Hey ya'll. How is your week going? TGIF, right? I hope that those of you who celebrated all had a nice July 4th. I got rained on, but it was still nice to be with old friends.
We Celebrated. Did You?
As you know, America celebrated its 231st birthday on Wednesday. Our festive Search Engine Roundtable theme joins other themes in search. I especially like Ask.com's really cool flag background. This could be a good background too, Matt.
Sicko!
Over the weekend, a Google employee posted her opinion about Michael Moore's movie, Sicko, in a Google Health Blog post. As Barry said, this buzz overshadowed the iPhone press, especially because the blog post gave an opinion about how the health care industry should buy ads to improve its image. It turned out that it was the employee's personal opinion, and she wrote a follow-up saying that she was speaking for herself and not for the company. Matt Cutts, a seasoned Google blogger, made a great follow-up post himself about company blogging policies. He says that mistakes happen, and it's better that they happen when you're new. Blogging isn't a behavior or habit you can pick up immediately; it's a learned skill.
Google Acquires GrandCentral: It's Official
Google has acquired GrandCentral, a service that consolidates multiple phone numbers into one phone number. It's actually a very cool service that I've recommended to users from the howto written up on TechCrunch. So, how will they use it? Many people are asking that question. That's for us to find out, I guess.
Gmail: Gone in Germany
You win some, and you lose some. Google has lost the Gmail trademark in Germany to an individual who had registered it much earlier than Google had been using it. Apparently, they wanted to buy it from him for a low price. Maybe he'd have caved if they offered more? I don't know if the legal trouble would have been worth it.
Flickrized
We covered reputation management earlier this week. Barry wrote earlier this week on how you can achieve high rankings with Flickr. All you need to do is put two and two together on this one, folks. It works pretty well. :)
FREEdburner
Feedburner is now free, which I'm really excited about. I really can't wait to try out MyBrand, which Danny explained how to use so well. That is just hot.
Search Engine Strategies
I can't wait until next month which will be my first time in California. What will SES bring us beyond SES San Jose? Well, we'll see. Kevin Ryan has opened the podium for search marketers to discuss what they are looking for when they attend the SES conferences in the future.
Given Up
I had this scheduled for 12AM GMT as many people noticed: the Give it Up liveblogged notes have been published. I was not home when it was published, so I got buzzed by my BFF who was shocked that I got it up so early. Hey, Danny said we were on Greenwich time! It's fair game! :) Other coverage came from the Lisa, Stephan Spencer at Search Engine Land, and Jordan McCollum at Marketing Pilgrim. (Did I miss anyone?)
