeware and shareware out there and pays a commission for the installs. There's a clear incentive for software authors to try to push as many Chrome installs as they can because they get money for it. It's like the new Bonzi Buddy.
If they had opted-in. Google does the same, but without even asking. You have to opt-out of it.
That's completely false. Bing didn't copy any result from Google. Bing's toolbar just captured (if they had opted in) what users searched on any site of the internet and where they go next. It's a good assumption too - if user searches for something and then chooses that site over something else, there's a good change it's relevant. However, it was only small part of Bing's algorithm but since Google's engineers used made up words, there wasn't any other page to compete with those words. This resulted in Bing assigning those made-up keywords to those sites.
You could get the same effect in Google by bombing it with links that have some made up word as anchor text.
But if I want to block say, specific host in Opera, how I do that?
No one suggested the failure was because of the version numbering, it was just another thing that has been stupid with Firefox recently. And yes, Firefox's memory usage has always been horrible, along with the general slow feel that XUL gives the UI.
I'd rather not use a search engine that literally has to reward users to even get them to use it.
Just pointing out that Microsoft isn't actually losing money when they do that. It's just clever marketing and Microsoft is actually profiting by rewarding users. There are many such reward sites on the internet whose owners also get money by offering rewards to users. The catch is, advertisers want to sell something or offer a service. They pay the publisher (in this case Microsoft) for getting those users. But instead of taking the whole payment to themselves, they reward some percentage of it back to user. In the end, Microsoft actually profits from it and users want to use Bing because they get free/almost-free stuff. Very clever.
It wouldn't be lump sum of $100 million, it would be percentage from ad clicks like with Google. So any way you look at it, it's only favorable for Microsoft. Their revenue per click would be less if they negotiate better deals with Mozilla, but they also get to grow their market share further. On the other hand Google doesn't really like paying Mozilla now that their own browser is becoming so popular - they're giving a large share of the profits they could have from ads to support a competing browser.
Yes. Firefox gets money, Microsoft gets users to Bing. Hell, maybe they combine IE and FF and it becomes Microsoft Firefox.
It's not limited only to your company - this means employees in other services can snoop all they want too. This is why you should never trust cloud services. Hell, even Google employees are secretly snooping your personal emails, XMPP chat logs, Google Voice calls and search queries. And yet even most Slashdotters think it's perfectly fine to trust everything you have with Google - your search queries, your personal emails, your calls, your contacts, your social network, what you watch on YouTube, what you listen to, where you walk and go (Android) and everything else. Screw the law enforcement requests for info, they can't even keep their own personnel from snooping your personal stuff.
It's why I will never trust my personal files on the likes of Dropbox and other backup services. People misuse their privileges whenever they can, that's human nature.
I have to disagree with CakePHP too. It's a horrible mess. I looked into the subject earlier, and there are many better PHP frameworks. I went for CodeIgniter because it was fast to pick up and I would never use anything else for PHP again. I used my own framework for years, but it's much better this way.
Saying that immaterial things like movies or "data" shouldn't have copyrights, but then at the same time saying that you shouldn't charge for downloading such immaterial things made by others (even if they would be without copyright now) kind of contradicts itself, don't you think?
US is just scared of rest of the world going forward while they're still lacking in last century. They should know - blatant violation of European copyrights was how US got its power and industry where it is to begin with.
And for that matter .com is international TLD. United States' gTLD is .us , no matter if you like it or not.
Exactly this, and even if it's a few GB. It's just too small amount to bother about. Besides, you never know which one you may want or need later. Even the ones you snobbishly think as uninteresting now.
It was US that violated Iran's airspace. They have every right to shoot it down. It happens frequently with my country too and they never do anything about it - they just go "yes, we will demand answers from the this time, honestly we promise!". Kudos to Iran for taking a stance.
You're still free to use any other framework or do your own. Hell, if we make that argument then Linux would be walled garden too. But in both cases you are still free to do what you want, if you want. In true walled garden (like iOS) you are not.
It's not US business at all. Let other countries handle their own things and start handling your own problems.
But Google doesn't want it to be Twitter. It wants it to be Facebook.
That might be so, but it doesn't change the fact that it's only Android devices where it's enabled by default.
Isn't it interesting that the only OS that sent the info out by default was Android? iPhone didn't. While they were there too, Carrier IQ was disabled by default.
And after all, Carrier IQ was just Google Analytics to mobiles. I can just hope that people start the same kind of uproar once they realize how much Google is spying them. If it's not allowed on mobiles, I don't see why it should be allowed on our computers and internet. Maybe there's still some hope in humankind.
You do understand that there's lots of Microsoft code in Linux? So you are using Microsoft's product too.
ask.com
Uses Google back-end.
alltheweb.com
Redirects to Yahoo, uses Bing back-end.
aolsearch.aol.com
Uses Google back-end.
hotbot.com
Uses Lycos back-end.
altavista.com
Uses Bing back-end.
looksmart.com
Is an pay-per-click search advertising company and doesn't have a search engine. Why is it on the list?
lycos.com
Finally we had one that actually runs their own search engine apart from Google and Bing!
search.netscape.com
Redirects to AOL, uses Google back-end.
dmoz.org
Directory, not a search engine.
duckduckgo.com
Uses Bing back-end.
dogpile.com
Oh second!
I think that it is safe to say, if Google went out of business tomorrow, I could still search the intartubez, without relying on Microsoft.
Yeah right. Your "impressive" list came to pretty much nothing after removing the sites that use either Google or Bing as back-end or didn't have anything to do with search engines. In fact, you probably have used Microsoft's products without even knowing it.
But what matters here is that Google is actively working to destroy competition, by forbidding their advertisers from using the same ads in competing advertising places. This leaves worse revenue stream for competing services, and no finances to compete against Google. Bing is only capable of it because Microsoft can back it from separate revenue sources, and yet Google is still actively trying to prevent advertisers from moving to their services. Other companies just don't have any change. That is pure abuse of monopoly.
And at 32% market share in the US, I would say Bing is a really successful product
Bing is losing more than a billion a quarter. Highly successful, if it was a government project.
Which just shows how committed Microsoft is to think long-term and keep that market share. And do you honestly want Microsoft to pull out? That leaves no other search provider in the US. Google will be only one you can go to.