Month: December 2007

Scoble On My Predictions

Robert says I did pretty well. You are too kind, my man – I still think there's time for eBay to change senior management (they did fire Zennstrom…and I think I can make a case for #8 as well…). But thanks! My review of 2007 is coming, as are…

Robert says I did pretty well. You are too kind, my man – I still think there’s time for eBay to change senior management (they did fire Zennstrom…and I think I can make a case for #8 as well…). But thanks! My review of 2007 is coming, as are my 08 predictions. I had a nice chat with Robert today, he’ll be putting it up online soon.

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Is YouTube Profitable?

Mark Glaser asks. My answer: It doesn't matter. What matters is that Google owns the most important distribution network for video on the planet. The rest will follow….

Mark Glaser asks. My answer: It doesn’t matter. What matters is that Google owns the most important distribution network for video on the planet. The rest will follow.

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Google R&D: Not So Much

Google has long argued that its approach to R&D includes the "20 % time" its engineers are encouraged to take for side projects. Gary has a list of top R&D spenders this year, and Google makes the list, but is way down on it (#79), lower than Valley middle…

Google has long argued that its approach to R&D includes the “20 % time” its engineers are encouraged to take for side projects. Gary has a list of top R&D spenders this year, and Google makes the list, but is way down on it (#79), lower than Valley middle fry like Sun and NEC.

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There Is More Here

And I suggest, regardless of politics, we all focus and really think about this….

And I suggest, regardless of politics, we all focus and really think about this.

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A Brief Interview With Chris Sacca

I've enjoyed my professional relationship with Chris Sacca, who is leaving Google to pursue a career in investing. When I heard of his move, I pinged him in email, and the resulting dialog can be found below, verbatim, despite the fact that Google PR was cc'd on the thread….

Sacca

I’ve enjoyed my professional relationship with Chris Sacca, who is leaving Google to pursue a career in investing. When I heard of his move, I pinged him in email, and the resulting dialog can be found below, verbatim, despite the fact that Google PR was cc’d on the thread. Thanks for your time, Chris, and good luck!



Why leave, and why why now?

A few reasons. First, I feel like the wireless team I built is in great shape and poised for some amazing achievements. I am proud of what the team accomplished this year and it makes me smile to see Verizon and AT&T fighting over which is more open than the other. Hard to say more about that without triggering the anti-collusion rules of the FCC around the 700MHz auction. That said, though I love Google and my colleagues here, I vested this Fall and it occurred to me how much I miss working in small, entrepreneurial environments.

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Yup, The Machine is Using Us

Paul notes that Google is using us for speech recognition via 800 GOOG 411. Yup, so was/is TellMe….

Paul notes that Google is using us for speech recognition via 800 GOOG 411. Yup, so was/is TellMe.

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Google Profiles: Watch This Space

As TC reported earlier, Google is rolling out Google Profiles. From the description: A Google Profile is simply how you represent yourself on Google products — it lets you tell others a bit more about who you are and what you're all about. You control what goes into your…

Profilecards

As TC reported earlier, Google is rolling out Google Profiles. From the description:

A Google Profile is simply how you represent yourself on Google products — it lets you tell others a bit more about who you are and what you’re all about. You control what goes into your Google Profile, sharing as much (or as little) as you’d like.

But the page that describes what it is doesn’t let you set one up, odd. And it’s apparently only available for Maps and Reader, for now.

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Surface Coincidence

As far as I can tell, this is a holy grail – surfacing coincidence. Why? Because we all trust coincidence, be its very definition….

As far as I can tell, this is a holy grail – surfacing coincidence. Why? Because we all trust coincidence, be its very definition.

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Jimmy Wales Responds

I pinged Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, about Google's competitive move this past week. I asked him his initial thoughts: Sounds more like Yahoo Answers than Wikipedia to me. It is not a collaborative tool, it is a competitive tool. "We hope that knols will include the opinions and…

I pinged Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, about Google’s competitive move this past week. I asked him his initial thoughts:

Sounds more like Yahoo Answers than Wikipedia to me. It is not a collaborative tool, it is a competitive tool.

“We hope that knols will include the opinions and points of view of the authors who will put their reputation on the line. Anyone will be free to write. For many topics, there will likely be competing knols on the same subject. Competition of ideas is a good thing.”

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