October 2009

Google Wave Preview

An interesting topic that's emerged on the blog the last few weeks is how a new host of Google tools can help editors and perhaps aspects of project management when it comes to publishing.

On Oct. 1, I sampled Google Voice and came away pretty impressed with features like voice mail transcription and easy call recording.

Today, I got a chance to take Google Wave for a spin when a friend invited me to take part in the preview. Based on a few early reports and impressive screen shots, I had high expectations for this latest goffering.

Granted, I only kicked the tires for about 15 minutes with three friends, but my first experience was a mixed bag.

The Social Network Gender Gap

Cool study last week from Information is Beautiful. Turns out that every night is ladies night when it comes to social networks, with a solid female majority at Facebook (57%), Twitter (57%) and myspace (64%).

The major networks with gender equality include YouTube and Linkedin. Digg (64%) was the only network skewing male.

Bonus totally informal and anecdotal aside: 75% of the 20 most recent entries on my Facebook feed were posted by women. Supporting evidence or excuse to social network at work, you decide!

Google Voice: Awesome editorial tool or another step in Google's world domination plot?

So I was excited to learn that Google has invited me into the Google Voice cabal. Google Voice is a phone service that combines any number of cell phone numbers and landlines under one phone number, calls to this phone number can be recorded and voice mails are kept online among a lot of other tools.

To try this out I gave Diablo's IT Director Alex Ackerman a call. We were both on cell phones. He shares my opinion that Google is taking over our lives one awesomely convenient communication app at a time.