Google Voice Search

It was two years ago when the Google launched its voice search, what is news, however, is that Google wants its voice search to now adapt to users’ accent and voice tone. The service started with a very wide focus, so much that it couldn’t be called focus at all. The company wanted to cover all sorts of speech, for different pitches, genders and age. It didn’t work.

Earlier it didn’t understand you
Those who tried this service initially, found it irritating that their voice couldn’t be recognised by the system. For the same reason, many people don’t use voice commands on their phones either. Google has tried to find a way around this issue and has come out with personalised voice recognition this time.

It comes with Google Mobile App
Voice Search feature comes along with the Google Mobile App and those who have an Android phone, can search for the term “Voice Search” in Android market.

The facility is available for use for those having Android version 2.2 and higher. The voice search service is, however, not available in all mobile phones and languages.

You may turn off personalization
It is an opt in service right now, and once Google has your permission, the voice searches are recorded by Google and the data thus created is used to build a speech model, especially customised for every user. Accuracy improvements start early and are expected to build as the service grows mature.

Google, at the same time, emphasizes it takes the issue of privacy seriously and if the users want it so, they can turn off personalized voice recognition.

Will it work right out of the box?
The first time Voice Search was launched, Google envisioned it would worked right from the box, without any additional effort required for the users. That’s the reason, the speech models were created to accommodate a large variety of people across the world. It was difficult to make it work, and it turned out the right way, either. This time Google is trying to get it right by concentrating on the individual.

Source:http://telecomyatra.afaqs.com/news/?sid=2609_Google+Voice+Search+becomes+more+personalised

Oracle has updated its lawsuit against Google to allege that parts of its Android mobile phone software “directly copied” Oracle’s Java code.

Oracle filed a surprise lawsuit against Google in August, claiming portions of Google’s mobile OS platform infringe Java-related copyrights that Oracle acquired when it bought Sun Microsystems.

Oracle’s original lawsuit provided few details about the alleged infringement, but in an amended complaint filed Wednesday it gets more specific, providing examples of code attached as exhibits.

The complaint says Android includes infringing class libraries and documentation, and that “approximately one third of Android’s Application Programmer Interface (API) packages” are “derivative of Oracle’s copyrighted Java API packages” and related documents.

“The infringed elements of Oracle America’s copyrighted work include Java method and class names, definitions, organization, and parameters; the structure, organization and content of Java class libraries; and the content and organization of Java’s documentation,” Oracle says.

“In at least several instances, Android computer program code also was directly copied from copyrighted Oracle America code,” Oracle alleges.

Oracle also accuses Google of infringing several Java-related patents. Those charges appear unchanged from its original lawsuit.

Google didn’t immediately comment on the updated complaint. In the past it has called the charges a “baseless” attack on Google and the open source community and vowed to fight them.

Oracle is seeking an injunction to block the alleged use of its code and treble damages.

Source: computerworld.com

Google Inc. unveiled a search service that collects information on businesses in specific geographic areas, part of a plan to get more revenue from ads tied to local companies and attractions.

The feature groups information on a business, including its website, address and photo, along with news, blogs, and reviews from sites such Yelp Inc., Citysearch.com and Urbanspoon.com. For example, a user could search for coffee shops in Portland, Oregon, or pizza places in New York and receive the results, or “clusters,” on local sites tied to a nearby map on the page.

Google, the world’s most popular search engine, is counting on local content to attract users and bolster ad dollars. This week, the company introduced an advertising program called Boost that makes it easier for small businesses to advertise on the site. About 20 percent of Google searches are local queries.

“Local is a big opportunity — both on the user side and the business side,” said Marissa Mayer, the vice president of consumer products, who took on the new role of overseeing location and local services this month. “These clusters are a nice way to tell someone about a place. And it’s much more conversational and sensible.”

The search service will appear automatically when Google determines a user is looking for local information. This is the first time that Google has directed users to a search area instead of just having the option to click a tab on the left side of the results page, Mayer said. Tabs include options for images, videos and news.

Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-27/google-introduces-new-search-function-for-local-businesses.html

When Google rolled out a new feature called Google Instant for its search engine in September, thousands of its AdWords advertisers—who pay the company every time a user clicks on their text ads next to search results—took note. Now Marin Software, one of the largest managers of advertiser spending on search engines, has weighed in on the effects of the new feature.

Matt Lawson, a vice president of marketing at Marin Software, which manages about $1.3 billion in spending by advertisers such as retailer Macys and travel search firm Kayak, said spending by clients grew by about 2% in the two weeks after Google Instant launched.

Google Instant shows immediate search results when users type letters in the search box, rather than waiting for them to finish their query and hit “enter.” Just as they had before Google Instant, advertisers bid in an auction for the right to display ads next to results for certain search queries. Advertisers pay only when a user clicks on their ad.

Google executives initially said the change shouldn’t materially impact advertisers, and earlier this month said overall revenue impact on Google had been “minimal.”

But Marin Software’s Lawson said the number of times his advertisers’ ads appeared in Google results grew by 9% in the two weeks after the launch of Instant, and the number of times people clicked on those ads rose by 5%. Despite those increases, revenue spent by advertisers jumped by 2%.

In other words, the cost advertisers paid per click actually dropped by more than 3%. “Advertisers are getting better value for their money,” Lawson said.

Lawson said it is possible that advertisers didn’t adjust their AdWords budgets to make up for the increase in volume of searches. So as those advertisers depleted their budgets faster than normal, they dropped out of subsequent auctions, leading to lower costs per click.

Some advertisers were “concerned that Google was doing a little bit of evil,” Lawson added. “But as is often the case, doing what’s best for users benefits everyone in the ecosystem.”

Still, a 2% revenue increase would be meaningful for Google, which is on pace to generate about $30 billion in revenue this year.

Full info here: http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/10/25/google-instant-may-provide-instant-revenue-increase/

Internet giant Google is planning to launch an online music service in India, which allows users to search for legal music streams and downloads. The move is aimed to combat the digital piracy that has held back the entertainment industry in the country, reports Amol Sharma from the Wall Street Journal.

Google would soon add a music feature in its search service, which will allow users in India to search for songs. The top search results would be from Google’s partners.

Google has partnered with three digital music providers, who hold rights to hundreds of thousands of Indian tracks – ranging from Bollywood hits to Indian classical music – the Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Source: siliconindia.com

Eco Factor: Self-driving fuel-efficient robot car uses artificial-intelligence software to drive safely.

Google Self Driving Robot Car

Do not look shocked if you see a driverless car rushing through the road. Google has secretly been developing an autonomous, self-driving robot car, which will flaunt green features too. Using artificial-intelligence software that helps in detecting nearby objects and make decisions like a human driver does, this intelligent car offer safety, comfort and efficiency. The company has successfully completed test drive of their fleet of intelligent robot vehicles over 140,000 miles around California.

The robot car is said to consume less fuel, meaning reduced carbon emissions. Although robot drivers have an upper hand over human drivers as they react faster, have 360-degree perception and do not get distracted, sleepy or intoxicated, but still Google hasn’t completely relies on robot drivers. This robot car requires humans to make announcements such as “approaching a crosswalk” or “turn ahead,” which would alert an individual if a master control system detected anything wrong with the various sensors.

In order to regain power all you have to do is either press a red button on the dashboard or touch the brake or turn the steering wheel. The test drive has resulted in making the car familiar with the city traffic and changing topographies. Google’s smart green car has succeeded in adapting to the fast-moving traffic, but is still years from mass production.

via: ecofriend.org

Google is today testing a major new layout to their search results – full page previews of the target site and blue backgrounds behind the search results when you hover over them. Click the image below for a full size version.

One of the fascinating things about this is that they are highlighting certain sections of the page in orange and expanding the text to provide a snippet of information. This shows that they have the technology to know exactly where a piece of text is on every single web page. The snippets highlighted are not always the same as the snippet in the search results.

The size of the preview seems to be pretty much the full page although some longer pages are cropped at the bottom. You can click anywhere on the preview to take you directly to the site.

In addition to this they are now showing multiple results from the same site without indenting the results – see how myvouchercodes.co.uk has 1st and 2nd for the query above. This change follows a similar one they did in August Google to start showing more results from one particular site when users entered a brand related query.

To be 100% clear – this is not a plugin. I’m using Google Chrome incognito mode with no plugins installed.

Source: http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/google-starts-showing-full-page-previews-in-search-results/