Julian Smith gives us a great video of 25 things he hates about facebook. I feel pretty much the same about all of them. I’m sure you do too.
Via: Laughing Squid
Category: Technology
- Image by niallkennedy via Flickr
In a move probably more related to a push from Apple and Vodafone over the uselessness of the iPhone‘s mapping ability than out of Google‘s own world domination attempts, Google Maps has finally been updated with a vastly more comprehensive detail level on maps in South Africa.
So its good news for all us tech junkies who are too lazy to bother with paper maps, but for the likes of Streetmaps, Brabys and various other South African map printing companies it spells time to rethink or get out.
Best we keep an eye out for Google Street View Cars clogging our streets in the near future, but my hopes aren’t high, so I’ll take that one with a pinch of salt, but it is likely the directions feature should become available as soon as Google points their route crunchers at the new mapping data.
Related articles
- Google Maps South Africa gets an update (marcforrest.com)
- Google wins Street View privacy suit (Steven Musil/CNET News) (techmeme.com)
- Share Your User Photos with Google Street View (blippitt.com)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](https://i0.wp.com/img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?w=580)
This is probably the most amazing sign of the times I’ve seen!
I am now, officially, an old-timer. Tech-Grandpa Shaun.
Fortunately not yet a has-been.
It really puts the pace of progress in perspective when I see Windows 3.1, the first GUI “operating system” I ever crashed and re-installed, running on the Nokia N95, the very same phone I now have in my pocket today. There’s a bit of DosBox hackery involved, but I am absolutely gobsmacked. Now I need to go dig out some floppy disks…
[Via Gizmodo]
Related articles:
- del C:\WIN – A Goodbye to Windows 3.1 (technosailor.com)
- What’s The Best Mobile Phone in terms of Signal Strength/Reception? (lucafiligheddu.com)
- Image via Wikipedia
Here’s Jared Spool’s story in which he tells how a single change to a site’s shopping cart checkout process from a forced registration to an optional registration increased the site’s annual revenues by $300 Million!
As one of the “test customers” says in the article. “I’m not here to be in a relationship. I just want to buy something.”
Yes, sometimes you simply do not need the 6 step registration, newsletter and community feel. Avoid the hype and get the job done.
I think a lot of South African sites can learn something from that statement. (Nice work, springleap!)
Related articles:
- Are You Guilty of Crimes Against Usability? Let the Jury Decide (searchengineguide.com)
- Is your website like a leaky bucket? (andybudd.com)
In a sadly predictable turn of events Google has binned Jaiku, a service they bought just over a year ago for a huge chunk of change ($12 million). Dodgeball too, has eventually suffered the cruel fate that has been looming over it ever since Google bought them back in 2005. Apparently it’s part of a Google cost cutting and re-focusing exercise, but I can’t for the life of me understand why they went ahead and bought duplicate services in the first place and then didn’t build out on those products.
I’m worried its becoming quite the modus operandi for Google to buy out small exciting startups, starve them of resources and then discard them when they fail to bring in any real revenue. Not cool, Google. In fact, it’s rather evil. In future this should surely make any startup think twice before flipping their passion to Google for a sum of cash.
Why do I care? Well, apparently I told you so.