Protected: AIIM White Paper on SharePoint Deployment
August 9, 2011
Google Tightens YouTube Thumb Ties
August 8, 2011
Google must have been inspired by the Kenton Knepper modern thumb tie “trick”.
Lady Gaga is one of the most popular artists today and has millions of fans that follow her every move. However, according to the NPR article “Lady Gaga’s YouTube Account is Suspended” no one is above the rules even a mega superstar. According to the article Lady Gaga’s Google Inc. owned YouTube account was suspended “due to “multiple or severe violations of YouTube’s copyright policy.”
It is company policy to remove accounts after there have been three copyright violations. The singers account was restored later the same day but the whole situation makes one wonder just how far Google and others are willing to go. The site in question is run by Lady Gaga officials so it seems hard for her to infringe on her own copyright laws. If Google suspends an account of such a popular personality then that means that the rest of the public better beware.
You may sign into your YouTube account only to find that you have been accused and found guilty of YouTube violations. It will be interesting to see how Google and others target alleged “wrongdoers” and lay down the law.
With the Kenton gizmos struggling is not a good idea. Even magic acts can go wrong.
April Holmes, August 8, 2011
ACIS Shoulders into the SharePoint Search Market
August 8, 2011
According to the PRWeb article “ACIS Extends Enterprise Search Services into the Cloud — Opportunities for Cutting Costs While Increasing Quality of Search,” ACIS (ACIS Consulting Inc.) recently announced the introduction of its Cloud-based Enterprise Search Service (EsaaS). ACIS asserts that it is “one of the most experienced Microsoft Fast Enterprise Search technology developers and systems integrators.)
The new EsaaS system, according to our source:
…is a complete solution plus services package that includes a cloud-based IT infrastructure, a highly advanced enterprise search platform, professional consulting and management services that tie it all together.
Clients can look forward to reduced costs as well as a noticeable improvement in search experience which in turn improves overall their customer satisfaction. As more and more enterprises realize the importance of the cloud, ACIS believes that the cloud working side by side with their technology can better meet the needs of customers. Efrem Habteselassie, principal at ACIS Consulting made the following statement:
This is why we are launching this ESaaS service offering – to combine the benefits associated with cloud computing with our world-class experts to offer the first complete Enterprise Search as a Service package.
Seems like the beginning of a beautiful and lucrative relationship. The challenge, of course, will be differentiating the ACIS solution from Microsoft’s own solutions, industrial strength solution providers like Exalead, and the dozens of Certified Gold firms offering similar services. ACIS does have some interesting acronyms.
April Holmes, August 8, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Inteltrax: Top Stories, August 1 to August 5
August 8, 2011
Inteltrax, the data fusion and business intelligence information service, captured three key stories germane to search this week, specifically about the careers that have either sprouted up or drastically changed during data analytics’ rise.
The first such story, “Big Data Architects in Demand” involved the rising importance of digital architects in the expanding data warehouse field.
Following the trend of data warehouses evolving with job responsibilities, our story, “Warehouse Database Administrator Roles Changing” showed how this important role, too, is rapidly altering as newer and more niche-oriented technology becomes available.
Stepping away from the warehouse and into the halls of congress, the article “Congressman Issa Weaves Government and Analytics Tighter” shows how the roles of politicians are changing and becoming more efficient thanks to analytic tools.
While the economy is sputtering in many areas, we’ve seen nothing but growth in business intelligence and data analytics since launching our site over a year ago. Routinely, analytics firms post record earnings, which leads to more job opportunities. We expect to see this employment market grow and evolve as more companies learn how analytics can help them.
Follow the Inteltrax news stream by visiting www.inteltrax.com
Patrick Roland, Editor, Inteltrax, August 8, 2011
Sponsored by Digital Reasoning, developers of the next generation content analytics system Synthsys.
FCC Close Captioning: Unintended Side Effects?
August 8, 2011
In July, the Federal Communications Commission inadvertently handed a gift to indexers of Web content. Broadcast Engineering reported, “FCC sets six-month deadline for Internet closed captioning.”
The goal, of course, is improved accessibility to video content for the hearing impaired. The new rules continue the spirit of the 1996 Telecommunications Act which required closed captioning for most TV shows. Now that Web programming has become central to modern life, the requirements bring this accessibility up-to-date. Writer Michael Grotticelli states,
“Next January, captioning for live and near-live programming must be online. By next July, all prerecorded programming ‘substantially edited’ for the Internet must be captioned. The report recommends performance objectives, technical standards and regulations. No information can be lost in the transcoding process, including spelling, positioning, timing and presentation.”
We would like to point out the side effect this will have on the search industry: this development will makes it much easier for content to be indexed. Speech to text is not so hot, so putting the burden on the video maker shifts costs.
It will also create a legal gotcha for those who violate the guideline, so watch out. See here for the text of the report.
Cynthia Murrell, August 8, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Protected: Boost Your SharePoint Search Maturity
August 8, 2011
Google: Now in the Barrel
August 7, 2011
What happens to a rodeo clown in a barrel? Most bulls eye the barrel and they continue to do unpredictable things. But when the rodeo clown is in the barrel, the clown knows a hard knock may be coming. In the Silicon Valley ranch land, there’s a bull riding contest underway. Google, it seems, is now in the barrel. The bulls are charging around and it seems as though some of the bigger ones are looking to put some horn on the clown in the barrel. Every company gets a turn in the barrel. Silicon Valley is mostly family with a handful of Hatfield and McCoy schisms. Siblings and cube mates may leave one company to go to another, but the closeness and shared experiences persist. When a company finds itself in the barrel, then there is a moment of fear, then horror, and then shock. How can those folks who shared a cube or a dorm room or a significant other find themselves in a fight that can become bloody, even fatal?
Easy.
Power is like those nifty sticks that some of the southern Europeans jab into tomorrow’s dinner. The grace and elegance is superficial. The real business of irritating the bull is the thrill of the kill and the utter, total domination of the bull. In the US, we don’t do outright public bull killing. We use the word sport and focus on the clown thing. It is a bit like sumo wrestling with combatants wearing plump, air filled fat suits.
I enjoyed “With Google There Will Be Bad Blood.” The run down of the bulls, matadors, and clowns is interesting. I found this passage notable:
Speaking of failed Google acquisitions, after Google tried and failed to buy Yelp and Groupon, they moved forward on products that competed directly with them. In the process, Yelp has felt Google was actively screwing them in search results. Bad blood galore now. On the smaller startup side of things, both Color and Path turned down massive acquisition offers from Google. Part of it was because the startups wanted to remain independent, but a large part was also that neither groups of employees wanted to work for Google. Naturally, Google has since been working on products that compete with both — not only Google+, but also mobile apps created through Google’s Slide division.
This passage resonated with me for three reasons.
First, if the statement is accurate, it caused me to understand that Google’s approach to innovation is to learn, try to acquire, and then do the “me too” thing. With innovation pushed to the product level at Google, I wonder how much “me too” is operating in Google’s core?
Second, Google seems adept at identifying what’s hot. My question is, “Why doesn’t Google convert a trend into a product or service itself? I find this an interesting question to which I have no answer.
Third, whatever Google is doing, some of the companies it covets are not ready to journey to the Googleplex to get a Google mouse pad. In 2004, I think companies Google wanted to buy were swooning to be certifiably Googley. Perceptions seem to be different.
So what?
General Web search users are not likely to make a shift any time soon. Furthermore, the competitive fights over patents are likely to have an impact over a longer time horizon. Neither the media nor most azure chip “real” consultants have the mental chops to shift from the “if it bleeds, it leads” approach to “real” journalism. So today’s dust up is tomorrow’s forgotton dust bunny.
The rodeo clown analogy provides me with an anchor point. Other Silicon Valley cowboys had to do time in the barrel. Some survived. Google strikes me as an amiable clown and one likely to emerge with a few bumps and bruises but intact. No wonder some children find clowns scary. Which company goes in the barrel next?
Stephen E Arnold, August 7, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publisher of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search.
Metadata Formally Recognized by Courts
August 7, 2011
Meta-Cognition, meaning to think about thinking, is a term psychologists love to throw around to discuss intelligence and the capacity to learn. Now, it seems the legal community is going to jump aboard the thinking-ship with their own term – metadata, to think about data, or more precisely, data thinking about data. The article, Technology: Recent Cases Help Evolve Guidelines for Producing Metadata: Keeping ESI Load Files in a Forensically Sound Manner that Preserves Metadata is Key, on Inside Counsel, examines the nature of metadata and tries to pin down a practical use for it.
The first part of the problem – what is metadata? – is universally agreed upon now days. Metadata is any non-visible data, such as author, word count, title (including changes), time/date stamps, etc…, connected to documents or other Electronically Stored Information (ESI). Lawyers can use this valuable information to nail down time lines, prove who monkeyed with a document, and which custodians did what to ESIs, in general.
As the legal community catches up with technology, more and more judges are ruling that metadata is not hearsay, but rather falls under the protection of ESI. Most recently, a judge set some practical guidelines for metadata:
“Judge Shira Scheindlin emphasized that metadata is an integral part of an electronic record. Although it is not legal precedent, her list is a reasonable set of guidelines for in-house counsel responding to ESI requests, as follows. Earlier this year, in National Day Laborer Organizing Network v. United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, 2011 WL 381625 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 7, 2011) (opinion withdrawn upon agreement of the parties), Judge Shira Scheindlin emphasized that metadata is an integral part of an electronic record. Although it is not legal precedent, her list is a reasonable set of guidelines for in-house counsel responding to ESI requests, as follows. The metadata that should accompany the production of any text-based ESI includes: File Name…Custodian… Source Device…Source Path…Production Path…Modified Date…Modified Time…Time Offset Value…Identifier.”
Now that metadata is being recognized as a legitimate resource for information, indexing becomes even more vital than ever.
Catherine Lamsfuss, August 7, 2011
Sponsored by Quasar CA, your source for informed financial advisory services
Delightful Irony: Human Crashes Google Car
August 7, 2011
This morning my Overflight information service overflowed with Google related information. There were coveys of quales [Latin and not a misspelling, gentle reader] about Google and patents. There was another Googley shutdown story. The idea is that you should just Google a word. Who cares about a “real” dictionary entry. I find the reference appropriate because who cares about a “real” anything, including an azure chip consulting company with a penchant for becoming authorities in ANSI standard controlled term lists. I found a tardy response to the feline centric “How Do I Hate Google? Let Me Count the Ways”, which had precious little of the Elizabeth Barrett Browning gentleness from her pain and suffering.
Consider this EBB passage:
First time he kissed me, he but only kissed The fingers of this hand wherewith I write; And, ever since, it grew more clean and white.
Now evaluate the budding wordsmith Brian S. Hall’s passage:
David Drummond, you are [lame]. Larry, Sergey, you are [lame]. And I know why you’re [lame]. I know why you have monopoly profits in one business, use them to *destroy* other businesses, dominate the newest business (smartphones) and still whine.
Now who should be the focus for legions of soon to be unemployed English majors?
But what caught my attention was this item: “Google Blames a Human for its Robo-Car Crash.” My take: Algorithm good. Human bad.
Now what happens if Google’s next big product initiative such as a relaunch of the fascinating Google TV product line or a fully integrated, graphically consistent interface to the Android mobile devices flops?
Maybe algorithm good, human bad? Amusing to me because humans, not algorithms, are actually making decisions at the Googleplex. So a failure at Google boils down to “Human bad.” Seems logical.
Stephen E Arnold, August 7, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Trust: Rhymes with Rust and Like Rust, Trust Erodes
August 6, 2011
We don’t do philosophy. But Discover Magazine has examined in “The Slow Decline of Trust over Time the idea of “trust.” The article is full of graphs that illustrate trends in trust from 1972 to 2010, as reported annually by the General Social Survey at the University of California, Berkeley.
Writer Razib Khan explains,
“I realized that the General Social Survey has 2010 results available. This means that I could check any changes in public trust and confidence from 2008 to 2010! . . . . It seems that my intuition was wrong in that American society had slouched toward more general distrust.”
Well, no, not between 2008 and 2010, but it has gradually eroded since the survey was begun in ’72. Khan broke the results down by a number of factors, and the one that interests me regards “confidence in scientific community.” It shows that, since 2000, that confidence has gone down.
I wonder, does this mean that people are also losing confidence in Web and enterprise search technologies? This might play a factor in the future of search.
What’s trust have to do with search? Three points:
First, if a search system does not process a comprehensive, cohesive colleciton of content, the researcher will not get what’s called precision and recall. What comes out are results that do not represent the on point information that matches the user’s query. Distortion can enter search results in many ways. Most users “trust” search systems. That’s probably not a great idea.
Second, if the search system lacks an editorial policy which makes an attempt to winnow disinformation from information, then the search system and its index can be distorted by certain actions. Search engine optimization experts know many ways to get a search system to display content which may not match the user’s query or the more fuzzy notion of “intent”.
Finally, as costs crush even the big boys of search, decisions may be made by humans or algoritms to introduce efficiencies. Costs may fall, but the index may deliver results which are wide of the mark with the distance of the miss undetectable to all but an expert.
In short, once search systems generated distorted information, trust is what makes this situation persist. Most users will ask, “What’s the difference?” If yoiu don’t know the answer to this question, trust those search systems. Life will be just fine.
Cynthia Murrell, August 6, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
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