France’s data privacy regulator has announced that it has fined Google $142,000 (€100,000) for unauthorized data collections carried about by the company’s controversial Street View photo-mapping project.

The Commission nationale de l’information et des libertes (CNIL) informed Google in May of 2010 that it would face penalties if it did not stop the data collections and hand over the information that had been collected. CNIL today said that Google had failed to comply with its demands and therefore would be subjected to a fine.

The Street View project aims to add panoramic photos to Google’s mapping service, Google Maps. Last year, it was revealed that Street View vehicles had collected personal information from unencrypted Wi-Fi networks. Several countries, including the U.S. and the U.K., announced investigations into the breaches. Google has since apologized for its actions and has always maintained that the data collections were accidental.

And while Google has ceased siphoning Wi-Fi data, CNIL alleges that the company has resorted to collecting data about Wi-Fi access points through smartphones that are running Google Latitude, a geo-social app that allows users’ to register and share their locations. CNIL claims that the Internet giant has failed to inform Latitude users about the practice — another reason behind its decision to fine the company.

Google is free to appeal the fine, but hasn’t yet indicated if it will do so.

Google’s Knowledge Graph will display summaries of topics when your query is related to one of the 500 million items in Google’s new database of things. (Credit: Google)

Google has long sought to index the world’s information — and it’s now taking things a step farther with an effort to create “a database of everything in the world.” And it’s bringing this effort to your search results pages.

The new Knowledge Graph project, rolling out to English-language Google Search users over the next few days, provides more data snippets alongside its query results than the search engine currently provides. The results are based on Google’s new database of 500 million people, places, and things, says Jack Menzel, Product Management Director of Search at Google. Menzel says there are 3.5 billion attributes and connections between these things in the database.

You’ll be able to meander through lists of facts and connections when you are searching for items that are in the Knowledge Graph. As one Google example illustrates, if you search for Frank Lloyd Wright, you’ll get a fact box with a summary about him (from Wikipedia), a small collection of biographical facts, and picture links to the buildings he designed. If you click on Fallingwater, you’ll get another fact box about that house.

Google has both personnel and technology to curate what results appear in these fact boxes.

The new, fact-enabled Google will also help you disambiguate search results. If you’re looking for “Kings,” for example, Google will guess that you might be referring to the hockey team, the NBA team, or the TV show, and you’ll have the opportunity, alongside the usual search results, to select one of those topics to narrow down your search results.

Menzel says that before the rollout of Knowledge Graph, Google didn’t reflect any “knowledge that a word refers to anything in the world.” While some keywords would fire off specialized results with data in them (like searching for a sports score, a city’s weather, or flight information), those results weren’t linked together in a web of knowledge. They were islands. Knowledge Graph changes that.

“We would like to be able to model everything,” says Menzel. “Anything to get you to the information that solves your task as fast as we can. We want to guide you through your query a bit like a map.”

Stealing traffic?

Google, of course, is built on top of the open Web of sites and pages. That’s where Google gets its data and it’s also the information economy that Google supports. Knowledge Graph provides data to users without requiring them to go to the sites that the data may come from. One might deduce that Knowledge Graph would end up hurting sites by stealing traffic from them.

Menzel says that’s not the case. “We found that by doing better information summaries, the vast majority of the time people don’t just get facts and walk away. Actually, it entices them to go a little deeper. And now they have the time for it since their research was faster.”

He does acknowledge that in some cases, the most satisfactory outcome to a user’s search may be a Knowledge Graph data point. “We want to point people to the most relevant info. Occasionally that is just a fact.” He says it’s Google’s mission to get people those facts as quickly and efficiently as possible. But it’s against mission to harm Web publishers. “We really respect the ecosystem. It makes no sense for us to obviate the Web,” he says.

Not the first online knowledge engine

Other companies have tried to add context to search results. There’s also a rich history of startups who have tried to “understand” Web pages. Powerset is one; it was acquired by Microsoft. And then there was the unfortunate failure of Cuil.

Even Google has previously tried to create a database of things, as opposed to simply an index of Web pages. In 2010, Google acquired Metaweb, the creator of the knowledge base Freebase. Menzel says Freebase is one of the most important “concept cars” from Google’s past that ultimately became the Knowledge Graph.

Tech from Google’s Squared labs project also ended up in Knowledge Graph. Squared attempted to extract structured data from non-structured Web pages.

Google has also tried its hand at creating its own topic dossiers before: The Knol project was conceptually similar to Wikipedia. It was discontinued in late 2011.

As far as the disambiguation technology in Knowledge Graph, Menzel points to the technology behind the search query spelling corrector as “the ultimate grandfather of all this.”

What this latest knowledge extraction and display project brings to search users, Menzel says, is “comprehensiveness and sheer volume.” Also, he points out that Google will show just that data that is most relevant to a query, making use of Google’s expertise in ranking search results.

Menzel pitches Knowledge Graph without using the word “semantic” even once. While he says, “I dream of the semantic Web,” he takes pains to point out that what Google is announcing today is not what people talk about when they discuss semantic Web concepts. “We do continue to work on how to make search semantic,” he says, “but talking about it brings out the crazy people.”

One of the intrinsic capabilities of Windows 8 is the ability to use multiple accounts on any PC. This makes it much easier for parents to use tools that can help protect their children from content on the Internet as they see fit. It is also a great way for each family member to maintain their own unique online identity while still sharing a single PC. Microsoft has been a leader in creating tools to help maintain a safe computing environment for all users as well as for parents in particular. With Windows 8 we have substantially improved the family safety features and services available. Phil Sohn, the senior program manager lead for Family Safety, describes how Family Safety features will work in Windows 8.

Kids today grow up online. They use computers to do their homework, play games, communicate with friends, and access the wealth of information on the web. Computers give children access to many positive experiences; however, parents face challenges in monitoring what their children see online, the people they meet, and the information they share.

At Microsoft, we want to help parents create a healthy computing environment for their kids. We encourage parents to talk to their children about online safety and to set guidelines for their computer use. Microsoft and many safety advocates also recommend moving the family computer to a common room in the house so parents can glance over their kids’ shoulders to gain a better understanding of their online activities. Parenting techniques like this are important, but they may be difficult to employ if your household has multiple PCs or if your kids use laptops and tablets. And glancing over a teenager’s shoulder can be awkward for both parents and kids.

A safer Internet is just a click away

With Windows 8, you can monitor what your kids are doing, no matter where they use their PC. All you have to do is create a Windows user account for each child, check the box to turn on Family Safety, and then review weekly reports that describe your children’s PC use. No additional downloads, installation wizards, or configuration steps are required. Just check the box!

The “monitor first” approach

In the past, many of the industry software solutions for family safety (including Microsoft’s) focused on web filtering and other software-based restrictions. This resulted in a more complex setup experience and a constant stream of parental approval requests that could be difficult to manage. The end result was that many parents abandoned family safety products and returned to in-person supervision only—a tactic that has become less effective as computers have gotten more mobile.

Windows 8 gives you a “monitor first” approach, which provides informative activity reports for each child. As previously discussed on this blog, signing in to Windows 8 with a Microsoft account makes setup much simpler: just create a separate user account for each child and then check the box to turn on Family Safety. As soon as you do, you’ll receive a welcome email followed by weekly email reports summarizing your child’s computer activities. We expect you’ll find activity reports a great tool for teaching your kids about responsible computer use. Of course, you can also easily add restrictions by just clicking a link in the activity report. With the simplicity of activity reports, we believe more parents will adopt Family Safety, resulting in a safer computing environment for children.

Here’s what a Family Safety activity report looks like:

With a Microsoft account, you can take action from anywhere, on any device, because the reports are delivered directly to your email inbox. Any changes you make to Family Safety settings are stored in the cloud at familysafety.microsoft.com. These changes are then automatically applied to all Windows PCs where Family Safety is active.

Standard accounts for the kids

We’ve long recommended that parents log in as the computer administrator and make sure children have separate standard accounts. In Windows 8, accounts that the administrator –or “parent”—creates are automatically created as standard accounts. This approach has several benefits. Children:

For parents who want more control

Activity reporting, which is on automatically in the new Family Safety, is the perfect solution for many parents. However, if you like more control, you can set up more powerful and customizable restrictions directly from links in the activity reporting email, or on familysafety.microsoft.com, if needed. In addition to the restrictions currently available in Windows 7, we’ve added some new ones in Windows 8, including:

Watch for Family Safety in Windows 8 Release Preview

We are continually striving to help you create a safe, family-friendly computing environment for your kids, but of course, we know that this means different things to different parents. Some parents prefer to simply keep an eye on their children. Others prefer to set up software restrictions on their child’s computing activities. We think the simplicity and power of the “monitor first” approach in Microsoft Family Safety addresses either style effectively and will lead to more family conversations about online safety, a safer computing experience for kids, and increased peace of mind for parents. Watch for these Family Safety features in the Release Preview.

Experiment Confirmed
I noticed these appearing yesterday in my own search results, and Google has confirmed that there’s an experiment happening:

We’re always experimenting with ways to improve search, but we have nothing to announce at this time.

Google does indeed often experiment with new formats, randomly tagging some visitors to see the formats being tested. I apparently was one of those tagged. Most people, however, won’t see some of the examples I’ll share below, as they’re not tagged into the experiment.

I think that will change in the near future, because as I’ll explain at the end, this is one test that I suspect will go fully live soon.

TV Shows
Here’s what I see in a search for Lost:

You can see off to the right-hand side there’s a little summary about the TV show “Lost” that’s drawn from Wikipedia. Cast members are listed, along with a “People also search for” area showing other TV shows that seem related to Lost.

In the previous test last November, this box was called “Sources.” That label is now gone. I’m continuing to call it the “Sources” box for want of a better name.

Actors
Clicking on the links generates a new Google search along with further information. Here’s a close-up of what’s shown for Evangeline Lilly:

Movies
Similar units appear for movies, such as this for in a search for Avengers:

Music & Bands
Musical groups like U2 appear:

People
There’s also extended information about some people, apparently if they are listed in Wikipedia. For example, a search for “dooce” brings up extended information about blogger Heather Armstrong, who is known by that name:

Books
Even books can get a special display:

With Or Without Google+
None of the units are dependent on Google+, nor are they part of Search Plus Your World. They appear whether you’re signed in or not, whether you use Google+ or not. But if you are part of Google+, the units might get additional information.

For example, signed-out, I see this for a search on the TV show New Girl:

Signed-in, since I follow the New Girl page on Google+, information from that appears in a “From your circles” area above the sources box:

New Format For Direct Answers Live For Everyone?
Google is also showing direct answers that come from different sources. Bas van den Beld from State Of Search also appears to be in the test and noted that for a search on “hot fuzz director,” he got a direct answer like this:

This is similar to what you see at Bing for the same search, where the information is disclosed as coming from Freebase, a service that Google owns:

However, these direct answers don’t seem part of the sources experiment. For example, using my Chrome browser in “incognito” mode, which keeps me out of the Google sources test, I can still make these boxes appear, such as this for “avengers cast:”

Is This The “Search Refresh” The WSJ Wrote About?
Direct answers like these have long been part of Google. The formats, however, seem new. The addition of the sources box also suggests that what the Wall Street Journal wrote about earlier this year, about Google offering more direct and semantic answers, is about to happen.

In WSJ Says Big Google Search Changes Coming? Reality Check Time!, I took the WSJ article to task because I thought it overhyped what was likely to happen, which was Google expanding things that it already does.

That still seems to be the case. This will no doubt be a big change to hit Google. But it will also be one of those “evolutionary not revolutionary” type of changes.

If you see these boxes, then you’re one of the few who have also been tagged as part of the experiment. If you don’t, then there’s not much you can do but wait. It seems likely they’ll eventually come for everyone.

To add and/or manage your fonts go to the Font Selection Menu and click on Add Fonts.

Once you have accessed the fonts list simply click on a font listing to add or remove it from your Fonts Selection Menu. Click OK when finished.

To enjoy the latest template goodness click on the From template… listing when creating a new document.

Additional Links

Google Docs – Templates
Google Drive – Templates

If you’re looking for a cloud-based storage service, this handy overview will help you pick which one is the best fit for your needs.

At Freeware Genius they’ve rounded up a collection of cloud storage solutions and compared them based on factors like initial free storage, max storage, OS support for desktop apps and mobile apps, number of supportive devices, and so on. They even detail why certain services were excluded (such as lack of a desktop folder syncing app).

Now that the biggest tech companies in the world are taking aim at Dropbox (with Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon all offering their own cloud storage services), we thought we would compare the FREE cloud storage plans that are out there, in terms of how much free storage space they offer, how easy it is to get it raised, and how much you could get in total. We also compare other pertinent factors that could help you decide which one is best for you.

We tried to list all the “good” cloud storage services; however, there were criteria for inclusion on our list, as well as criteria for exclusion (see below for more info on both). Our list eventually encompassed the following: , Dropbox, Skydrive, Amazon Cloud Drive, Google Drive , Sugarsync, Glide , CX (Cloud Experience), Memopal, Safecopy, Mimedia, Teamdrive, HiDrive, Comodo Cloud Storage, Spideroak, MegaCloud, Wuala, and Synplicity.

Note: this is a snapshot of the way things were as of our last update: May 1st, 2012. Things could have changed since

How much free storage do I need?

Although the answer to this question is up to you, this issue was explored in a previous post entitled “How much free cloud storage space do you really need?”, which posited that 7 gigs may be the magic number.

Inclusion criteria: what the services have to offer to be on the list

A free plan: obviously

Desktop folder sync: a desktop client that syncs a local folder or folders with the cloud. Services that offer this only with a paid plan were excluded. This is also why most ‘file locker’ type services were excluded.

The Comparison

Sorting order: the services on the list below are sorted in descending order according to the amount of maximum free storage attainable for each.

Recommendations: if you want to know which services we like here at Freewaregenius, go to the ‘recommendations’ section below.

Links: go down to the links section for sign-up links. In most cases you will get the initial extra referral bonus.

[1] This will also depend on your browser or OS file size limits
[2] We couldn’t find documentation for this, but found it in practice
[3] Safecopy seems to be a mere rebranded copy of Memopal, with a few minor differences between the two,
[4] Legacy accounts have 25 gigs free, and if you have a Hotmail or MSN account you may be able to get 25 gigs as well (see the recommendations section below)
[5] It may be possible to get more if you’re buying music off of Amazon (see here)
[6] Not 100% sure about this.

Exclusion criteria: why some services are excluded from the list

No desktop client in the free version: Box.net, sadly, and Adrive are guilty of this.

Maximum attainable free storage @ 2 gigs or less: if you can only get 2 gigs free maximum storage no matter what, we excluded the service. Mozy is an example.

Mac only, or requires ownership of an Apple device: Apple’s iCloud, and Dolly Drive were excluded on this basis.

Free versions have bandwidth or speed restrictions: with so many options available, we decided to toss out the following services that restrict daily or monthly bandwidth in the FREE version, or restrict upload speed: YouSendIt (1GB/month restriction), OpenDrive (1GB/Day, 200KB max upload speed), FilesyncAnywhere (25MB per file, max 25 files per day) , and Asus WebStorage (500MB per day).

Defunct services or ones that are being phased out: ZumoDrive and Windows Live Mesh fall into this category.

Unclear or misleading offering: ZenOK was tossed out because it doesn’t know what it is and what it wants to offer.

No free plan available: many services were overlooked on this basis.

Whether you’re an inexperienced user or a seasoned professional, you’ll probably find at least one search operator you weren’t aware of here. Many of Google’s search operators aren’t very well-known.

Exact Words and Phrases

One of the most basic and widely known search tricks is using quotation marks to search for an exact phrase. For example, perform the following search and you’ll only get pages that contain the word “Hello” followed by the word “World.”

“Hello World”

This same method now works for exact-word queries. For example, if you search for “mining,” Google will also show pages that contain the words “miners.” Previously, you’d use a plus sign and search for +mining, but now you have to enclose the word in quotes:

“mining”

Excluding a Word

The minus sign allows you to specify words that shouldn’t appear in your results. For example, if you’re looking for pages about Linux distributions that don’t mention Ubuntu, use the following search:

linux distributions -ubuntu

Site Search

The site: operator allows you to perform a search in a specific site. Let’s say you’re looking for information on Windows 7 on How-To Geek. You could use the following search

site:howtogeek.com windows 7

You can also use the site: operator to specify a domain. For example, if you’re looking for high-quality references, you could use site:.edu to only pull up results from .edu domains.

Related Words

The tilde (~) operator is the opposite of enclosing a single word in quotes — it searches for related words, not just the word you type. For example, if you ran the following search, you’d find search results with words similar to “geek”:

~geek

Apparently, “Linux” is the most similar word to geek, followed by “Greek.” “Nerd” comes in third. (Hey, no one ever said Google was perfect.)

The Wildcard

The asterisk (*) is a wildcard that can match any word. For example, if you wanted to see what companies Google has purchased and how much they paid, you could use this search:

“google purchased * for * dollars”

Time Ranges

A little-known search operator allows you to specify a specific time range. For example, use the following search to find results about Ubuntu from between 2008 and 2010:

ubuntu 2008..2010

File Type

The filetype: operator lets you search for files of a specific file type. For example, you could search for only PDF files.

filetype:pdf how to geek

One Word or the Other

The “OR” operator lets you find words that contain one term or another. For example, using the following search will pull up results that contain either the word “Ubuntu” or the word “Linux.” The word “OR” must be in uppercase.

ubuntu OR linux

Word Definitions

You don’t have to Google a word and look for a dictionary link if you want to see its definition. Use the following search trick and you’ll see an inline definition:

define:word

Calculator

Use Google instead of pulling one out or launching a calculator app. Use the +, -, * and / symbols to specify arithmetic operations. You can also use brackets for more complicated expressions. Here’s an example:

(4 + 2) * (6 / 3)

Unit Conversions

The calculator can also convert between units. Just type “X [units] in [units]”. Here’s an example:

5 nautical miles in kilometers

Combine these search operators to create more complex queries. Want to search a specific website for a PDF file, created between 2001 and 2003, that contains a specific phrase but not another phrase? Go ahead.

Google said on Monday that Google+ On Air is now available to Google+ users worldwide. This allows members of the social network to stream their live video broadcast on YouTube or other non-Google sites supporting the stream. The service originally launched last year to a limited number of broadcasters who have since helped shape the product into what is offered today.

“By checking ‘Enable Hangouts On Air,’ you can broadcast your live hangout — from the Google+ stream, your YouTube channel or your website — to the entire world,” Google explains on its blog. “During your broadcast, you can look inside the hangout to see how many people are watching live. Once you’re off the air, we’ll upload a public recording to your YouTube channel, and to your original Google+ post. This way it’s easy to share and discuss your broadcast after it’s over.”

Like any other new Google feature, the company doesn’t plan to open the doors to the entire public all at once, but gradually roll it out over the next few weeks. However until then, there are a handful of Google+ Hangouts taking place this week alone including:

CBS This Morning: May 8th at 4:20am PT / 7:20am ET
Conan O’Brien: May 8th at 7:30pm PT / 10:30pm ET
CNBC: May 10th at 1:15pm PT / 4:15pm ET
Global Poverty Project: May 10th at 4:00pm PT / 7:00pm ET
Cadbury UK: May 11th at 1:30pm PT / 4:30pm ET
The Nerdist: May 11th at 3:00pm PT / 6:00pm ET
Jamie Oliver on Food Revolution Day: May 19th at 5:00pm PT / 8:00pm ET

To see what’s live right now, Google+ members can head over to the new Hangouts page. Google has also listed a number of Hangouts that are now stored away on YouTube including President Barak Obama’s public Q&A earlier this year, KOMU-TV anchor Sarah Hill sharing live coverage of the recent protests in Montreal, and more.

Hangouts On Air is available to all users in the countries listed here who are 18+ and who have a YouTube account in good standing without any strikes. Users will only have a strike on their YouTube account if they have previously posted content to YouTube which violates the YouTube policies, Google said on Monday.

Despite attracting the ire of financial journalists – including the Daily Telegraph, which prevented it from winning its Startup 100 awards – Wonga has made as many as 4 million short-term loans to consumers since its launch in 2007.

The new scheme means it will be offering SMEs loans of £3,000 to £10,000 pounds for between one and 52 weeks depending on the application. Interest rates will be fixed at between 0.3 and 2 percent per week, with the risk attached to the loan.

Under the new service, business will have to provide information about their company and its directors, who personally guarantee the loan, as with normal Wonga loans. Wonga says the application takes about 12 minutes, and money can be transferred to the business in around half an hour.

Wonga has a sophisticated automated risk-processing algorithm to quickly tell an applicant if they can have a loan or not. It turns down about two-thirds of applications. This simple application process it being extended to small businesses.

Chief Executive Errol Damelin said: “We wanted it to have all the characteristics that people positively associate with Wonga in terms of transparency, simplicity, ease of use, speed … and we wanted to bring that to small business.”

Wonga has been criticized for charging just under 1 percent per day interest, something which can appeal to vulnerable people. However the company insists it takes these people out of the black hole of dealing with often violent loan sharks on the street, and also mainly appeals to white-collar workers who can usually afford the payments at the end of the month

Wonga does not take deposits and operates under a consumer-credit license, so it is not subject to the capital requirements that banks are. That means it is more free to lend than banks.

Wonga operates in Britain but is looking at Canada and South Africa. The company is backed by Accel Partners, Balderton Capital, Dawn Capital, Greylock Partners, Oak Investment Partners and the Wellcome Trust. The company raised £73 million in new capital a year ago.

In the continued omnipresent integration of Google+ into all of Google’s products, the Web giant announced some new features to its U.S. edition of Google News today. In addition to larger images on the main page and real-time news coverage, the tech company is also adding “relevant” Google+ posts to its news pages.
Google News product manager Scott Zuccarino wrote in a blog post today:

“Many news stories inspire vibrant discussions on Google+, and today we’re starting to add this content to both the News homepage, and the realtime coverage pages. This way you can see what your circles, journalists covering the story and notables like politicians or others who are the subjects of stories have to say about breaking news, and even contribute to the discussion directly from Google News.”

For now, the Google Plus discussions will only show up in the U.S. edition of Google News and for people who are signed into the social network. If users prefer not to see the featured comments they can either log out of Google+ or turn off the posts on the Google News settings page.

When Google first launched its social network last June, the company’s goal was to combine what was at the company’s core — its search engine — with social networking. This also meant moving toward the integration of its products, such as Google News with Google+.

Not all users seem to be happy about the social network’s ubiquitous approach to the Internet. Earlier this week, actor and writer Wil Wheaton got up in arms about having to sign into Google+ to like a video on YouTube.

The latest upgrades to Google News will be rolled out over the next week. “Today’s updates are the latest examples of how we’re working to provide users with a beautiful, consistent experience across Google,” Zuccarino wrote.