Monday, May 08, 2006

Keeping up with the Googlers #10

Googler may refer to:


In web-meanderings I usually end up reading yet another product/technology/website/business review. Sometimes those pieces of news are refreshingly insightful, sometimes they are not, and it may take some time to admit it that they don't contribute to my life in any significant manner. On the other hand they do keep my thirst for news quenched. That's a start.

No wonder though, that after having fed myself with this gumbo for quite some time, I eventually felt an utterly painful need for something else. Something that is not tech or news or cheap entertainment that Internet is so full of. And oddly enough, I have found the thing I needed in the place I didn't expect it to be. From present day's perspective though, there couldn't have been a better place for this material, and there couldn't have been a more logical source of top-quality information than this:

Google Video: From Googleplex

(note for those who don't know: Googleplex is the global headquarters of Google Inc., located in Mountain View, California; Google Video is a service hosting all kinds of motion picture material: from free commercials and home-made shorts to premium, paid content - video.google.com)

From Googleplex is a collection of movie clips divided into two main categories:

The movie clips published there (available both as free download and streaming) are essentially recordings of lectures and talks that happen to regularly take place at the Googleplex. It turns out that Google - in order to keep their emloyees' minds fresh, and their ideas up to date, I presume - takes an effort to frequently invite many prominent or important or in some other way interesting personae (usually a combinantion of the three) and lets them freely present their ideas, products, read their books or just simply share their experiences of what they do, how and why the thing they do seems to be important or innovative. Most of the lectures are ca. 1hr long, usually with rather thorogh Q&A at the end.

Here are a couple of gems that I've personally found very interesting (or sometimes even deliberately humorous):
  1. How to survive a robot uprising? (this one is a MUST)
  2. Sergey Brinn's lecture at the Search Enginges course in Berkeley (the basics of search and Google)
  3. The Search (analysis and extrapolations of significance of search)
  4. The Google Story (Google's business model)
  5. Connexions - Building Communities and Sharing Knowledge
  6. EFF Confidential (Electronic Frontier Foundation)
If you don't feel like doing anything at the moment and care to take a plunge into the avant garde of innovation, give it a try. Keep up with the Googlers!

Reviews of some of the more entertaining and mind-bending ones soon. Enjoy.

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