Google+ Project: It's Social, It's Bold, It's Fun, And It Looks Good — Now For The Hard Part Last night, you may have heard talk of a mysterious black bar appearing on the top of Google.com. Or you may have even seen it yourself. No, you weren’t hallucinating. It was a sign of something about to show itself. Something big. Google+. What is Google+? Sort of. You see, the truth is that Google really is trying not to make a huge deal out of Google+. How’s that for downplaying it? “We believe online sharing is broken. What he proceeds to show me is a product that in many ways is so well designed that it doesn’t really even look like a Google product. The first thing Gundotra shows me about Google+, and the first thing you’re likely to interact with, is something called “Circles”. It’s through Circles that users select and organize contacts into groups for optimal sharing. Gundotra realizes that many social services have tried and failed to get users to create groups. Next, Gundotra showed off a feature called “Sparks”. “Our goal here is to connect people. More:
Google+ Traffic Floodgates Open - Deal Journal Reuters When Google opened its new social network to the public this week, it also opened the Web-traffic floodgates. On Tuesday, the first day Google+ was open widely to the public, Google+ recorded nearly 3.58 million Web visits in the U.S., according to new data from Experian Hitwise. Since its invitation-only launch in June, Google+ posted a daily high of about 321,000 U.S. visits. Compared to Facebook, however, Google+ remains a minnow. The figures don’t include Web visits from mobile devices, from mobile apps or from users on the Google+ “notification bar.” As it opened its social network broadly, Google has been using its Web popularity– and the allure of celebrity sparkle — to drive more people to Google+. Wednesday night, Google+ held a “hangout” — a group video conference — with pop star will.i.am. The “hangout” with will.i.am also continues Google’s efforts to promote the online-video chat features of Google+, one of its technology advantages over Facebook. Experian Hitwise
Google gave original Mac designer free rein on new Google+ UI By Josh Ong Google's new Google+ social networking project departs from the company's usually spartan interfaces with an animated UI designed by original Apple Macintosh team member Andy Hertzfeld.Update: Hertzfeld has written a Google+ post giving credit to his colleagues who also contributed to the service's user interface. While he admits to having "almost single-handedly" designed the Circles editor, he also notes that he wasn't responsible for the design of the entire product. "Now some people are saying that I'm responsible for the broad visual refresh now rolling out across Google, which couldn't be further from the truth - in fact, I'm not even sure I like it," he wrote. The search giant announced its Google+ endeavor on Tuesday. A self-described "Software Wizard" while at Apple, Hertzfeld joined the company in 1979 and was instrumental in the design of the Macintosh's graphical user interface. Hertzfeld admitted to having taken a risk with the Circles design.
Is It Time to Rethink Website Navigation? The hyperlink has been a staple of the Internet since it began. The Web simply wouldn’t be a web at all if we didn’t link from one web page to another. Links make the Web work. So it would make sense to put a lot of time and effort into how we design our links and navigation systems. But, this isn’t always the case. The Status Quo of Site Navigation One of the many beautiful things about Web Design is the near-limitless options available to us. For small, personal sites, a simple top horizontal navigation bar is the typical option. For larger sites with more pages to link to, we default to a stacked vertical navigation bar to give us the ability to include more links. In other situations, we find that drop-down menus or fly-out menus are used to keep the navigation menu compact. Drop-down menu on Google home page. It’s easy to see why we have these options. As time went on, our users got used to the status quo. But are these conventional forms of navigation still the best solutions?
Google+ Google+ (pronounced and sometimes written as Google Plus /ˈɡuːɡəl plʌs/) is a social networking and identity service[3][4] that is owned and operated by Google Inc. Google has described Google+ as a "social layer" that enhances many of its online properties, and that it is not simply a social networking website, but also an authorship tool that associates web-content directly with its owner/author.[5] It is the second-largest social networking site in the world after Facebook. 540 million monthly active users are part of the Identity service site, by interacting socially with Google+'s enhanced properties, like Gmail, +1 button, and YouTube comments.[6] In October 2013, Google counted 540 million active users who used at least one Google+ service, of which 300 million users are active in "the stream".[1][7][8] History[edit] Creation[edit] Growth[edit] Mobile App[edit] User base[edit] On January 26, 2012, teenagers were finally able to create a Google+ account. Social Media Statistics U.S.
Occupy Wall Street returns with 'sleepful protest' Occupy Wall Street supporters have moved their protests to sidewalks. The Occupy Wall Street movement is ramping up its activitiesIn New York, protesters have moved to a sidewalk near the Stock ExchangeProtesters plan for May 1 to be their first large-scale demonstration of the year New York (CNN) -- In the spirit of spring rebirth, the Occupy movement is ramping up activities as warm weather blankets the country. But while the season is typified by a reawakening of life outdoors, demonstrators are using sleep to get their points across. They call it "sleepful protest." The sleeping bags started appearing on the corner of Wall and Broad streets across from the New York Stock Exchange on April 9. Occupy organizers declared a month ago that the movement would be planning a comeback in the spring and summer. Every morning, they talk about income inequality and the role of big money in politics as commuters pass by on their way to jobs in the Financial District. "We're not afraid anymore.
Nym Wars I hadn't been paying much attention to the Google "Real Names" clusterfuck, because it was so obvious to me that they were going to lose this one in the press that it would all be over soon. But it's still not over, and the Google brass appear to be digging in their heels, despite the universally bad press they're getting over it. And then the other night I had dinner with a friend which turned into an hour long argument over it, because he thought that forcing everyone to use their real names was just fine. This is someone I've known for decades, so to say that I was shocked and horrified by his attitude is an understatement. EFF: A Case for Pseudonyms There are myriad reasons why an individual may feel safer identifying under a name other than their birth name. "Anonymity is a shield from the tyranny of the majority. When the rebuttal to your argument is The Federalist Papers, generally that means that you've lost the argument. You stay klassy, Larry and Vic.
3.2 now available Here in the U.S. we are observing Independence Day, and I can’t think of a more fitting way to mark a day that celebrates freedom than by releasing more free software to help democratize publishing around the globe. I’m excited to announce that WordPress 3.2 is now available to the world, both as an update in your dashboard and a download on WordPress.org. Version 3.2 is our fifteenth major release of WordPress and comes just four months after 3.1 (which coincidentally just passed the 15 million download mark this morning), reflecting the growing speed of development in the WordPress community and our dedication to getting improvements in your hands as soon as possible. We’re dedicating this release to noted composer and pianist George Gershwin. Before we get to the release, in anticipation of the State of the Word speech at the upcoming WordCamp San Francisco (the annual WordPress conference) we’re doing a survey or census of the WordPress world. A Community Effort Like this:
It’s official: Google+ will be connected to everything By now it’s become fairly obvious that Google’s new social network, Google+, is here to stay (unlike some of the company’s past efforts at being social): depending on which estimates you believe, Google+ may have as many as 50 million registered users, which is not bad for a three-month old product. And the company has made it clear that it wants to use Google+ as a kind of identity platform for other things — hence the importance of its controversial “real name” policy. But it wasn’t obvious just how much was riding on the new network until recently, thanks in part to some comments made by vice-president of product Brad Horowitz, who said that in the future, Google+ and Google will effectively become inseparable. Google+ “is Google itself” But the real meat of the interview appears in a statement that the Google staffer makes about where the Google+ network stands in relationship to the rest of the search engine’s vast empire. Google+ is Google itself.
Cities struggle to deal with occupy movement NEW: "We acted proactively," the mayor of Portland, Oregon, saysPolice arrest 32 as they clear downtown Occupy Oakland campThe city will allow demonstrations at the plaza, but no more camping, officials sayCity officials across the country are raising concerns about public health and safety San Francisco (CNN) -- Police in riot gear moved into the Occupy Oakland encampment Monday, tearing down tents and arresting some protesters, the latest effort by city officials across the country to gain control over a movement that some leaders say has become a public safety and health threat. Oakland, California, police, aided by dozens of officers from nearby jurisdictions, arrested 32 people in the effort to clear Frank Ogawa Plaza near City Hall before dawn, Interim Chief Howard Jordan said. There were no reports of injuries or complaints of abuse, he said. "The encampment became a place where we had repeated violence and this week a murder. Occupy Wall Street protesters evicted Riot police vs.
GHH - The "Google Hack" Honeypot Design in WordPress 3.2 | Matt Thomas The focus for this release was making WordPress faster and lighter. The first thing you’ll notice when you log in to 3.2 is a refreshed dashboard design that tightens the typography, design, and code behind the admin. (Rhapsody in Grey?)— Matt Mullenweg, WordPress 3.2 now available Back during the development of WordPress 2.8, the core team decided to solicit some ideas for dashboard refreshes. Two designs inspired by Dean J. “No matter how beautiful, no matter how cool your interface, it would be better if there were less of it.” An aside on typography: I’ve seen a few people question why we chose Arial over Helvetica for most text in the dashboard. I’m proud of the updated typography and cleaner look of the new dashboard, but my favorite aspect of WordPress 3.2 was a great surprise when I first saw it. Composing this post in Distraction-Free Writing mode Speaking of Twenty Ten, it’s got a beautiful successor in Twenty Eleven, the new default theme for WordPress. Like this:
Google+ is truly powerful Google Chrome Store has new Google+ apps “Simply Amazing times” below is an link list of all the best apps for Google+ from the Chrome Store Google+ is awesome Extended Share Google TranslateG+ TweetLiveOn+G+ Me for ChromeShare+ Social ButtonAdblock Plus for ChromePlus 1+ buttonGoogle+ Ultimate (Themes)Google+ Notification Checker The Black Eyed Peas featuring a cool “Live Concert” video meeting on Google+, with fans and others World Wide. Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu & The Dalai Lama on Google+ This is history in the making thanks to Google developers & this awesome new technology they created“Google+” If you haven’t yet heard the buzz on the all new Google+, well your in for a rude awakening, this awesome new networking tool/web location that Google provided recently during early summer in June. Like this: Like Loading... About Cloud Tops I enjoy web design & helping people on the web.
Tear gas used on Occupy protesters in Oakland One protester, a war vet, has his skull fractured by a police projectile, group saysIn Oakland, police say they fired tear gas after a crowd hit them with paint In Atlanta, demonstrators are arrested at Woodruff Park "It hurts to see America do this to people who want change," an Atlanta man says Are you there? Share your photos and videos. (CNN) -- Authorities made a series of arrests at Occupy Wall Street protests in California and Georgia on Tuesday and Wednesday, with clashes in one city that involved tear gas being used on demonstrators. Police said they fired the tear gas on protesters in Oakland, California, after the crowd threw paint and other objects at officers. Among the injured in the clash was a two-time Iraq war veteran, Scott Olsen, who sustained a skull fracture after allegedly being shot in the head with a police projectile, according to Iraq Veterans Against the War. "I think at first it was a pretty inspiring sight," he said of the protesters. Occupy London protest grows