Yahoo Launches Axis Visual Search
Yahoo tries to elbow in into Google Search by introducing Yahoo Axis, a visual search tool. It is available on iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touch devices and also as add in extensions for Chrome, Internet Explorer, Firefox and other web browsers featuring HTML5 graphics capabilities.
The design goal of Axis is to eliminate the middle step between searching for information and ending up on the relevant web page.
Our first look at Axis is not very good as it implements widgets like the arrow buttons that stay permanently on your browser screen. Good try Yahoo!
Google Adds Knowledge Graph To Search
Google has rolled out the latest update to their search engine, adding Knowledge Graph feature where users are presented with more information related to their searches.
From Google blog:
The Knowledge Graph enables you to search for things, people or places that Google knows about—landmarks, celebrities, cities, sports teams, buildings, geographical features, movies, celestial objects, works of art and more—and instantly get information that’s relevant to your query. This is a critical first step towards building the next generation of search, which taps into the collective intelligence of the web and understands the world a bit more like people do.
Google Is Destroying Your Memory
Columbia University researcher Betsy Sparrow speculates that Google search engines are changing human thought patterns. A user would less incline to remember things and rely heavily on the search engine to bring back the memory.
From Sparrow: Our brains rely on the Internet for memory in much the same way they rely on the memory of a friend, family member, or co-worker. We remember less through knowing information itself than by knowing where the information can be found.
Google Search Adds Instant Site Preview
Google has debut instant preview sites feature on their search engine. A feature that will let users get a glimpse of search results pages by hovering over a magnifying glass icon next to the link.
Google Launches Google Instant Search
Google revealed a faster way of searching the Web with Google Instant, which shows search results as users type their queries. It is a predictive search technology.
From Google Instant:
Google Instant is a new search enhancement that shows results as you type. We are pushing the limits of our technology and infrastructure to help you get better search results, faster. Our key technical insight was that people type slowly, but read quickly, typically taking 300 milliseconds between keystrokes, but only 30 milliseconds (a tenth of the time!) to glance at another part of the page. This means that you can scan a results page while you type.
Google Launches Realtime Search
Google has released Realtime search which allows a user to see up-to-the-second social updates, news articles and blog posts about hot topics around the world. Google search in giving up to date update to conversations much better than Twitter’s own search. The other cool feature is the geographic filtering of status updates. Watch the video for more features.
Check it out at: http://www.google.com/realtime
Google New Search Feature Deliver Results As You Type
Google is testing a new kind of search capability that delivers the results instantly as you type the letters. Google has confirmed to TechCrunch that the video is not a fake. No news when this feature will be released.
Do Not Search For Cameron Diaz
McAfee has compiled its “most dangerous celebrities” search on the internet which lure you to risky sites. Top of the list is Cameron Diaz followed by Julia Roberts, and Jessica Biel.
The other celebrities in the top 10 were model Gisele Bündchen, Brad Pitt, model Adriana Lima, a tie for Jennifer Love Hewitt and Nicole Kidman, Tom Cruise, a tie for Heidi Klum and Penelope Cruz, and Anna Pacquin.
Google Images Search Gets A Facelift
Google has redesigned the interface to Google Images search page. Now it features an infinite scroll interface that can show up to 1,000 images on a single page. You have seen this kind of interface on Apple’s App Store.
From Google Blog, here are the new features:
- Dense tiled layout designed to make it easy to look at lots of images at once. We want to get the app out of the way so you can find what you’re really looking for.
- Instant scrolling between pages, without letting you get lost in the images. You can now get up to 1,000 images, all in one scrolling page. And we’ll show small, unobtrusive page numbers so you don’t lose track of where you are.
- Larger thumbnail previews on the results page, designed for modern browsers and high-res screens.
- A hover pane that appears when you mouse over a given thumbnail image, giving you a larger preview, more info about the image and other image-specific features such as “Similar images.”
- Once you click on an image, you’re taken to a new landing page that displays a large image in context, with the website it’s hosted on visible right behind it. Click anywhere outside the image, and you’re right in the original page where you can learn more about the source and context.
- Optimized keyboard navigation for faster scrolling through many pages, taking advantage of standard web keyboard shortcuts such as Page Up / Page Down. It’s all about getting you to the info you need quickly, so you can get on with actually building that treehouse or buying those flowers.
Google Search Page Is Now Not Customisable After All
Last week Google allow users to change the look of the plain looking search homepage on Google.com. But now the search company has pull the plug on letting users have the customizable background option. Why? Users are not happy Google is trying to introduce busy background to the search page like Microsoft’s Bing. Google search should be nice and clean from distractions.
From Google blog: Last week, we launched the ability to set an image of users’ choosing as the background for the Google homepage. Today, we ran a special “doodle” that showcased this functionality by featuring a series of images as the background for our homepage. We had planned to run an explanation of the showcase alongside it—in the form of a link on our homepage. Due to a bug, the explanatory link did not appear for most users. As a result, many people thought we had permanently changed our homepage, so we decided to stop today’s series early. We appreciate your feedback and patience as we experiment and iterate.
