Heritage Blog and Business Reviews

Old Street View Lawsuit Allowed Another Gasp

About 22 months ago, Google was sued over its Street View program by a couple named Aaron and Christine Boring.  The entire suit was dismissed a little while later.  Now, the Borings have made a small bit of headway with an appeal, but it doesn’t appear that Google has much to worry about.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit is sticking by the dismissal of the Borings’ claims for invasion of privacy, unjust enrichment, injunctive relief, and punitive damages.  The only claim that will be allowed to go forward is one regarding trespassing.

  (Now-Deleted) Street View Shot Of The Borings’ House

The Borings, who originally sought $25,000 in damages, don’t seem likely to get much money due to this, either.  A court document stated, "[T]hey ‘bear the burden of proving that the trespass was the legal cause, i.e., a substantial factor in bringing about actual harm or damage’ . . . if they want more than a dollar."

This looks to be a significant win for Google.  Had things gone another way, the lawsuit could have encouraged all sorts of people to sue the company.  Taken to an extreme, Street View might have met its end as a result.

Yet as things stand, no one can count on getting more than a single dollar, and that’s only if Google’s Street View drivers prove unable to turn back at "Private Road" signs.

Have You Read This?

> Street View Spreads To Denmark, Sweden

> Google Headed To Swiss Court Over Street View

> Google Street View Hits Hawaii, Mexico

Tags: Aaron, All Sorts, Borings, Christine, Court, Court Document, Court Of Appeals, Denmark, dollar, Google, Google Street, Google Street View, Hawaii, Headway, Injunctive Relief, Invasion Of Privacy, Mexico, Nbsp, Over Street, Private Road, program, Punitive Damages, Read, Related Articles, Review and Story, Street View, Substantial Factor, Sweden, Swiss Court, Trespass, United States Court, United States Court Of Appeals, Unjust Enrichment, View

Customer Connections Now Important for Google Results

If you are one of those people still skeptical about the business uses of social media, you may be interested to know that Google’s Social Search is no longer just an experiment. Though it does have the beta tag on it, it is now mainstream. This is something we’ve all known would come sooner or later, but now it’s here.

Have you established enough connections to do well in social search? Comment here.

If people were already seeing different search results from one another before, that is really going to be true now, now that Google is plugging results based on the individual’s social circle into any given SERP. This is one of the many ways SEO is changing, and it would appear that any business looking to get some play in Google search, would do well to have as many connections established as possible, via various social networking sites and tools.

Keep in mind that the social circle is based upon information that Google has about you from your Google account. You can see your list of connections anytime from here (assuming you have a Google account). It pulls connections from your Google Contacts, and any services you have listed on your Google profile (assuming you have services listed on your profile). If you have Twitter listed for example (Facebook connections are not public), anyone you are connected to through one of those services is fair game for potential search results.

Google’s thinking is that if the user is connected to certain people, results from those people will have relevance because you know and trust them. Google says, "You can improve social search results for your friends and contacts by linking to content you have created such as blogs, photos and videos on your Google profile."

"We’ve been having a lot of fun with Social Search. It’s baby season here on our team — two of us just had little ones, and a third is on the way," the company says in the announcement. "We’re all getting ready to be parents for the first time and we have lots of questions. So, what do we do? We search Google, of course! With Social Search, when we search for [baby sleep patterns], [swaddling] or [best cribs], not only do we get the usual websites with expert opinions, we also find relevant pages from our friends and contacts. For example, if one of my friends has written a blog where he talks about a great baby shop he found in Mountain View, this might appear in my social results. I could probably find other reviews, but my friend’s blog is more relevant because I know and trust the author."

Appearing in social search results means:

1. Make sure you have all of your important links on your Google Profile.
2. Make as many connections as possible.
3. Encourage customers to follow you via social networks.
4. Participate in social media so people will engage with you.
5. Encourage sharing of content (there are plenty available social media buttons)
6. Include social network info on business cards/signage, etc.
7. Include social network info in your online advertising
8. There are probably many more worthwhile tips (if you have any, share them in the comments).

Google’s social search doesn’t end with regular web search. They’re adding it to image search, and who knows what else. Look for a lot more features to become part of social search, as Google leaves that Beta tag on. Let’s not forget that Gmail only left beta last year, and I don’t have to tell you they’ve added a lot to that over the years.

Just remember that social results will always be clearly marked as such on Google’s SERPs. They will be accompanied by a heading that says "Results from your social circle". Still, for traditional SEO it is just one more thing to compete with as far as page real estate. That’s why social is a much more of an important part of search than ever.

Google has been making many moves over the last couple years that seem to slowly turn it more and more into its own social network. Now that its profiles have a direct impact on search results, how people view Google in this light is likely to change significantly. Once more and more average users start to realize the social features are being integrated more into their everyday searches, they may find themselves getting sucked into using Google as more of a social tool, as opposed to just search.

What are your thoughts on Google’s social search? Discuss here.

Have You Read This?

> Google Profiles Go to the SERPs

> Google Launches Social Search Experiment

> Can Search Engine Optimization Survive Google?

Tags: Baby Season, Beta, business, Contacts, Customer Connections, Facebook, Fair Game, Friends, Game Search, Google, Google Results, Google Search, Little Ones, People, Photos, Profile, Read, Relevance, Review and Story, Search, Search Google, Serp, Serps, Social, Social Media, Social Networking Sites, Social Search, Videos

The Latest Revolution From Apple, The iPad

Award winning BBC comedy personality, Peter Serafinowicz, has released a video in which he shows the “latest revolution from Apple, the iPad”.

What did you think of the video? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends….

I’m sure by now you’ve figured out this isn’t the real iPad… well I guess it could be as this one doesn’t feature a camera either. This spoof of Apple’s announcement is from Funny or Die’s UK site. Serafinowicz seems to be both poking fun at Steve Jobs and the following video, which is the official one from Apple’s site.

Do you think the initial comedic value of the iPad will die down anytime soon? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends… what you think.

Tags: Apple, Award Winning, Bbc, Comedic Value, Comedy, funny, funny or die, ipad, Personality, Peter Serafinowicz, Review and Story, Rsquo, site, Spoof, Steve Jobs, Talk, UK, video, Viral Video

Google Announces Unicode Progress

Google’s made an announcement regarding Unicode, and believe it or not, there’s something for everyone here.  Programmers should be interested to know that Unicode is becoming more popular at a rapid pace.  Normal Google users, meanwhile, will be happy to learn that searches should now turn up additional useful results.

Let’s start with the stuff that’s easier to understand.  On the Official Google Blog, Mark Davis explained today, "[T]he characters ‘fi’ can either be represented as two characters (‘f’ and ‘i’), or a special display form ‘fi’.  A Google search for [financials] or [office] used to not see these as equivalent – to the software they would just look like *nancials and of*ce."

Davis then continued, "But no longer – after extensive testing, we just recently turned on support for these and thousands of other characters; your searches will now also find these documents."

As for the news that may only mean something to a smaller set of people, well, Google’s been tracking Unicode usage for a while based on its index, and the search giant believes Unicode has itself nearly earned the "giant" moniker.  The graph below shows that usage is almost at 50 percent.

According to Davis, Google’s ability to deal with different languages should improve as Unicode becomes more common.

Have You Read This?

> Google Celebrates Data Privacy Day

> Chrome Wins Browser Speed Test

> Has Google Begun Changing How It Indexes The Web?

eBay to Make Changes to Seller Fees

eBay announced today that starting March 30, it will be lowering the cost of selling for sellers of all sizes. The company will introduce its lowest insertion fees ever. Here are the new options for sellers, as described in eBay’s announcement:

Option 1: "eBay Everyday" Standard Rates

- List up to 100 items a month Auction-style free—no Insertion Fees—when you start your Auction-style listing under $1.

- Get new, lower Insertion Fees for all other start prices.

- Either way, pay one easy Final Value Fee of 9% of the winning bid—and never more than $50—pay only if your item sells.

- List in Fixed Price for 50¢ with Final Value Fees mostly the same as today

Option 2: eBay Stores Subscription Packages

- List in Fixed Price with full search exposure for as low as 3¢ Insertion Fees with Final Value Fees for the most part the same as today

- Get FREE pictures

- Get deeply discounted fees on Auction-style listings

eBay says option one is ideal for those who sell occasionally, while option two is better for most sellers with 50 or more listings a month.

eBay’s price change does represent a price increase for sellers who don’t have a store. This is brought up in an interview (though supplied by eBay itself) with eBay VP of Buyer and Seller Experience Dinesh Lathi. His response is below (there is more to the interview, which can be viewed here):

When asked about why eBay will now only offer zero insertion fees for auctions starting under $1, as opposed to 5 item listings for free at any start price, Lathi says it is because eBay feels like the under $1 price is where the auction format works best.

Not everything from eBay’s announcement is targeted at sellers. For buyers, the company is launching a new buyer protection program, which they see as a way to bring in more buyers and keep them on eBay. There is another series of videos discussing this aspect of the announcement with eBay Senior Director of Resolutions Lynda Talgo here. When asked whether or not the program could be perceived as eBay favoring the buyer over the seller, she says:

Another key component of eBay’s announcement is what the company refers to as a boost to seller efficiency. For example, sellers of auto parts will be able to create a single listing with a complete list of compatible vehicles, which will save the seller on insertion fees and time. Sellers will be able to list multiple variations of a product in one fixed price listing in "many more" categories.

More details that reflect upcoming eBay changes can be found in this interview, this interview, the 2010 Spring Seller Update overview, and this announcement itself. In addition, there will be a webinar Thursday, and more details announced on the announcement board.

What do you think of eBay’s upcoming changes? Discuss here.

Have You Read This?

> eBay Declares Mobile Success For Holiday Season

> eBay Fined $2.6 Million Over LVMH Sales

> eBay Previews Possible Geotargeting Feature For Sellers