Google To Air Chrome Ads On TV 148
mikesd81 writes "Google plans on advertising with spots promoting its Chrome browser this weekend. Google Japan had already released a 30-second video promoting Chrome on YouTube, but the company will distribute that video through the Google TV Ads network this weekend as an experiment to see if it can drum up interest in Chrome. Google advertised their browser on the New York Times' website on Wednesday."
Too simple (Score:2, Insightful)
Chrome is still too simplifistic for everyday use. Its just a plain browser with no extra functionality, no mouse gestures or anything that actually browsing a lot more efficient.
I'm not in the firefox legion tho, I prefer Opera for its fast responsiveness and having everything required for nice browsing experience built in. That being said, firefox does have some nice addons I would like to use aswell, but its not just as good and nice for my daily usage. I do however use it for web development because of
On the Contrary (Score:5, Insightful)
Chrome is still too simplifistic for everyday use.
I would wager that a simplified computing experience is not only what the general public desires but would also be a very refreshing change of pace.
I'm sure that's part of Google's strategy with their general public campaigns. Remember Slashdot is maybe ~1% of web browser users and our tastes are atypical.
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Because they're based on informed decisions?
Not that two informed people can't disagree with each other, because on a matter of taste, they can. It's just that each of them would have a reason for doing so other than "it's what the computer came with."
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Hi! I'm Chrome! I come without all the plugins you depend on to protect your privacy, and without those to accelerate every other browser function except JavaScript execution!
AdBlock Plus
BetterPrivacy
Cache Search
FoxyProxy/TorButton
Ghostery
Greasemonkey
DownloadThemAll
FasterFox
Firebug
Launchy
Stealthier
TabMixPlus
YSlow
I don't run FireFox, but an individualized web tool kit that Chrome will NEVER provide. Why
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As for the rest - many of these break Google's insidious revenue model, which is the moral equivalent of sifting through your phone bills, credit card statements, GPS data and personal correspondence - then selling the results repeatedly to all bidders.
Subtly wrong. The trick is that they don't actually sell your info, but rather sell services that use that info in a black box. Obviously, you still have to trust that Google themselves won't misuse the information, but nevermind privacy laws, they just can't afford to sell your raw info: the moment they do that, they lose the value-add their services (ie, advertising) have.
Re:On the Contrary (Score:5, Informative)
Why? It's either a troll or satire.
The "individualized web toolkit" is webkit, which is used by KDE, Nokia, and Safari.
Chrome is getting extension support (albeit not Firefox compatible) real soon now.
Furthermore, Chrome has Greasemonkey support to a degree already. See http://mashable.com/2008/12/15/google-chrome-greasemonkey-scripts/ [mashable.com]
Finally, Chrome has better privacy than Firefox in some ways because it has an anonymous browsing mode, and it's more secure because of the process and sandbox model they use. Firefox is working on that, but they're a long way behind.
Really, Firefox is falling pretty far behind many of the other browsers at this point. Don't get me wrong - it's still a good browser, and way better than IE, but all that it's got going for it now is the extension framework. Safari and Chrome are both way faster than Firefox. Even IE has a better process model (Firefox runs everything in a single thread, which is why it gets really sluggish with a lot of open tabs, or when one tab is really CPU heavy). Firefox is also a huge memory hog and, at least on Linux, is pretty unstable.
Again, most of these things will be fixed if they can fix their process model, but I expect that's a long ways off. They've got a lot of catching up to do.
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[snip] Firefox [...], at least on Linux, is pretty unstable.
Use Ubuntu. Now turn off all the addons that didn't come with it. Now disable the unstable Ubuntu repositories (-backports, -proposed etc.) and downgrade to the latest stable version. Now run whatever "scientific" test you ran last time. It's solid as a rock for me, but maybe I'm just lucky. Try it yourself; see what happens.
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WebKit is not an "individualized web toolkit". It's a browser engine Google borrowed from Apple.
By the way, the one process per tab thing in Chrome, now THAT'S a memory hog.
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So is Firefox if you have phishing detection turned on.
Anyway, I expect that many of these things will be in Chrome soon enough, once extension support is done.
BTW, one point I should mention is that although Chrome doesn't support NoScript right now, there's less of a need for it because of its improved security model. At least in my case, that's a lot better because I tried NoScript and it drove me insane within a
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I claimed no novelty. It was merely an observation.
That Linux hasn't accepted that as though it were the only possible way could be one of the main reasons why I use it. That's part of why I never felt like it was Linux's job to appeal to the masses or to replace the monop
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The purpose of any open source project is writing good software. Not converting people. Not waxing philosophical. Not appealing to the masses. And not arguing about naming.
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The purpose of any open source project is writing good software. Not converting people. Not waxing philosophical. Not appealing to the masses. And not arguing about naming.
If you look at my post to which you are replying, you'll find that you are preaching to the choir.
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Why'd they use the corporate "edgy rock experience" music that is tone and not the exact same as teh pseudo-indy sound behind every schlock Microsoft and Starbucks corporate-stooge video montage?
I feel so energetic and inspired to do valuable work! How much do I now need to spend?
Still, the girl with the afro and the dominoes gave me a boner.
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Really? I guess I will have to tell that to the users I deal with every day who are still confused over the concept of opening a tab in Firefox.
Mouse gestures aren't even on the map. Inability or all out fear of installing a program (thanks to idiotic mainstream tech reporters).. now there is a problem for Chrome.
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Chrome is missing a lot to make it feel like a full app.
The mouse wheel must not be implemented using the native features because it doesn't follow the settings in the mouse driver. I also can't click the mouse wheel to scroll quickly.
Find sucks compared to find in other browsers. Especially if you're trying to find text in a text area.
No Google toolbar and some other important plug ins.
That said, I wind up using it every day and am making this comment with it. I have firefox running as my main browser but
Re:Too simple (Score:5, Funny)
No Google toolbar and some other important plug ins.
*Every* toolbar in chrome is a google toolbar
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They put the search bar and awesome bar (URL etc. bar a la firefox) together to make a super-awesome bar (the next step is some form of hyper-awesome bar). You don't need Google toolbar; use the super-awesome bar.
Re:Too simple (Score:5, Insightful)
Chrome is still too simplifistic for everyday use. Its just a plain browser with no extra functionality, no mouse gestures or anything that actually browsing a lot more efficient.
It's amazing how many people are confusing a minimalist interface with no features. One doesn't necessarily mean the other. Take your time, poke around, look up some guides and how-tos, Google, check the help files and official forums, etc. You just might be surprised.
That said, right now it's unrealistic to expect Chrome to have every feature Opera and Firefox (with extensions) have. But if you're an early Phoenix adopter back in 2002-03, you'll know that Chrome has the right formula for success: a strong focus on the basics. A pity Phoenix lost sight of that; perhaps in 6-7 years Chrome will become slow, bloated and insecure as well, and someone else steps up to repeat the cycle.
Re:Too simple (Score:5, Insightful)
It really is funny how pretty much the exact same arguments Mozilla users made against Phoenix back in they day are now being made by Firefox users against Chrome.
I used Phoenix then, and I use Chrome now, whenever I use a machine it actually runs on.
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Chrome is still too simplifistic
Apparently so is English.
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Chrome is still too simplifistic
Apparently so is English.
He obviously meant a long s [wikipedia.org]; he just has no key for it (and slashdot doesn't like unicode and has a love/hate relationship with (X|HT)ML entities).
I'm not sure why this is such a big deal (Score:5, Insightful)
I just don't understand what's so interesting/damning here. So a company is pitching it's product. Good for them. Maybe it will educate people (average people) to the fact that there are options.
I haven't used it myself as there's no Debian package for it and I'm not compiling it from source. Sorry.
While on the browser discussion, has anyone else noticed that the slashdot.org homepage triggers the live bookmark in Iceweasel/Firefox?
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It only happens if I'm logged in and it just started for me recently so it has to be some setting... I just don't know which.
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https://launchpad.net/chromium-project [launchpad.net]
https://launchpad.net/~chromium-daily/+archive/ppa [launchpad.net]
Not sure if it will run on debian but
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There's a comment on that video that I found rather humorous, if not a little creepy: "See the three 6's in the pong ball?"
Until they said that, I never noticed that the circle in the middle with the three lines branching out could be interpreted as a "6". Personally, I don't care, but there are people that do.
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It is interesting because advertising its own products is not something we generally associate with Google
I'm not sure how you navigate the tubes but every time I do a search I see their logo plastered all over the page. It must cost them a fortune.
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It does. Do you know how much a pixel is worth these days?
Re:I'm not sure why this is such a big deal (Score:5, Interesting)
It's a big deal, because google has jumped the shark and become a big company. Why do they need to buy TV adds? They *are* an advertising company.
Re:I'm not sure why this is such a big deal (Score:4, Insightful)
google has jumped the shark and become a big company
Google has become a big company?! Oh no! :O
Google might be an advertising agency, but they don't have any connection to the world of traditional media - they are (nearly) entirely dependent on the Internet.
The Internet is a great place to advertise, but I feel a television campaign can really open up the flood gates for the "casual user" demographic.
This also fits with Google's mantra when you boil down everything they do -- throw your money at it. They have the resources, why not?
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They're doing it so that we can all go up to our bosses and legitimately say, "You need to remove internet explorer from the workplace, here are some alternatives that are actually secure and work better." And we won't get outright dismissed as biased or wrong, because they saw it on TV.
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They are advertising to pointy haired bosses, in order to give employees the tools they need to do their jobs?
Hmm, still sounds like a big company. Maybe they could also do some adds for Kubuntu?
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Uh, no, Chrome has less than 2% of the browser market. They want more users.
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I haven't used it myself as there's no Debian package for it and I'm not compiling it from source. Sorry.
Not compiling from source!?
Hand in your nerd badge, please.
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It is very unlikely that you will ever see Chromium in the Debain repositories. Two outside programs that the browser uses are under the BSD Protection License, which Debian has not classified as a license that passes the Debian Free Software Guidelines.
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And completely fails in Mobile Safari.
Also, for what it's worth, the setting seems to be "use beta index" under "index beta settings" on http://news.slashdot.org/help [slashdot.org]
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I just don't understand what's so interesting/damning here.
Do you do web development? Do you support an intranet web app that only runs on IE 6.0?
I don't. But what I hear is that you first develop for standards-conforming browsers, then spend a lot of time hacking your site to be IE-compatible too.
A lot of development hours could be saved if IE was more compliant with the standards. A lot of system administration hours could be saved if users could be made to use a more secure browser than IE 6.0. ("a lot" was pulled from my ass.)
Possibly, more competition migh
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As someone that DOES do web development, I'll say that "a lot" is probably a good 50% of the total front-end time. Thankfully javascript libraries have almost completely eliminated the cross-browser scripting incompatibilities, but hacking around its incomplete and inaccurate rendering abilities still takes a huge amount of time.
As such, I fully welcome IE8. Not because I like Microsoft or its products, but because it does a pretty good job adhering to standards (those that it misses tend to be pretty non-
How about actually getting the mac version out? (Score:5, Interesting)
How about actually getting the mac version up and running before spending tons of time on tv ad production?
for christ sake they've been promising a beta for how long now?
Safari used to be zippy, but, despite being the best option for mac right now, has some nasty habits and memory leaks. I'd like to see what chrome can offer.
Re:How about actually getting the mac version out? (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that Google doesn't care that much about bringing Chrome to the Mac or Linux, since they only bother is most likely IE, with is very backwards in its technology and pretty much restricts Google on what they can write for their users.
Safari seems to be pretty compatible with community-approved standards, and in fact, it even is ahead in many of them, implementing what is still in draft. While someone might argue, that this way they might actually break websites when - yet not finished - standards change, but I think that people who tinker which them actually know that, and design their pages in a way, that won't break them in the future, just cause they relied on some experimental feature.
Okay, seems like I'm getting off-topic here.
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Browser chrome means the browser UI. The term originated in Firefox, where it is used in the urls for extensions and browser XUL (e.g, chrome://browser/content/browser.xul )
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Re:How about actually getting the mac version out? (Score:4, Informative)
Chromium (the open source basis for Chrome) is available to download and compile, and you can also download unofficial binaries [manu-j.com] if you're really dying to see how Chrome for OS X is coming along.
And if you want to experience what a one-process-per-tab feels like on the Mac, you can check out the Chrome-inspired OS X browser, Stainless [stainlessapp.com].
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How about actually getting the mac version up and running before spending tons of time on tv ad production?
PROTIP: Google's marketing department doesn't develop Chrome.
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Better to... (Score:5, Funny)
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Better to have Chrome ads on TV, than to have TV ads in Chrome!
It's like a Russian reversal without the Russian.
Sup dawg! (Score:2)
Yo, dawg! We heard you like ads, so we put an ad in your TV so you can have (our) ads while you browse.
At last Spyware for everyone ! (Score:3, Insightful)
un-removable updaters with unique id's ? check, keylogging via google suggest ? check , encrypted strings sent to the largest advertising company on the planet ? check.
i really dont understand the hard on people have for Chrome, if it was branded by Doubleclick everybody would condemm it (Google own Doubleclick so they are the same) yet if its branded by Google it must be ok, regardless of the facts.
I would think you have to be crazy to install any binary software made by an advertising company, perhaps Gator or Zango should release a browser as there seems to be thousands of people who would install it if it was branded something else
the force is strong, the stupidity of hipsters even more so
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Some of us aren't totally fucking paranoid and use software because it's good.
If you're that afraid, use SRWare Iron, or compile it yourself. Google Chrome is BSD licensed.
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So what is the compile option for "don't grass me up" ?
Personally, I'm going to dig out my copy of Phoenix and reinstall that. Firefox has jumped the shark.
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un-removable updaters with unique id's ? check, keylogging via google suggest ? check , encrypted strings sent to the largest advertising company on the planet ? check.
[citation needed}
Re:At last Spyware for everyone ! (Score:4, Interesting)
Fact remains that Chrome gives you a very smooth experience. It's quick (major concern for me), very handy start page (there's probably a ff plugin that does that too), download manager is an improvement; tab dragging to open a new window is very useful. The only thing that sucks is the bookmark manager.
If you don't like the usage tracking then there's always the opensource clone SRWare Iron.
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I forgot: memory usage. As a java developer I have to run a few memory sucking applications such as an IDE. The main thing that made me switch to chrome was that I got tired of restarting ff because after a while it would have eaten a significant amount of memory.
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Chrome's one process per tab thing will ensure high memory usage, then.
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The download manager is an improvement? I guess its all preference but I strongly have to disagree -- In chrome downloads are per tab, so its very easy to forget which tab you started along download in once you switch away or start navigating to other sites.
Also if you close chromes window the downloads stop.
Contrast to firefox which keeps the download manager separate
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You Fail! [mozillalinks.org]
Also, closing the tab does not stop the download, it just closes the tab. The download continues in the download manager.
Thats double fail.
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Chrome treats you like an idiot. You can't configure the interface and anything more than the bare essentials is buried under a complex cascade of menus. I also hate how all the status messages are treated like pop-ups. Don't obscure the content, please.
It's just another slick-looking "you don't need to know" applications. That's hardly good interface design, unless the product is designed from the ground up just for marketing.
Testing my code in Chrome is a PITA. I hope the Iron developers start making
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I would think you have to be crazy to install any binary software made by an advertising company
You can alway download and remove those code if you are paranoid, i'm sure there are people who did that already.
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SRWare Iron [srware.net].
Chromium source code with all of the privacy-infringing stuff removed.
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Looks very promising... too bad it's not working for Linux yet. :(
TV ad spots are a great idea... (Score:2)
... I think it's a really good idea personally as the average user does not know about these kinds of things. Also chrome is very high speed and less prone to freezing and crashing. IE tends to be one ofthe worst for that, although with IE8 they tried to make it so it doesn't take down the whole browser.
I think mass advertising of little known things to the average person is great, it's unfortunate that it's so expensive to do any many great things never get the exposure they deserve.
Personally I think in
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Go ask one of your friends that knows nothing about computers except how to turn them on what browser they use, and I bet they'll say IE.
Tried it before. Either they say "I use the Internet" (meaning IE), "What is a browser?", "I use Windows", or some other thing that halfway makes sense but really doesn't. Sure, after a while you can get them to say that they use Internet Explorer, but for the most part they have no clue what a browser really is.
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I get "I use MSN" (meaning their homepage) or "I use Google" (meaning their homepage). It's even hard for them to separate their own computer and the Internet - for example going over quota most people will be "shaped" to around 64kbps - they think their entire computer will be slowed down by that.
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Actually, Mozilla has tons of cash.
I can see the testimonials now (Score:5, Funny)
I can see the testimonials [today.com] now:
"We are so, so happy with Google Chrome. That most of our income is from Google has no bearing on me making this statement." - John Lilly, Mozilla (through gritted teeth).
"Browsers don't need to be integrated with online apps. Certainly not like the operating system ... I'll just get back to you." - Ian Moulster, Microsoft IE Team.
"We're Google. We know where you live. In a completely not evil way. Sponsored link: Get Chrome Browsers on google.com. Or we'll make you use Windows Live." - Larry Page.
Install, did you say? (Score:1)
So, I saw the add. It said at the end, "Install Google Chrome".
Good Morning Google, Wake Up! We haven't got Chrome as yet, just by the way...
I'll never understand why a lot FOSS is provided better (or only) on Windows and not Linux. Chrome, TortoiseSVN, KeePass, etc. Why is KeePassX so much worse than KeePass? Why are eSVN and RapidSVN just so bad?
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On the other hand, would they care to make their software Free if it weren't for the Open Source movement? At least we can port the best written software (if its core is not too tightly-coupled to Win32 APIs), so still better than nothing. The biggest problem is t
Please not another minor browser (Score:1)
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Re:Please not another minor browser (Score:5, Insightful)
If you code to standards, your only real issue will be IE.
If you don't, well, it's never too late to start.
Adding another Webkit based browser to the mix does not cause much extra pain. You also forgot to include mobile browsers in your list - the beauty of the web is that you don't have to know all the capabilities of the clients which will look at your content ahead of time, and yet your site can still be read by them. Yes it's nice to have things render the same on every browser, but it's not essential, and if that's really your goal, you should give up now, or use Flash or something.
The reason for this browser to exist is to unseat IE as the default way to run google web apps, and prevent Microsoft screwing google (and ruining the web as collatoral damage), as they have done so many times to rivals in the past. With Google threatening Microsoft on multiple fronts, it just doesn't make sense that they rely on MS as their main conduit for users, particularly given the modus operandi of Steve I'm-going-to-fucking-kill-Google Ballmer.
The (old) hope is presumably to reduce Windows to a poorly debugged set of device drivers, which run Google software without getting in the way too much, for Google or the user.
That's also why you won't see them rush to put Chrome on Linux or OS X - there is no corresponding threat on those platforms, and healthy browsers exist there.
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Actually I've never really had a problem between Firefox, Opera and Safari. If anything, it's Firefox's font size difference that's the real problem.
Advertising is 100% tax deductible in Canada. (Score:2, Funny)
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Google Big Brother (Score:3, Insightful)
Do they realize (Score:1)
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how much word-of-mouth advertising they're sacrificing by shafting OS X and Linux distributions?
Yes, which is why they don't care.
Hulu Add (Score:2, Informative)
YouTube Link (Score:2)
Why link to Blogspot for the video (which doesn't actually have it) instead of the actual video?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5535Ts-iOP0 [youtube.com]
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I was too quick on the reply button. It's because there are many links to different videos about browsers on that page.
Yeah... Chrome might be real goog for browsing... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Yeah... Chrome might be real goog for browsing. (Score:2)
But people will still use firefox for porn.
CTRL+SHIFT+N brings up a new "incognito" tab - porn mode.
Google has WAY too much money (Score:2)
There's no rational economic rationale for expensive television advertising a software product for which you charge no money.
Please don't say "Netscape!" either. That was an economic failure at the end of the day...it made a tonne of people very rich and, indeed, helped to change the world. These may have been noble goals, but it was an irrational bubble that created the wealth. The company failed...finally.
I think fear might explain this: fear of an antitrust probe (either into Google, or into its relation
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Google charges no money for their search engine. Does that mean that they aren't making money from it? Of course not.
Currently, Google either gets none of the search revenue through a broswser (Microsoft gets it all in IE), or not all of it (they have to share with Opera and Mozilla). With Chrome, they keep all the search revenue.
"Can you install Google on my computer?" (Score:2)
I hope Google doesn't run Chrome ads in the country where I live. I already am the involuntary user help desk, for relatives, friends, their friends, etc.
I can hear the calls already: "Hello? PolygamousRanchKid? I saw this ad from Google on TV . . . can you install Google on my computer? This means that I can watch all that stuff from Google without an Internet connection anymore, so I don't need to pay those monthly fees anymore, right?"
I am, of course, kidding, but only slightly.
This is the new Google: using ads vs word-of-mouth (Score:2)
So what ever happened to Google promoting itself through word of mouth? What happened to the Google that prided itself on having grown entirely without needing to advertise?
For me, the problem with Chrome is that it is too minimal. It certainly doesn't help that for the things that it is supposed to do well (multiprocess to mitigate stability memory leaks), it doesn't actually do all that well (because it reuses processes and often groups multiple tabs), and I end up getting stability problems and memory
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seriously no but they do advertise against microsoft word no3 ad on the right side
Google Apps
Email, calendar, docs & more!
£33 user/year. Start free trial now
www.google.com/apps
guess even google can't make their ad quality good enough for google :/