Google Acquires Picnik

Google announced Monday it has acquired Picnik, a photo editing software that allows people to edit, share and print images using any Internet browser on any computer platform. Although there will be no immediate changes to the software, Google plans to dedicate its time and resources to integrate the software, design new features and “improve the online photo editing experience on the web.”

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Google Acquires Picnik

Ballmer Talks Google, Bing at Search Engine Marketing Conference

During a keynote session at the Search Engine Marketing conference in Santa Clara today, the San Francisco Chronicle reports that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said that Google’s search engine dominance came from its role as an early innovator in the space, but that Microsoft’s Bing search engine has the technology and staff behind it to make it a player in the space in the future.

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Ballmer Talks Google, Bing at Search Engine Marketing Conference

Chile Earthquake Person Finder

In the wake of the 8.8 magnitude earthquake that shook central and southern Chile Saturday, Google is reminding concerned loved ones about its Person Finder tool. Initially developed for the people of Haiti, the tool can be used to submit or search for information about individuals who may have been affected by the quake.

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Chile Earthquake Person Finder

Google Faces Complaints to European Commission

One day after three Google executives were convicted by an Italian court on privacy charges after the company blocked a video making fun of a child with Down’s syndrome, Wired News reports that the search engine might have more legal trouble in Europe. According to the report, the European Commission has received at least three recent antitrust complaints against Google.

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Google Faces Complaints to European Commission

Three Excuses That Cause You to Fail in Internet Marketing

Many of us are excited at the thought of working from home and making “lots” of money. This is not a dream; in fact, it can be quite real if approached in the correct manner. Going to Internet marketing seminars and workshops can get you motivated and help you get started, but once at home, you have to get down to the business end of things and that’s when the motivation starts to fizzle out. This is where the three worst excuses start appearing and causing everything to fail.

1. “This method is not working; it isn’t generating results fast enough”.
2. “I can’t be bothered doing it now; maybe tomorrow”
3. “I can’t do this by myself; let me wait until I find someone who can teach me”

Are these excuses familiar? If they do, then it is time to stop being negative and give everything an almighty positive push. You can easily turn the negatives described above into positives that will bring your success in your online venture.

1. Perseverance – “This method is working slowly, let me keep at it and see if the results start building up”. No method will work straight off the blocks; you have to keep at it until you build up some momentum.
2. Urgency – “If I don’t do it now, I will never do it and I will fail”. Put some fear into your efforts, this will help you prioritize your tasks.
3. Self-motivation – “I can’t do this by myself, so let me find out how I can”. The internet is the mother of all resource libraries, so use it! If you do not know how to do something, Google will help you to find it. Never fear the unknown.

Therefore, as you can see, turning the negatives into positives requires only a slight difference in the way you approach matters. Try these suggestions in your ventures and see how they work for you.

Spare a Thought for USP and ROI

When starting an online business, there is a multitude of things to consider. Most often overlooked among those things are the USP (Unique Selling Proposition) and the ROI (Return On Investment).

It may seem funny but many people believe that the product that they sell has a USP, while others cannot for the life of them figure out how to create a USP. For example, if you were selling Teddy Bears online, what would make a customer buy them from you? The Teddy Bears alone have no USP. In this case, you can create a USP by offering customization. From customized colors to clothing and even personalized gift-wrapping, anything that you can use to put a spin on the product can create a USP. At the end of the day, whatever makes the customer buy from you is your USP. If you fail to address this issue, all the money you spend in setting up and marketing your website will be an utter waste.

ROI is actually very crucial in the normal business world, but in the online world, it is often missed by the would-be-entrepreneur. ROI refers to the gains you make on the amount of money you spend. Generally, ROI is gauged on time, i.e. how long before you start making a profit. For example, if your entire online operation costs $10,000 to setup and $2,000 per year to maintain, you should have a target of six months in which to recover your total spending. If you do achieve this, everything after that is a profit. If you make $6,000 in 6 months it is not a total failure, but you have not achieved your ROI. This is also related to another gauging of ROI, the profit margin. If the business does not have the potential to generate enough profits to cover your investment and running costs in an acceptable amount of time, you end up with a negative ROI. This must be avoided at all costs and can be generally identified at the feasibility study stage.

Google Executives Found Guilty in Italian Court

The New York Times reports that three Google executives were convicted today of violating Italian privacy laws in a ruling that the search giant denounced as an attack on freedom of expression on the Internet.

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Google Executives Found Guilty in Italian Court

Survey Results: Google Does Not Make You Dumber

Does Google make you smarter by bringing you access to a wide range of information? Or (as posited by analyst Nicholas Carr in The Atlantic) does having the ability to find anything you want at your fingertips make you lazier and less likely to engage in deep, critical thinking. That was the question posed by the Pew Internet & American Life Project to 895 technology stakeholders and critics through an online poll, and the results were fairly comprehensive – Google is not making us stupider.

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Survey Results: Google Does Not Make You Dumber

Xerox Sues Google and Yahoo

Xerox Corp. has sued Google Inc. and Yahoo! Inc. over patent-infringement claims related to search queries and data integration, reports Business Week. According to the suit which was filed February 19, Xerox is requesting cash compensation and an order to stop Yahoo, Google and Google’s YouTube from using two patented Xerox technologies without permission.

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Xerox Sues Google and Yahoo

Google Faces Class Action Lawsuit on Buzz Privacy Issues

The reaction from the public and industry insiders to Google Buzz — the search giant’s latest attempt at social media networking — has been decidedly mixed. But while much of the discussion has revolved around the usability and usefulness of Google Buzz, Computerworld reports that this has led to the first piece of legal action, as a Florida woman has filed a class action lawsuit against Google for adding Buzz to the company’s Gmail service.

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Google Faces Class Action Lawsuit on Buzz Privacy Issues

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