Michael Hickins

Google’s YouTube acquisition is looking less and less like a financial boondoggle every day. YouTube is now selling ads against 9% of its content, versus 6% a year ago (and remember, this is a market in serious recession). According to AdAge: “A YouTube spokesman confirmed that the social site is placing ads on more videos […]

Eric Schmidt gave at least four different speeches yesterday to an equal number of publisher association meetings in four different cities all named Washington, D.C. At least that’s what you’d gather given the remarkably different takes on his comments. But that’s to be expected: we all know reporters never get the story right. The Wall […]

This isn’t as bad as the recent “improvements” Skype introduced to its desktop client, but it has some users questioning the value. According to the Google Mobile blog, the company used HTML5 and Gears to make the mobile browsing experience faster, more resilient to carrier network snafus and more like the full-screen experience you get […]

The forces of reaction are aiming their pitchforks at Google. Like pogroms of the past, entrenched powers faced with uncontrollable change try to forestall the inevitable by egging on disgruntled masses in the wrong direction. Cause and effect. Rupert Murdoch has been for months voicing displeasure at Google for stealing his intellectual property; mobs turn […]

T-Mobile plans to start selling a home phone and a small tablet computer, both running on Android, in early 2010, according to published reports. This is in addition to the G1 it currently markets and the forthcoming G2. It’s a great sign for Google that Android is being picked up not only as an operating […]

There actually is a deal in place between Google and Twitter, but it’s not an acquisition (contrary to a report by Techcrunch). Google is selling marketers a service that streams their five most recent Tweets across the AdSense network. Intuit, Google’s first customer for this service, as reported by AdAge, will direct people clicking on […]

Google just released an application for the G1 smartphone from HTC that helps sight-impaired people dial their phones. It turns out, of course, that the app is also popular among sighted people. I guess that proves the old saw that sometimes you can do well by doing good. But I don’t think that was foremost […]

HP is testing Android as an operating system for its forthcoming line of netbooks, according to several published reports. Far from being a welcome sign of relief in an otherwise dry period for Google, this is yet more evidence that Android is being taken very seriously by people in the industry. Yes, the HTC Touch […]

The utility company for Snohomish County District 1, Snohomish PUD No. 1, knows the value of power since it supplies electricity for 300,000 residences and businesses, including Boeing. But just because the utility produces electricity doesn’t mean it gets the power for free, so Snohomish PUD No. 1 found itself in the same situation as […]

Google’s new venture fund will finance just about any kind of project its board likes, although, as the Washington Post points out, it doesn’t own the domain name for googleventures.com–yet. Indeed, Google is likely to get its hands on that URL, even though it doesn’t seem like the domain is being squatted by a troll: […]

Google is close to striking a deal for an enterprise-level Gmail implementation with Prudential for 40,000 seats, unseating IBM’s Lotus Notes in the process. This would be a huge win for Google, not least because of draconian risk and security policies in place at the financial services giant. Every piece of e-mail sent by a […]

If Google doesn’t straighten out its act in a hurry, it may lose the enterprise crowd for good. Google Docs has three potentially crippling security breaches, according to a report from Techrunch, that put recent Gmail availability issues into proper perspective. That’s because if this is true and goes on for much longer, there won’t […]