As Internet Websites were being blacked-out on Wednesday, January 19th, in protest of the controversial SOPA legislation more reminiscent of the days of governmental blacklisting, Seattle was being blanketed in a coat of frosty white. Mayor Mike McGinn activated the Seattle city government’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC) after the National Weather Service forecasted several feet of snow and icy road [...]
Heck, no, we don’t love snow! Seattle is “Rain City,” remember! We have more than a dozen words for rain including rainfall, cloudburst, sprinkle, drizzle, showers, downpour, precip, drencher, and cats n’ dogs, but, unlike the Eskimo’s, only one word for snow — dismal! Catch our drift of emergency online resources in the story below [...]
After a 14 year tenure as the opening act in the tech world’s largest new product extravaganza, it seemed only fitting that American Idol host, Ryan Seacrest, would be on hand to send Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s back home after in his final star turn as a CES keynoter. While the Redmond brigade says its marketing [...]
For the opening chapters of his professional life story, Joe Justice assumed the lead character’s role of software consultant, writ large. So when Joe set out down the road to solve a classic hardware problem like how to build a motor vehicle that could exceed 100 miles to the gallon, his mechanical thinking gave equal [...]
Cashing in on online poker may still be illegal in the state of Washington but free-to-play Video Poker, Blackjack, Slots, Roulette and other online casino games have hit the virtual jackpot for Seattle-based Double Down Interactive (DDI). The Seattle startup has been acquired by International Game Technology for $500 million. Counting up the chips, the deal includes $250 [...]
Does ”Everybody in Seattle really want to work for Amazon?” Business Insider’s Matt Rosoff says the attraction is irresistible for these reasons: 1. Goodbye Beacon Hill, Hello South Lake Union! Amazon is no longer quarantined in a renovated VA Hospital on Beacon Hill. It has traded Count Dracula’s castle on the cliff for much trendier digs [...]
Windows 8, The iPhone 5, 4G phones, Smartphones and smarter cars, the birth of “Business TV,” further meteorology in the Cloud, and new avionics in the clouds from Boeing’s 787 and 747-8 aircraft. All are in our future forecast for the Pacific Northwest and the Seattle metaverse in 2012. Friday Harbor’s Mark Anderson of the Strategic News [...]
What does the coming year hold in store for mobility, commuting and accessibility around the Puget Sound? The tolling that is set to begin this week on the 520 floating bridge between Seattle and Bellevue-Redmond, beginning at 5 a.m. on December 29th, won’t “bridge” into other transportation systems. The oll revenue is expected to shore [...]
Seattle Site of New World Internet Speed Record The recent SuperComputing 2011 (SC11) conference in Seattle was the scene of a new world record for an Internet transfer of gigabyte proportions. A FIOS shattering 98 gigabits per second (Gbps) was achieved between the University of Victoria Computing Centre located in Victoria, British Columbia, and the Washington State Convention [...]
Amazon Kindle Comes Under Fire Will the flames of early excitement that have tantalized consumers and ignited sales of Amazon’s 7″ color Fire handheld, the lowest cost entrant into the tablet wars at less than half the price of the Apple iPad and $50 lower than the Barnes & Noble Nook, be cooled by customer reviews? A few outspoken end-users [...]
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May 14 2012
Google Blinks! Bing Sings, and Slings the Arrows of Social Interface Discontent! Amazon’s Social “Denny Triangle!”
At last week’s Bing Search Summit in San Francisco, Microsoft took the wraps off a brand new Bing featuring a new, right-hand social column (“The Sidebar”) that will eventually include Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Quora and LinkedIn integration, as well as people who may know something about your most recent Bing query. The new Bing search even offers a way to ask questions on your favorite social network, directly through Bing. “The search engine has been reinvented!” wrote Mashable’s Lance Ulanoff.
In total, there are three new Bing columns in all:
* Core Search: minus many of the social annotations that Bing has added over the years (that have been relocated).
* Snapshot: providing additional information about a particular search listing, without having to leave Bing
* Sidebar: serving as the new home for social integration with search
“With this update, the competing search philosophies are clearer than ever,” opined Mashable. “Google sees the world as a deep blend of data, people and activities, all of which can be mined simultaneously for a rich and useful experience. Bing sees a more structured world, where social interactions, while extremely helpful, are kept a safe distance from the core results you desire.”
How does Bing build these “Friends Who Might Know” lists? Microsoft execs explained they’re leveraging as much publicly available data as possible from Facebook (for now) and soon Twitter and other networks. Inclusion in the list is not necessarily based on something you posted about the topic.
The sidebar includes people you know through your social networks that have, say, posted a photo about the topic, liked a certain relevant topic or searched for a similar topic in Bing, and people you don’t know, who are, for example, known Topic Experts and Enthusiasts (identified by Bing). All of them could be considered helpful in your quest for knowledge. Conversations revolving around a query topic are viewable through the social pane — you just hover over the activity and a small box will slide out to the left with the original post. You can add comments in any conversation in the activity pane or see the conversation in the slideout.
For example, a search for “Seattle restaurants” might pull up Facebook friends who have “liked” dining establishments in the metro area under a header that reads “Friends Who Might Know.” Bing users can also post comments or queries in the sidebar interface that will automatically be published to their Facebook page (provided they’re signed into Facebook) and could hypothetically flag their Seattle-based friends in posts seeking advice on where to go for dinner.
To see the new pane at work, you have to sign into Facebook and install the Bing App in Facebook. With that done, your social pane will be filled with recent Bing activity that’s also been shared on Facebook. When you enter a search query in the Bing interface on the left, the pane will also display a list of Facebook friends, and topic experts who might be able to assist with your query. Note: The Bing App defaults to sharing your posts with Everyone. If you do a lot of searching, you may want to dial that down a bit.
This deep integration with Facebook isn’t the first time the two have collaborated, and Bing has been adding social recommendations powered by Facebook to its search results for the past year. But it’s a sure sign that Microsoft — which bought a 1.6% stake in Facebook for $240 million in 2007 — will lean on a company it’s heavily invested in to improve on the social-search product Google introduced in January. “Search Plus Your World” pulls up Google+ content deemed relevant to signed-in Google users and has gotten a tepid reception, said Adage. [24x7]
Amazon Advances Its Vision for a Social Campus Compass, Not an “Apple Circle,” but a “Denny Triangle.”
The City of Seattle’s Department of Planning and Development has posted the latest renderings of Amazon’s proposed Denny Triangle campus.
At a public design review board meeting, attendees liked proposed amenities that include outdoor artwork, a playing field, a dog park and space for food trucks.
The venue also incorporates a healthy measure of social engineering into the design. To ensure public open spaces between buildings are both lively and safe, buildings are designed so that people who park their cars in the underground garages will have to walk outside to get from the garage elevators to the elevators in the building lobbies. “That will help ensure a steady flow of people moving through the plazas.”
The project will also be a haven for bicyclists. Each of the three blocks will have a dedicated bike entrance and storage for as many as 400 bikes. That could allow as many as 1,200 Amazon employees to bike to work. [24x7]