Gawker
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clips
Microsoft's Bing Puts Google and Yahoo on the Defensive
In the tech world, dominance can be lost with mere clicks, which in turn spring from mere thoughts. Perhaps that's why Google and Yahoo's CEOs are so quickly dismissing Microsoft's new search site, Bing. More »
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19
By Ryan TateComment by TheHonJudgeSmails: I have used it, and it is no better than anything else out there. Mindshare is really all that matters. 3 Responses | Other threads
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print is dead
Google's Newspaper That Wasn't
Eric Schmidt now says Google thought about buying a newspaper but rejected the idea as "crossing the line" between technology and content. The real message for newspaper hacks: You're just not profitable. Compared with, say, TV and movies. More »
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By Ryan TateComment by Nyarlathotep: Online video is a growth business. It will 'grow' into the $100B Cable/Satellite TV market. more » | Other threads
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antitrust
Uh Oh, Google's in More Antitrust Trouble!
Google's G1 is the biggest enemy of Apple's iPhone. And Apple is making a big push into the Web. So it's totally hunky-dory that Google and Apple share board members, right? Wrong, say antitrust cops. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by dontmindme: I absolutely have no pity, nor compassion, for any of those companies: Microsoft, Apple, or Google. May their... more » | Other threads
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print is dead
Maureen Dowd Gapes at the Horror of Google
What happens when the prim self-satisfaction of New York's media elite meets the smug hubris of Silicon Valley's unblinking technocrats? Why, a Maureen Dowd profile of Google CEO Eric Schmidt, that's what happens. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by jbuberel: What would it take to get the NYTimes to implement the following robots.txt: User-agent: Googlebot Disallow: / Within a few days, the... 3 Responses | Other threads
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print is dead
Google CEO: Newspapers Need to Speed Things Up
What's the mysterious plague that's killing newspapers? According to Google CEO Eric Schmidt, it's not search engines, Craigslist, or Monster.com. It's those agonizingly slow-loading websites! More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by ifstone: Eric Schmidt, when he was at Sun, actually made websites slow today by f-ing up Java. Newspaper sites are weighed... 2 Responses | Other threads
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layoffs
Google Execs in Secret Layoff Meetings
More layoffs are coming to Google, employees there believe. A Googler tells us top executives abruptly cancelled meetings across the Googleplex Friday.
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By Owen ThomasComment by uncle_wiggly: Hey, where'd you get this photo. I didn't see any cameras in the room for that meeting. That's me with... 2 Responses | Other threads
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geeks gone wild
Who's Saying 'Fly Me' to Eric Schmidt?
How does Eric Schmidt do it? The computer nerd runs Google, has Obama's ear, parks his jet fleet in a NASA hangar, and has a rocking girlfriend. Is she the reason he flies so much? More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by MisterHippity: Owen, I don't know if it was intentional or not, but your headline recalls this 1970s advertising campaign for National... 4 Responses | Other threads
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antitrust
It's Time to Ask if Google's Too Big to Fail
Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently told the BBC that the U.S. should break up banks that get "too big to fail." What about Google? Is it too big — and should the government take action? More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by snitch29: Google is the only search engine that delivers the entire web, MSN search for example only shows you what ever... 6 Responses | Other threads
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free
Google, No Longer the Land of the Free
The accountants have taken over the Googleplex, once a hotbed of amiably unprofitable innovation. The notion that ads would pay the way for everything has been dropped — and "fee" is replacing "free." More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by unclevanya: What the hell is Google Checkout? I use the Web, Image, Video and Map searches. Anything else is delusional meat... 4 Responses | Other threads
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wantrepreneurs
Obama's Tech Twit Conference Will Destroy Us All
The nation is in crisis, our economy on the brink. And yet President Change is spending time with a group of technowastrels whose sole noteworthy accomplishment has been to spend other people's money.
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By Owen ThomasComment by turniptable: Is this article supposed to be ironic? I am not entirely sure as to the credentials of these people,... 6 Responses | Other threads
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Shut Up, Google
Why Google CEO's Twitter Diss Is All Wrong
Eric Schmidt is an old dude who just doesn't get Twitter. That groupthink consensus emerged after the Google CEO dismissed the fast-growing messaging service at a conference. But he missed the real critique Twitter deserves.
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By Owen ThomasComment by JeromeMabawza: I guess no one sent Valleywag the memo: Twitter sucks and has been myspaced. Please, PLEASE move on. 5 Responses | Other threads
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Googlefreude
Marissa Mayer: Google's Biggest Failure
Google's perfectionist cupcake princess is totally misunderstood! That's the claim Marissa Mayer, the VP who oversees Google search, makes to a credulous New York Times, which licks up the frosted version of her career.
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By Owen ThomasComment by Wrapitup: "Good students are good at all things." But a good student is not necessarily a good software engineer or a good... 5 Responses | Other threads
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death of print
Google Boss to Newspapers: No Bailout
Everyone wants a sugar daddy to save them. Wall Street has found one in Washington. But the newspaper industry has been batting its eyes in the direction of Mountain View, Calif., home of Google. Ha! More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by CodePink: Um, this man resembles a mentally challenged adult who likes doing that fast hand moving thing when he gets excited.... 8 Responses | Other threads
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Inaugural Cash
Google Execs Pay $150,000 for Obama Bash
It's Google's presidency. We're just watching it. Six Google executives, including CEO Eric Schmidt and cofounder Larry Page, have donated $25,000 apiece to fund President Barack Obama's swearing-in party.
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By Owen ThomasComment by Goose Spruce: First you get the money, then you get the power, then you get the president. 1 Responses | Other threads
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wilson sonsini
Lawyers nix champagne amid popped bubble
It may be time to put a cork in Silicon Valley's most famous law firm. Wilson Sonsini is no longer celebrating its new attorneys with champagne. That trimmed perk is just the beginning of its woes.
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By Owen ThomasComment by schvitzatura: A perfectly good méthode champenoise, $10.99 out the door... Wilson Sonsini...spiritless bastards. Show some fortitude and backbone, you losers! 1 Responses | Other threads
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kate bohner
Google CEO's unemployed girlfriend
What's the use of dating a megabillionaire if he can't throw some bucks your way? Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who's been seeing video producer Kate Bohner since last fall, hasn't come through with funding for her documentary production firm, so she's out of a job.
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By Owen ThomasComment by giddieup: why does she look like a retired pr0n star 6 Responses | Other threads
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rumormonger
Henry Blodget wants you to think Eric Schmidt will quit
Two weeks after Valleywag stopped believing that President-for-Change Obama might steal Eric Schmidt from Google, Silicon Alley Insider editor Henry Blodget has weighed in with the same speculation. His bullet list of reasons Schmidt might quit isn't crazy, but here's the six-word version of Blodget's post: "We have no inside knowledge here. " I have enough inside knowledge to say this: true Googlers don't see Google as a stepping-stone to a government job. Government is part of the problem. Google is the solution. (Photo by Reuters/Carlos Barria)
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By Paul BoutinComment by ghunda: No but seriously, in that picture is Schmidt photoshopped in because it kind of looks like the ghost-of-Google-CEO haunting Obama.... more » | Other threads
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your privacy is an illusion
Google CEO has no time for your privacy
Is Google becoming the king of the Web? Well, duh — that happened about five years ago, before anyone really noticed. But activist groups, now and again, worry about whether Google knows too much about us. Yesterday, Consumer Watchdog's John Simpson quizzes Google CEO Eric Schmidt about whether his company is doing enough to guard our privacy. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by ShreemayiDexamenus: I don't understand why anyone expects Google to protect your privacy on search. They are not a utility. They are... 1 Responses | Other threads
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rumormonger
Google CEO pulled over for driving with a cell phone
No man is above the law — not even multibillionaire Google CEO Eric Schmidt. At least that's what we hear from a well-placed tipster, who says Schmidt recently confessed to having been pulled over by the cops last month in Los Angeles for talking on his cell phone while driving. (California law recently changed to require the use of a headset.) Oh, but it gets worse for Schmidt. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by MissVolare: Don't dial & drive: like the CHP needs more crap laws, besides "driving while minority," to enforce. I've started asking... 6 Responses | Other threads
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caption contest
Eric Schmidt's 20 percent time project
Google CEO Eric Schmidt, left, sits at a campaign event for Barack Obama in October. YouTube's growing role in politics makes Schmidt an unelected Washington player. Can you think of a better caption? Leave it in the comments. the best one will become the post's new headline. Yesterday's winner: jasonnellis, for "That's not a sweater, honey." (Photo by cjwoolridge)
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By Owen ThomasComment by m0nty.au: Eric Schmidt's 20% project did good this year 1 Responses | Other threads
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don't be evil
Eric Schmidt and the YouTube election
Is YouTube making Google a political player? The video-sharing site, with its stratospheric bandwidth bills and questionable new ad formats, may never pay Larry and Sergey back in cash for the $1.65 billion they shelled out to buy it in 2006. But it doesn't have to. YouTube, having conquered online video, is taking over political broadcasting. The conventional unwisdom in Manhattan and Washington, D.C., is that this election made YouTube. Pah! It's true that campaign videos spread faster than ever thanks to YouTube. But they made up a tiny fraction of clips and traffic on the site. Politicians owe YouTube a debt that Google is just starting to collect on — and hosting President Obama's 21st century fireside chats is just a down payment. More » -
barack obama
President Change dumps radio for YouTube
This week's Democratic Party weekly address by our audaciously hopeful President-elect will not be on boring old NPR. Barack Obama's going to upload to YouTube, reports the Washington Post. The WaPo says the Obama administration will also make "online Q&As and video interviews" part of its communications strategy. Think this is payback for Google CEO Eric Schmidt's late-to-the-game Obama endorsement? More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by Omelas: In my experience working for the gov, when we use Gmail or other free services, it's because they're providing a... 2 Responses | Other threads
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America's CTO
Eric Schmidt rejects Obama's lame CTO job
"I love working at Google and I'm very happy to stay at Google, so the answer is no," Google baldfaced-liar-in-chief Eric Schmidt told Jim Cramer on CNBC Friday, when asked if he'd take a job with the incoming administration. "Google is its own exciting opportunity." I know what you're thinking: Obama turned him down already, how cold is that? More likely, Schmidt truly doesn't want the job. He just wanted Obama to ask. More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by Rachel Marsden: there isn't going to be a CTO folks. that was just BS to keep the nerds busy. 1 Responses | Other threads
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America's CTO
Doerr pushes Bill Joy on Obama
At yesterday's Web 2.0 Summit, Kleiner Perkins whiz John Doerr — a man so successful he can get away with wearing the same three ties for ten years — told attendees that Barack Obama should skip over Googlers Eric Schmidt and Vint Cerf, and instead hire Kleiner Perkins partner and Sun co-founder Bill Joy as his national chief technology officer. Obama's job description was focused more on counter-terrorism intelligence and IT supremacy. Doerr thinks that's misguided: “The most important thing he's got to do is kick-start a huge amount of research and innovation in energy." Energy tech is Doerr's current focus at Kleiner, of course. But it's unclear to me whether Joy is now a leader or a dilettante on the topic. Doerr also suggested the U.S. "staple a green card to the diploma" to keep foreign-born engineering students from going back home after graduation. Throw in a fixed-rate mortgage for gossip bloggers, and I'll endorse the whole package.
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By Paul BoutinComment by Rachel Marsden: Hey you deluded web 2.0/socialmedia assholes, unless you can root out Bin Laden from his cave using IT skillz, you... 1 Responses | Other threads
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caption contest
With my $1 salary, I'll be getting a tax cut!
Even before Google CEO Eric Schmidt officially endorsed Barack Obama, he was cozying up to the Democratic candidate. Take this interview in May, for example. What was Schmidt really thinking when this photograph was taken? Suggest a caption in the comments. The best one will become the post's new headline. Yesterday's winner: its_a_feature, for "Zack and Mari make a porno."
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By Owen ThomasComment by theodp: With my $1 salary, I'll be getting a tax cut! 1 Responses | Other threads
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dumbphones
Does Eric Schmidt hate show tunes?
The FCC is having its own vote today, on whether or not to allow future wireless gadgets to operate in parts of the radio spectrum already in use by wireless microphones. Google is all for the new spectrum-sharing policy. Professional musicians and their audio engineers are dead set against it. More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by sample032: I thought Journey was done with large venues and working the county fair circuit, these days. Not that it... 2 Responses | Other threads
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antitrust
America's CTO bows to the feds on Yahoo-Google deal
When did Eric Schmidt turn into such a wimp? When Google and Yahoo first proposed a deal to have Google sell search ads for Yahoo, Schmidt brazenly gave antitrust regulators a four-month deadline to review it. After that, Google would blaze ahead with the deal. The deadline came and went. Over the weekend, Google and Yahoo turned in a revised deal that they hoped would impress regulators. The bottom line: It is half as lucrative as Yahoo had hoped, generating $400 million a year rather than $800 million, limiting Google-sold ads to a quarter of Yahoo's search-related revenue. It's better than nothing, but it leaves Schmidt in a weak position the next time he wants to talk tough with the feds. Then again, maybe he's planning to dump Larry and Sergey for a nice, safe government job.
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By Owen ThomasComment by its_a_feature: I don't think he's ever intended to actually implement the deal. Instead, it has just served as a way... 2 Responses | Other threads
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eric schmidt
America's CTO does infomercial for Obama
In exchange for his late-to-the-party endorsement of Barack Obama, Google CEO Eric Schmidt got a spot on Obama's prime-time infomercial last night. Note how Schmidt explains his decision, made only after Obama took a substantial lead in the polls: "When I read his economic plan and saw the people endorsing it, Warren Buffett, I thought, 'This is the right plan for America.'" In other words, Schmidt didn't endorse Obama until he saw it was popular with the right people, and might help Google get its search deal with Yahoo passed under an Obama administration. Brave! We still don't think you'll get that government job, Eric.
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By Owen ThomasComment by drinkwater: At this point you're weird if you DON'T endorse Obama. He's hopping on the bandwagon, but probably because he's playing... more » | Other threads
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politics
Valley homophobes still drafting Yes on Prop 8 response ad
BoomTown reporter Kara Swisher rappelled from a skylight at Jerry Yang's secret hideout to score this draft copy of an ad, in which a bunch of tech bigwigs come out in favor of gay marriage — or at least in opposition to Proposition 8, a California state ballot initiative which would ban it. No Valley company in its right mind would be seen opposing gay marriage, so why bother? More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by Apel Mjausson: Implying that people are homophobic based on a draft of an ad is skating on very thin ice. There are... 2 Responses | Other threads
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search
The Yahoo-Google deal? Let's just assume that's not happening
Yahoo's deal to outsource some of its search advertising to Google continues to face scrutiny on Capitol Hill. Google CEO Eric Schmidt had said he'd carry out the deal whether or not regulators had finished their review. Regulators called his bluff, and America's CTO has now lost face, not to mention credibility. Why not just bow out and move on? That seems easier.
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By Owen ThomasComment by macbeach: I was stunned to actually hear and ad for Yahoo on a local niche radio station yesterday. Seems like... 1 Responses | Other threads
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eric schmidt
Google now getting into the energy business
Let's face it: Google's every attempt to venture outside its holy circle of search and ads has been a financial nonstarter. So is it thinking about getting into the energy business? Yes. Read between the lines in CEO Eric Schmidt's statements to the New York Times. "Our primary mission is one of information," he says. "As to whether we will be in these other businesses, we will see.” See? When a project is some years off, America's CTO out-and-out lies. Remember how he denied, for years, that Google was working on a Web browser, and then presto ta-da, Google Chrome emerged fully formed from the forehead of Sergey Brin? Right. So if Schmidt is merely ditherating about the idea that Google could play in the energy business, you might as well be getting utility bills in your Gmail tomorrow.
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By Owen ThomasComment by deluxe2000plus: This company really doesn't know what to do with all the AdSense money they earn. Data center boats, satellites, energy... 2 Responses | Other threads
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toogle many googlers
Google waffling ahead on monster office building
"A space-age structure that could be the greenest office building of all time." "A living building that has no carbon footprint." That's the spin. So is this: Google spokespeople are telling reporters that plans are on hold. Charleston East, site of Google's planned superplex, used to be a parking lot for Mountain View's Shoreline Amphitheater, just up the road from Google's main campus Now the lot is idle, pending a bunch of paperwork by the city. But here's the truth: The building was planned when Google was growing by more than 100 employees per week worldwide. Last quarter, it added 500 Googlers to its ranks — about 40 a week. That's why Google has shuttered a café. There's green, and then there's green. Eric Schmidt, America's CTO, is not thinking about the tree-hugging kind right now.
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By Paul BoutinComment by nirreskeya: Not to gang up on you Paul, but 500 / 12 = 41.6 employees added per week... 3 Responses | Other threads
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party plane
Why Larry and Sergey bought a fighter jet
Larry, Sergey, and Eric have a fighter jet, and you don't. They also have a sweet place to park it: Moffett Field, the airstrip closest to the heart of Silicon Valley. Even Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has to get chauffeured down to San Jose to board his private plane. Remind us, how did the Googlers get such a sweet deal? More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by dotcomburnout: Might as well use Moffett for something, it is a ghost town. Charge them and all the other guys... 1 Responses | Other threads
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toogle many googlers
America's CTO gets a fighter jet
There's a new party plane at Moffett Field. Not another boring Boeing — this one's a Dornier Alpha Jet, a German/French built fighter plane that seats two. The New York Times is updating its report faster than I can retype, so I'll skip NASA's phony backstory and cut to the facts: "It is not clear who exactly owns or flies the fighter jet. Mr. Schmidt is an avid pilot." I'd love to replace this Wikipedia stock photo with shots of the real thing. Pics or it didn't happen, right?
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By Paul BoutinComment by colonelpanic: AlphaJet?! Pussy. That's an easy shoot-down for my surplus SA-8 Gecko: [upload.wikimedia.org] (if only the instructions weren't all written in Russian) more » | Other threads
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rumormonger
It's like PageRank for layoffs
Yes, Google has laid off employees before. But those were DoubleClick employees. America's CTO, Eric Schmidt, managed to cull any deadwood from Google's Mountain View campus without it becoming a hot story. This time it's different, writes one of my leakers, and all the smart people can smell it. Here's the algorithm: More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by foobarz: contractors are the ones who dig the ditches...you can't do much w/o them if you leave it up to those... 1 Responses | Other threads
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eric schmidt
America's CTO prepares for Google's layoffs
"All of us are vulnerable,'' Google CEO Eric Schmidt told a Bloomberg reporter yesterday . "It's a race between a contraction in advertising, which would affect everybody, and a very positive shift from offline to online." Carly Fiorina couldn't have said it better. This photo of Squirrel Boy with Barack Obama and PepsiCo Chairwoman and CEO Indra Nooyl is a bit stale — July 28 — but it makes the point: Schmidt has what Tom Wolfe called the right stuff to lead geeks. Try to picture Larry and Sergey in that room as the co-heads of U.S. technical preparedness for a terrorist attack. Vint Cerf, maybe, if he ever ships a project more tangible than Net Neutrality. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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By Paul BoutinComment by ThatKid: "Schmidt has what Tom Wolfe called the right stuff to lead geeks." Is this Valleywag's official endorsement? more » | Other threads
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commenter of the day
Churchill
Today was your last day to register to vote in California. Coincidence or not, today was also the day Google CEO Eric Schmidt decided to stump for Barack Obama. Is Schmidt trying to sway undecided voters, or just aiming for a government post? Either way, today's featured commenter, Churchill, explains why this wouldn't work: More »
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Comment by sample032: Except for Ron Paul. The under 35 libertarians love the guy. 2 Responses | Other threads
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eric schmidt
Google CEO auditions for America's CTO
The Wall Street Journal has an 800-word report this morning announcing Eric Schmdt's plans to "hit the campaign trail this week" for Barack Obama. Blah blah blah natural evolution, Google is officially neutral, "I'm doing this personally," says Schmidt, a week after self-appointed Internet Co-Founder Vint Cerf came out of his own Obama closet. What does Schmidt really want? It's buried at the end of the WSJ's report: More »
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By Paul BoutinComment by macbeach: Which reminds me (haven't heard this tech czar concept mentioned lately as I guess I'm not listening to enough Obama... 2 Responses | Other threads
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online video
Why YouTube's desperate revenue hunt is on the money
CEO Eric Schmidt botched Google's $1.65 billion acquisition of YouTube. Under his misguided traffic-first strategy, the online-video site has seen off would-be rivals, but failed to grow a business. When he decided, rather late, to make revenue a priority, he wasted time looking for a magical new ad format. (The one result of this effort, YouTube's InVideo ads, which are overlaid over a video as it plays, seems to be a complete failure.) Now, YouTube cofounder Chad Hurley admits there is no "silver bullet." YouTube has abandoned one of its shibboleths — that viewers are turned off by "preroll" ads which play before a clip — and is experimenting with a number of moneymaking schemes. More »
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By Owen ThomasComment by ShamitaNerq: Here's an idea, why doesn't YouTube have some sort of commerce marketplace and charge a fee for the conversions. Amazon... 1 Responses | Other threads
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eric schmidt
Google CEO says Internet is a "cesspool" without brands
"Brands are the solution, not the problem. Brands are how you sort out the cesspool," Eric Schmidt told an audience of magazine publishers assembled at Google yesterday. Wait, what happened to the magic Google algorithm that reverse-engineers our reputations? Does it now rank pages by brand, too? I hope so, because when I Google myself at midnight all I see is Valleywag, Valleywag, Valleywag. I'd like to believe Google knows something my agent doesn't. (Photo by AP/Phelan M. Ebenhack)
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By Paul BoutinComment by WilliamMarkFelt: Sounds to me like Schmidt is kissing the fleshy hindquarters of Madison Avenue. He knows how much they love... more » | Other threads
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Fri Jul 10
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