in.sight

Search giants circumvent standards and create controversial schema.org

14 Jun 2011
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Google, Yahoo and Bing have jointly unveiled a new vocabulary for the web that provides a standardised way to markup content so that it can be interpreted by search engines.
Sites that use Schema.org will get preferential treatment in the search results.
Unsurprisingly, this has tread on a few toes because the open standards community has been working on open semantic markup standards for years, and was not consulted about this. The main complaint is that this move enables the search giants to control the markup that's used on the web, instead of allowing people to choose what works best for them.

via netmagazine.com

This is such a terrible idea, Google, Bing, And Yahoo. Especially that they will be preferential to the people using Schema markup. Why would they circumvent all the hard work, development, and natural evolution that went into creating the current, open standards in microformatting?

I wonder if the backlash will be great enough to get them to change and adopt any of the many current standards out there. Really, the only people who care about this are going to be the people who know the most about it - and know how to do the most to change their minds.

Google to perhaps end operations in China following government attacks on dissidents

12 Jan 2010
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It seems that the Chinese government has been attacking the digital accounts of numerous human-rights leaders, and other political dissidents, through Google and many other online services. After the internet search giant found out about the attacks, they posted a public response outlining the attacks and the possibility of shutting down services in China.

These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered--combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web--have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.
The decision to review our business operations in China has been incredibly hard, and we know that it will have potentially far-reaching consequences. We want to make clear that this move was driven by our executives in the United States, without the knowledge or involvement of our employees in China who have worked incredibly hard to make Google.cn the success it is today. We are committed to working responsibly to resolve the very difficult issues raised.

Hopefully this will have an enormous impact on the Western view of Chinese politics and human-rights in the upcoming year. Google has the visibility, and the weight, to push people's eyes in a certain direction.

via BoingBoing

Google sends Cease-and-Desist to Android developer

24 Sep 2009
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Cyanogen, developer on the popular Android ROM mod CyanogenMod, was contacted by Google today.

See, when T-Mobile released the G1 (as they called it), it was running version 1.1 of the Android operating system. It was slow, bulky, and missing a lot of features that other mobile devices in the same price range had – video recording, multi-touch, and an on-screen keyboard…among other things. But, dedicated HTC Dream (the manufacture's name for the G1) users hacked away until they found a way to root and unlock the potential of the phone’s full capabilities. And then came Cyanogen.

Cyanogen started releasing optimized versions of the v1.5 (Cupcake) Android operating system with all kinds of tweaks and extras. As time went on, he started backporting features from other Android versions, or future versions that have yet to be released on the market. And his version of the Android – dubbed CyanogenMod (CM for short) – quickly became one of the most used ROMs for Android. I have been running it on my Android ever since.

Since it is a port of the standard Android OS with the "Google Experience", it includes standard Google apps like Maps, Gmail, Market, Talk, and YouTube. But, apparently Google is not happy about that. They recently sent a Cease-and-desist order to the developer, and he has stopped development until he can converse more with them.

From a chat-log:

[20:03] <cyanogen> google just cease and desisted me
[20:15] <cyanogen> cyanogenmod is probably going to be dead
[20:16] <cyanogen> i’m opening a dialogue with them
[20:20] <cyanogen> no they are talking specifically about the closed-source google apps
[20:20] <cyanogen> and how i am not licensed to distribute them
[20:20] <cyanogen> my argument is that i only develop for google-experience devices which are already licensed for these apps
[20:20] <cyanogen> so we’ll see what they say
[20:20] <cyanogen> maybe we can work something out
[20:24] <cyanogen> maps, market, talk, gmail, youtube

If you want to support Cyanogen, CyanogenMod, Android modding, and Open-Source software in general, please help spread the word!
Android users can also download the Save CyanogenMod app from the Market to help send a direct voice to Google. App downloads in the 10,000+ range would send a large message.

via AndroidandMe | Also, Engadget

Search giants circumvent standards and create controversial schema.org

Google to perhaps end operations in China following government attacks on dissidents

Google sends Cease-and-Desist to Android developer

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