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Shortly after purchasing the garage where the seeds of what would become Google were sown, a new series of Google products was announced to take advantage of the press created around the now famous car port.

The first new service is Google: Car Port. Through a series of massive server clusters, Google plans to spawn a global database of all vehicles currently being stored within personal and public parking garage as an overlay to Google Earth. With the push of a button, any user can see push pins and detailed information for every car, bike, moped, or 3-wheeled Euro-cart in the known populated regions. Before a vehicle will show up, owners must first sign up for a Google: Car Port account, which will be handed out in limited number and require Google Ads to be placed on the vehicles in a rotational manner.

In addition, plans are in place for Google: Oil Spill Relational Imaging, a service by which garage owners can photograph and post images of the oil stains left from poorly maintained vehicles. The images will then be run through high-end image processing through a series of massive server clusters to flag any likenesses to famous celebrities and religious icons. Any matches will immediately place the oil stain up for purchase through Google Auctions.

Finally, Google will tie the entire theme together with Google: Unneeded crap That’s Too Sentimental to Pitch Cataloging Service. Using a series of massive server clusters, Google will allow users to compile an inventory of every worthless piece of junk currently being stored in the garage because their spouse or roommate won’t allow it in the house anymore but it’s too valuable or memory-filled to even consider throwing away. For an additional fee, Google will email fake item appraisals and offers to purchase for the express purpose of proving to the spouse or roommate that it is in fact… too valuable to throw away, yet too sentimental to sell.

“Hey, Kids. Drugs aren’t cool.”  

The Bush administration is taking its fight against illegal drugs to YouTube, the trendy Internet video service that already features clips of wacky, drug-induced behavior and step-by-step instructions for growing marijuana plants.

The decision to distribute anti-drug, public service announcements and other videos over YouTube represents the first concerted effort by the U.S. government to influence customers of the popular service, which shows more than 100 million videos per day.

If just one teen sees this and decides illegal drug use is not the path for them, it will be a success,” said Rafael Lemaitre, a spokesman for the drug office.

Um…. I guess that’s possible. More likely, however, is that kids will stumble across the videos while looking for the singing dog video, laugh at how stupidly out of touch the makers of the video are, then go light one up so the singing dog looks like it’s actually in the same room with them.

Nice work, government. Way to connect with today’s youth. No doubt they’ll find it really “groovy”, daddio.

Talk about the most highly publicized and expensive form of “cheating” available to a team. How about having a network sports commentor give out the other team’s signals over the air during a game.

The University of Southern California formally complained Wednesday that ABC-TV’s Brent Musburger revealed privileged information in play-by-play commentary during Saturday’s game against the Nebraska Huskers.

The university sent a letter to ESPN, which oversees sports programming on ABC, saying Musburger, with less than 10 minutes to play and the Trojans leading 21-10, began describing how USC quarterback John David Booty lets receivers know he has spotted a certain kind of coverage.
 
“John David told us that his signal when he finds one-on-one and they’re coming, it’s that ‘hang loose,’ that familiar sign you’ve seen surfers use,” said Musburger, referring to the sign where the thumb and little finger are raised.

Evidently the Nebraska Huskers Football program wasn’t watching. They still lost 28-10.

Stand back…give them room!

Microsoft is “Innovating” again.

Hoping to tap the explosive popularity of online video sharing by joining startups and major Internet rivals with its own video service, Microsoft has announced their newset service, “Soapbox on MSN Video”. This service will let Internet users watch and post funny videos, rate or comment on them and share favorites by e-mailing them or linking them to their personal Web pages or blogs.

Rob Bennett, general manager of MSN’s entertainment and video services unit, acknowledged that Silicon Valley startup YouTube Inc. has an early lead, having already attracted tens of millions of users in the year and a half since it launched. Rivals Google Inc., Yahoo Inc. and Time Warner Inc.’s AOL also have similar offerings.

But Microsoft believes there is “still plenty of room to innovate, and go beyond what I would say most services provide … just sort of the basics, a very kind of primitive experience that is not that engaging,” Bennett said. “It’s not that fun to use. It just gets the job done.”

There you go. The “I” word. Straight from the horse’s mouthpiece. Microsoft once again “innovates” an idea from someone else, hooks up a cash IV, and calls it their own. I wonder how long this guy is going to keep his job, considering he’s not really clear as to which service he’s describing as “primitive” and “not that engaging”. His speech left me with the impression that the new Microsoft Soapbox won’t be “fun to use”. Poor guy. He’ll be watching the skies for the Microsoft Logo Black Helicopters all afternoon.

Don’t look now, but we might be taking a step down in the food chain.

A U.S.-based Team of Scientists from Conservation International said Monday they had discovered dozens of new species while combing through undersea fauna off Indonesia’s Papua province, including a shark that walks on its fins.

Evidently the shark will swim along the ocean bottom… using it’s fins to “walk” when it needs to maneuver at a different pace. Scientists have been unable to verify whether or not the sharks can walk on their hind fins, maneuver up and down stairs, or operate door knobs. They did caution that it is now no longer safe to open your door without visual confirmation when a stranger knocks and introduces themselves as a “Candygram” delivery person.

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Exactly how many variations can you make on a digital camera. Point. Click. Shoot. That’s all you need, right? Not according to the fine folks at Sony, Canon, and Nikon.

I spent the better part of last week trying to find a new camera. My Sony DSC P100, only 3 years old and top of the line at the time… died. Doesn’t open, gives an error, doesn’t work. Of course, Sony will fix it for me. Starting price is $180 plus shipping. That’s the exact retail price of their latest camera.

Thanks Sony. Not making me feel very “Welcome to The World of Sony.”

During my search I’ve found that the digital camera market has changed quite a bit in the last 3 years. If you’ve been away from it for awhile as I had, I’ll sum up the current state for you. Think Barbie. Here’s a Barbie with a new hat! Here’s another with different shoes! Wow! Here’s a third with that new hat AND those new shoes!

Each manufacturer has no less than 12 active variations on the point and shoot camera alone.

Just yesterday, Canon introduced four new point-and-shoot cameras plus three Digital Elphs, along with updated versions of their G-series cameras.

And Sony has released even more Cybershot cameras with the DSC S500… not 6 months after releasing an S600. They’re both practically the same price. Same features. What the hell? How do you release a new camera with a model number that’s LOWER than an older camera. How are we supposed to know which is better? Reviews don’t do any good, they’re releasing so many cameras now, your average digital camera review site can’t keep up with them!

The model number thing really trips my trigger, though. Take a look at the Nikon Coolpix P4. Nice little 8 megapixel point and shoot. So nice in fact that Nikon released another camera identical in every single way… but they added wi-fi access to your computer for wireless picture transfers and printing. Neat. The upgraded camera costs an extra $40 for this new feature. Can you guess what the upgrade to the Coolpix P4 is? You got it! It’s the Coolpix P3!

I’ve decided to protest the whole lot by taking a notepad and pencil to the next family outing. Screw the digital camera companies and their over-saturation tactics. I’ll just have everyone stand together for a group sketch. I can colorize it later with photoshop.

Dust off your video scripts… CBS has a few hundred million bucks burning a whole in their pinstriped pockets… and they’re on the prowl.

CBS Corp has announced that they are interested in spotting the next big phenomenon in user-generated programming over the Internet, not buying market leader YouTube, Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said on Thursday.

“It is obviously phenomenally successful,” Moonves said of YouTube. “I doubt we would buy it at this point. Maybe we would look for the next YouTube, the next great idea that’s not spread across the world.”

So think you’ve got the next big MyTubeSpaceBook and thinking about retirement? Give them a call. Just remember to remove those downloadable episodes of Survivor before taking them on the tour of your site. Never know what might set those corporate types off.

So much for your new life.

Second Life, the fast-growing online site where hundreds of thousands of people play out fantasy lives online, has suffered a computer security breach that exposed the real-world personal data of its users.

Linden Lab, the San Francisco-based company behind the Second Life site, said in a letter to its 650,000 users this weekend that its customer database, including names, addresses, passwords and some credit card data, had been compromised.

This story would be a little more tragic if it weren’t for the buckets of irony pouring out the sides. Think of the John Carpenter flick “They Live!”. In a flash, that hip young coffee house waitress from Boston that you’ve been “seeing a lot of” in your new little fantasy world turns out to be a 42 year old maintenance man from Newark. How’s that conversation going to go?

“So… listen. We can still be friends, right? We kind of had a special thing going there, didn’t we?”

Coulda been worse, I suppose. The information could have included photos. That’s why I always pad my information in a plausible way. “Sure I have a regular job. I’m just an average joe. Most of my international crime syndicate investigations happen at night and on weekends. Makes it easier to go unseen in the larger crowds… since, as you can see from my photo, I look too much like Matthew McConnahe to typically go unnoticed.”

Microsoft Corp.’s long-delayed upgrade of its flagship Windows operating system, Microsoft Vista, will cost the same as comparable packages of the previous version, the company said this week.

Microsoft Vista Basic : $199
Just like XP. Only prettier.

Microsoft Vista Premium : $239
Just like Media Center Edition. Except it works this time.

Microsoft Vista Business : $299
Includes all of the options that XP Professional has, including new security, data protection options, and frequent crashing. Blue screen is optional.

Microsoft Vista Ultimate : $399
Includes features from Vista Business and Vista Premium, with upgraded profit margin support.

Microsoft Vista Grande : $465
Includes features of Vista Basic with a full-bodied blend of 30% Vista Business and 28% Vista Premium. Served in an attractive collector’s mug.

Microsoft Vista Double Uber Ultimate Frappe Professional: Special Edition
This one is actually just Windows Millennium Edition re-packaged in a Vista Box. Microsoft hopes the excitement around Vista will help them offload several hundred thousand units of the vastly unpopular operating system. Price is not currently set, but the package is rumored to be had for 2 bucks and a cheese sandwich.

Old news is good news for Google these days. They are planning to expand their online news index to include stories published years ago, continuing the Internet search leader’s recent efforts to create new sales channels for long-established media while it strives to make its own Web site even more useful.

The catch? Gotta pay to play of course. You’ll see excerpts from the old stories, but must signup with the source’s website to see the entire article. The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Time magazine and The Washington Post are among the sources that Google will index. And they’re thrilled about getting their archives indexed and for the countless referels that will come their way.

The agreement represents “a perfect example of how we can work with content providers to realize their business goals,” said Jim Gerber, Google’s content partnerships director.

So what other “partnerships” can we expect to see from the unstoppable force that is Google? No one’s put up an archive of personal medical records yet. That’d be nice. How about “Google Moments”, a complete listing of your personal schedule culled secretly from your outlook or Google Calendar. Not looking forward to their release of “Google Most Embarrassing Moments Caught on Film: Personal Edition”.