Google is stepping up the ante against smart phones like the iPhone and Blackberry with the release of its own phone the Nexus One. The search engine aims to maintain its online advertising kingdom as individuals continue to increasingly sift through the Internet on smart phones and not PCs.
Employees at Google were the first to receive the device three weeks ago but T-Mobile users will have the opportunity to buy the Nexus One for $179 upon committing to a two-year service contract – the phone’s standard sales price will be $529, which the company will sell directly from a new online store.
Dubbed the first “superphone” by Google, the touch-screen Nexus One is lighter and thinner than other smart phones. The Nexus One is set to offer consumers more ways to “customize the phone’s home page and use voice recognition technology to perform more tasks, including composing e-mails and navigating Google’s mobile mapping products.”
Sex beats death according to Yahoo’s CEO Carol Bartz who told financial forecaster earlier in the week that Tiger Woods’ sexapade story is “better than Michael Jackson dying” because it has helped the online search engine generate money ad sales.
“It’s kind of hard to put an ad up next to a funeral,” said Bartz, who is known for her shady and tasteless commentary. She even said Tiger’s story will “absolutely” help Yahoo reach its projected numbers this quarter, although the company now says the comment was meant to be a joke.
Yahoo is not the only search engine benefiting from Tiger’s “transgression.” Google has also seen a significant spike in traffic from individuals searching for information on the golf superstar and his alleged extramarital affairs.
It’s good to know Tiger’s slight downfall is improving other folk’s bottom line.
As the Chinese proverb goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, so goes Yahoo and Microsoft, who have announced they are teaming up to “improve the Web search experience for users and advertisers and deliver sustained innovation to the industry” that up till now Google has dominated.
The 10-year deal will give Microsoft’s new search engine, Bing, an extended audience by accessing Yahoo’s search engine, which is the second largest on the Internet. Nonetheless, it will be an uphill battle for the two companies that together own 30 percent of the search market, nearly two times less than Google.
Listen to Yahoo and Microsoft’s CEOs talk about the deal here.
Taiwanese mobile-phone maker HTC showcased its third Google-leveraged, Android-based device, nicknamed Hero, which has a new interface that is easily customized to fit a user’s needs and wants.
The interface is called HTC Sense and it is believed to be the foundation for the company’s goal to set itself apart from its competition in the increasingly saturated high-end phone market.
HTC’s solution was to design Sense to more naturally mirror the way people think and function. For instance, all communications from a given person, including email, texts, photos, Facebook updates and calls, are listed under that person’s name.
Practically this means that instead of digging into each individual application to retrieve a piece of information, users can just tap a person’s name and the information will show up.
