Filed under: Products and services, Google (GOOG), Marketing and advertising

If you’re a Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) user, you probably enjoy the relatively high quality of the company’s products at t cost of — zero. How does Google give all this away for free, you ask? It’s the same as any other company on the internet that features quality products at no cost. The cost is your privacy. You are paying, and paying big.

Do you mind? It’s hard to say what kind of personal, financial and psychological profile Google has on millions of its customers, but you can believe that this large marketing database exists. How Google manages this will be the most important decision in the company’s young, decade-old existence, but the question remains: do many of us sell our souls for freebies? Every time you sign up for something free but fill out a complete demographic profile to get it, you’re selling out. Google is doing nothing different — but its scale is so large that all this data controlled by one entity does cause for concern among the informed consumer inside us all. It should, anyway.

Google, like anyone in business who is savvy, knows that giving away products or services for “free” on the front end is made up for on the back end. In other words, would you rather pay for every single product or service you use and not have any entity know how to market to you — or would you rather get a good majority of your products and services at no cost but with the attached condition that there are lots of entities out there that know you superior than you know yourself?

More importantly, they know how to push your exact buttons to have you behaving like a robotic consumer or a slot machine junkie? With the U.S. consumer responsible for two-thirds of economic activity (as tiny as that is at the moment), the harnessing of this kind of power becomes clear. Okay, I’m off to perform a Google search…

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SpuriousLogic writes to tell us that University of Arizona researchers claim to have broken a barrier in holographic technology by creating an updatable, three-dimensional display with memory. While the existing model is only able to update once every couple of minutes, and isn’t particularly suited for 3d images, it is certainly a step in the right direction. “Peyghambarian is also optimistic that the technology could reach the market within five to ten years. He stated progress towards a final product should be made much more quickly now that a rewriting method had been found. However, it is fair to say not everyone is as positive about this prospect as Peyghambarian. Lecturer in Electronic Engineering at Bangor University in Wales, Dr Justin Lawrence, told CNN small steps were always being made on technology like 3D holograms, but, he couldn’t see it being ready for the market in the next ten years.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Former British colonies tackle trade, poverty - International Herald Tribune
CASTRIES, St. Lucia : The prime minister of St. Lucia stated Wednesday that small developing countries such as his Caribbean island have few resources to cushion the impact of high food and fuel prices and the global finance crisis. Prime Minister

Germany urges G-7 to consider managers’ liability - Boston Globe
BERLIN— Germany’s finance minister has urged his Group of Seven colleagues to consider confidence-restoring measures including global standards to ensure that financial decision-makers shoulder greater personal liability. In a letter to his fellow

More Finance Firms ‘Will Go Bust’ - Ananova
The US Treasury Secretary has warned that more financial firms are expected to go bankrupt in the US - despite the big government bail-out there. Henry Paulson said: “One thing we must recognise - even with the new Treasury authorities - some

Finance ministry says turmoil will hurt growth - International Herald Tribune
BERLIN : Germany will likely cut its economic growth forecasts as turmoil on global financial markets risks causing the world economy to stagnate, one of the country’s deputy finance ministers said Wednesday. Deputy Minister Joerg Asmussen said the

NorthStar Realty Finance Announces Third Quarter Dividend and Share - Earthtimes
Author : NorthStar Realty Finance Corp. NEW YORK , Oct. 8 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — NorthStar Realty Finance Corp. (NYSE: NRF) this day announced that its Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $0.36 per share of common stock, payable with

Finance VP Stepping Down At NAB - Broadcasting Cable
Mike Wiliams, the National Association of Broadcasters executive VP, finance and operations, is stepping down as of Friday. According to an e-mail from Williams to the NAB board, he’s leaving to return to his consulting practice. “I have worked for

What Should Consumerist Ask The Personal Finance Toolmakers At - Consumerist.com
I’ll be reporting from the Finnovate 2008 personal finance tool conference on October 14. There’s 24 presenters from places like Mint, Yodlee, Quicken and Wesabe. Here’s the complete list . Some of these services you’ve heard about or might use

Cyprus to guarantee deposits up to 100,000 euros - Boston Globe
NICOSIA, Cyprus— The Cyprus government will guarantee bank deposits of up to 100,000 euros ($137,310) to bolster confidence in the banking system, the island’s finance minister said Wednesday. Charilaos Stavrakis said the government would submit

Finance crisis hits German car sector - Middle East Times
BERLIN, Oct. 8 (UPI) — The effects of the global financial crisis have hit the German car industry. Several German car giants, including Mercedes, Daimler and Opel, which belongs to Volkswagen, have announced they will temporarily stop

G20 leaders to meet over crisis - News.com.au
THE central bank chiefs and finance ministers of 19 nations, including the United States, Europe’s biggest economies, and China, India and Russia, are to hold a crisis meeting in Washington on Saturday. The impromptu gathering of the so-called G20

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Filed under: Forecasts, Good news, Consumer experience, Housing, Recession, Financial Crisis

With all the negative news that we’ve seen lately, it’s nice to hear one piece of positive news regarding the housing market. We got that this day on news that pending home sales rose unexpectedly in August.

The National Association of Realtors tracks home sales in its index, and reported today that its pending home sales index rose from 87 in July up to 93.7 in August. Going into today’s report, analysts had been expecting to see the index actual fall, and were thinking that we would see the number drop down to 86 in the month, so the increase was definitely a bit of good news in an otherwise rocky market.

The areas of the country that saw the ideal jump in July were the same ones that have been beaten up the most over the past year, including California, Nevada, Florida, and Arizona.

While this is some good news for the market, we shouldn’t read too much into the August numbers. What is on most of our minds these days is the declines we have seen in home prices so far this year. We should not expect today’s news to mean that home prices are going to begin to move higher any time soon.

The National Association of Realtors’ chief economist, Lawrence Yun, said that he does not think that prices are going to rebound during the latter part of 2008, and that it will not be until 2009 that prices will begin to move higher, and even then we should not expect to see too much in the terms of price gains. Yun believes that 2009 will see home prices rise by about 2 to 3%.

The battered housing market has been a major factor in the overall economic mess that the country is now in the midst of. Falling prices and rising foreclosure rates have led to a credit crisis that continues to rock Wall Street. The Fed is trying its ideal to help combat the situation, and this day lowered its key federal funds rate by 50 basis points down to 1.75%, and its discount rate by a similar 50 basis points, down to 1.5%.

It is definitely going to take a little more time for the housing market to regain its strength, but at least August sales give us a little reason to be optimistic, and only time will tell how the rest of the year will play itself out.

Are you currently in the market, as either a buyer or seller? If so, let us hear what you going through, and what you think the near future holds in store for the housing market.

Michael Fowlkes has worked as a stock trader for seven years and spent the last four years working as an analyst for the online investment advisory service Investor’s Observer.

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Filed under: Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), eBay (EBAY), Economic data, Housing, Financial Crisis

One of the few things that Barack Obama and John McCain agreed on during last night’s televised debate was that billionaire Warren Buffett would make a good Secretary of the Treasury.

Odds are that the universally respected Buffett won’t take the job. Why does he need the headache at this point in his life? Besides, he might not be the type of government official investors would like. Much to the horror of political conservatives, the Oracle of Omaha is backing Obama. He has come out against such bedrock Republican principles as abolishing the so-called death tax on inherited wealth. The financial disclosure requirements alone probably are enough to scare Buffett away from government service.

To counter Obama’s Buffett card, McCain stated that former eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman might be the right person for the job. I guess no one mentioned to the Arizona senator the big layoffs planned by the on the internet auctioneer. Interesting how another McCain supporter, ex-Hewlett Packard Co. (NASDAQ: HPQ) Chief Executive Carly Fiorina, did not merit consideration. Given her disastrous tenure, it’s no wonder.

Another good potential Treasury Secretary neither brought up is Michael Bloomberg. The founder of Bloomberg LP (where I worked for seven years) clearly knows the markets. He’s rich and has shown savvy in navigating New York City’s political landmines that Washington should be a walk in the park. Too bad he’s got his heart set on a third time as mayor.

Continue reading Obama, McCain both want Warren Buffett as Treasury Secretary

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Filed under: Products and services, Google (GOOG), Marketing and advertising

Google, Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) YouTube continues to take the lion’s share of the online video market. Although startup Hulu.com — which will broadcast the U.S. Presidential candidate debate live tonight — has come on strong, YouTube has it. Everyone from teens with $69 digital cameras to professional videographers are uploading video footage to the site.

Google announced recently that it was upping the file size of uploaded video to the site as well — by a factor of 10. Going from 100 Megabytes to 1 Gigabyte per uploaded video is astonishing in and of itself, but this will make YouTube all the more attractive to those who want to take rather exhaustive video and upload it for all to see while not being constrained.

For example, five minutes of video on a standard digital camera (just an average, of course) will easily eat up 100 Megabytes of storage. Since we’re not all video compression experts, Google — with this change — has just allowed its on the internet video universe to expand in a large way.

In addition to the video file size increase, YouTube’s new uploader will grant multiple file uploads at the same time. This is also a rather huge change from the “upload and wait” scenario of the past. Although Google surely wants to make more money from the big amount of video viewed every minute on YouTube, giving regular customers the capability to have more massive videos (and several at one) uploaded should just push it that much further in front of the on the web video pack. What it needs now is to lift the 10-minute limitation for non-partners. But then again, that would invite a whole new universe of copyright piracy. Maybe.

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An anonymous reader writes “A team of US researchers has asked the following question in the new field of systems biology: ‘Do we understand how a cell produces electricity well enough to design one, and to optimize that design?’ They believe it should be possible to build artificial cells copying the electrical behavior of electric eel cells. In fact, such artificial cells could deliver superior performance — as much as 40% more energy than real eel cells, a computer model recommends. They could be used to power medical implants and other small devices.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Presto Vivace and others sent us this CNet report on a just-released NRC report coming to the conclusion, which will surprise no one here, that data mining doesn’t work very well. It’s all those darn false positives. The submitter adds, “Any chance we could go back to probable cause?” “A report scheduled to be released on Tuesday by the National Research Council, which has been years in the making, concludes that automated identification of terrorists through data mining or any other mechanism ‘is neither feasible as an objective nor desirable as a goal of technology development efforts.’ Inevitable false positives will result in ‘ordinary, law-abiding citizens and businesses’ being incorrectly flagged as suspects. The whopping 352-page report, called ‘Protecting Individual Privacy in the Struggle Against Terrorists,’ amounts to [be] at least a partial repudiation of the Defense Department’s controversial data-mining program called Total Information Awareness, which was limited by Congress in 2003.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Northrop Grumman Awarded Air Force Equipment and Logistics Services - MSN MoneyCentral
HERNDON, Va., Oct. 8, 2008 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The U.S. Air Force has awarded Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) a contract to provide engineering services to the 542nd Combat Sustainment Group at Warner Robins Air Logistics Center, Ga., that

Garrido enjoying City life - Manchester Evening News
BLUES defender Javier Garrido is just concentrating on enjoying his first-team run at Eastlands despite rumours of large money signings in January. The left-back position is one of the perceived weak spots in City’s team, with Michael Ball and Garrido

Not only did they look good, they also raised money for youth - The London Free Press
As life changes and time ages it can be very hard to find your style groove. Whether you’re getting back into the dating scene, lost those final 10 pounds, just had that baby, hit a landmark birthday or find that mini-skirt isn’t so age

Humor and (Self) Help During These Troubling Financial Times - Forbes
CHICO, Calif., Oct. 8 /PRNewswire/ — If you’ve been losing money in the stock market recently, you’re probably feeling pretty lousy about that. But it could be worse. You could be like Mike Foster of livelife365.com — he’s lost his hair! In an

Three Perks That Work in Lieu of Raises - Street.Com
By Sarah Pierce of Entrepreneur.com In a down economy, small-business owners will invariably feel the pinch. And, unfortunately, so will their employees. According to a study by Hewitt Associates, employees can expect another year of skimpy raises in

Invitrogen Redesigns GIBCO(R) Bottle to Improve Form and Function - MSN MoneyCentral
Invitrogen Corporation IVGN , a provider of essential life science technologies for research, production and diagnostics, announced the global launch of its updated GIBCO cell culture media bottles. The new bottle design has an angled neck for easier

Living paycheck to paycheck - CNN
Editor’s note: CNN.com has a business partnership with CareerBuilder.com, which serves as the exclusive provider of job listings and services to CNN.com. Invisible expenses — a smoothie after yoga class or a burger for lunch — can swiftly deplete

Stranger tracks down owner of lost wallet, refuses reward - Bucyrus Telegraph Forum
CLEVELAND — We all know times are tough and money for many is hard to come by. One man, however, never hesitated about doing the right thing when he came across a bag that contained a wallet, cash, and credit cards. He then refused to take a reward

Asian stocks plunge on fears of global recession - Seattle Post Intelligencer
A pedestrian walks past an electric stock market board in Tokyo, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2008. The Nikkei index lost 460.78 points to 9,695.12 at the end of the morning session on Wednesday. The Japanese index on Tuesday shut at the lowest level in

‘Happy’ and ‘free’ Bonds lights up a ceremony - San Diego Union-Tribune
Barry Bonds made a rare public appearance yesterday in San Francisco and stated he’s enjoying life away from baseball. “I’m happy now that I have more time,” Bonds told the crowd at the kickoff event of the Macy’s Christmas tree lighting. “I’ve

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Filed under: Employees, Housing, Federal Reserve, Recession, Financial Crisis

The federal government has done virtually everything it can to solve the current credit and liquidity crisis. But even today’s decision by the Federal Reserve to purchase commercial paper did not get much reaction.

Going through the list, the Treasury is providing the FDIC capital for covering deposits in failing banks. It has set up its $700 billion “Paulson” fund. Bernanke has opened the emergency loan systems for banks and brokerage to the extent of making as much as $900 billion available. It might also cut rates.

Since the Dow is off 1,500 points in a month, it is safe to say that nothing done so far is cause for party.

What has been neglected over the last several months is the easy fact that Americans can still work. Burdened with debt, unable to make car payments and purchase gas, and facing mortgages, they have the ability to still work. But if the economy snuffs out jobs in record numbers, the last wall defending the economy will have broken.

Continue reading Liquidity does not work, jobs are the answer

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