Open Source: High Value, Low Regard?
July 3, 2014
If you are interested in the utility of open source information, you will want to pay particular attention to the disappearing content triggered by the EU’s right to be forgotten. Information is hard to find if the index has been scrubbed. I thought about the “disappearing” of information when I read “Out of Band.” The write up states:
Crowdsourcing and the wealth of networks are terms that are in vogue. What the government generally, and the secret world particularly, refuse to knowledge is that information is a team sport and nature bats last. The government is only as good as its ability to do outreach, and if it relies on lies, nature—reality—will always reveal the truth at some future date.
Interesting point. However, when the most used source of information is filtering information, open source access becomes more important. With a single point of access, the reality becomes what’s findable. Will information access expand. Mr. Steele points out:
For the secret world, only a million-dollar custom-made shim will do, and they won’t notice if the beltway bandit sells them a piece of a beer can claiming it is the custom shim. I cannot overstate the ignorance and inattentiveness of today’s contracting officers and contracting officer technical representatives in the secret world.
In my view, his perspective applies to both commercial indexes and to government information methods. Fascinating. I keep wondering if Google is now the information government.
Stephen E Arnold, July 3, 2014
Amazon Vs. Hachette And Indie Booksellers
July 3, 2014
The bookseller wars are getting nasty, says The Guardian in the article “Indie Booksellers Join Hachette’s Battle With Amazon.” Amazon and the book publisher Hachette have been at war for some time, but just recently has their conflict made headlines. Hachette is angry with Amazon, because the Internet retailer delayed delivery on over 5000 of its titles and removed the option to pre-order books by authors.
J.K. Rowling’s newest crime novel was removed from the pre-order option and she’s using her notoriety to garner support for Hachette. If the Harry Potter mogul was not enough, indie bookstores joined the battle. Their response is that they would never delay selling a book, because they were made at the publisher.
“Both sides in the dispute have released public statements on the issue, Hachette saying most recently that ‘we will spare no effort to resume normal business relations with Amazon – which has been a great partner for years – but under terms that value appropriately for the years ahead the author’s unique role in creating books, and the publisher’s role in editing, marketing, and distributing them, at the same time that it recognizes Amazon’s importance as a retailer and innovator”. Amazon, meanwhile, has said that “this business interruption affects a small percentage of Amazon’s demand-weighted units”, and that while “suppliers get to decide the terms under which they are willing to sell to a retailer … it’s reciprocally the right of a retailer to determine whether the terms on offer are acceptable and to stock items accordingly”.
Amazon is not without its supporters: mainly ebook readers and authors who like how Amazon has reshaped publishing. Both sides have a right to be angry, but does this cut down to a battle between the future and the past? Amazon is clearly a selling model for the future and indie booksellers are trying to save their livelihood. In the end, the money will win.
Whitney Grace, July 03, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Users Prefer Search Apps Over Search Engines
July 3, 2014
Search engines are seeing a drop in ad revenue, because instead of opening Web browser and hitting a search engine to find information, users are turning to search apps instead. TechCrunch states that in the article: “We Search More On Apps, Less On Google Now.” Google dropped from its 82.8 percent dominance of the search engine ad revenue to a mere 65.7 percent. The US mobile ad market, however, spiked to over $17.73 billion-way more than Google brought in the past two years for search.
Users are sticking to niche apps to find the information they need. It makes sense given that the aggregated results are more in tune to do what we want than having to sift through irrelevant search results. Nielson ran a consumer report that found users are spending 34 hours a month on mobile phones over 27 at their desktop. Their search wants have also shifted:
“According to the eMarketer report, we’re really big on local search. Yelp is leading the pack here in terms of ad-revenue growth. Predictions for the local business search company are at 136 percent, or $119 million in mobile ad revenue this year. While that’s a drop in the bucket compared to the spend for Google, Yahoo or Bing, it’s a telling shift in consumer behavior. Revenues are expected to triple by 2016 for Yelp. Meanwhile, Google revenue is expected to drop to 64.2 percent of the overall market by then.”
Google is not going bankrupt. The company is still making money and is still growing, it is just not dominating the entire search market. Users are getting smarter about the way they search as well as finding different ways to get their information. The old search browser might be a thing of the past soon.
Whitney Grace, July 03, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
NoSQL Has a Weakness. Just Tell No One.
July 2, 2014
I read “The Rise (and Fall?) of NoSQL.” The write up seems to take a stance somewhat different from that adopted by enterprise search vendors. With search getting more difficult to sell for big bucks, findability folks are reinventing themselves as Big Data mavens. Examples range from the Fast Search clones to tagging outfits. (Sorry, no names this morning. Search and content processing vendors with chunks of venture firm cash do not need any more fireworks today.)
Is Big Data the white knight that will allow those venture funded companies to deliver a huge payday? I don’t know, but I keep my nest egg is less risky
Here’s the segment I noted:
It’s quite simple: analytics tooling for NoSQL databases is almost non-existent. Apps stuff a lot of data into these databases, but legacy analytics tooling based on relational technology can’t make any sense of it (because it’s not uniform, tabular data). So what usually happens is that companies extract, transform, normalize, and flatten their NoSQL data into an RDBMS, where they can slice and dice data and build reports. The cost and pain of this process, together with the fact that NoSQL databases aren’t fully self-contained (using them requires using their “competition”” for analytics!) is the biggest threat to the possible dominance of NoSQL databases.
My take on this searchification of Big Data boils down to one word: Scrambling for revenues. Perhaps some of the money pumped into crazy marketing schemes might be directed at creating something that works. Systems that dip into a barrel of trail mix return a snack that cannot replace a square meal.
Stephen E Arnold, July 2, 2014
Google Orkut: A Social Network Pioneer
July 2, 2014
Now that I have some free time in my golden years, I enjoy going through my archive of search and content processing content. I read in “Google Shutters Orkut, Its First Crack at a Social Network.” The write up provides some history; to wit:
Ten years ago, Orkut was Google’s first foray into social networking. Orkut Büyükkökten created the site using Google’s notion of “20 percent time”—that employees could dedicate a fifth of their work week to developing projects not directly related to their work (as long as those projects were cool, and could become Google projects). Orkut, launched a month before Facebook and five months after MySpace, has what most social-networking sites have: profile pages, photos, groups (called “communities”), and apps. And even through two redesigns, it retained some vestiges of the MySpace era, such as themes and a more prominently displayed list of friends.
Intrigued by the reference to “before Facebook”, I dipped into my archive of search goodness and spotted some interesting factoids about Orkut. Frankly speaking, I don’t think even the most intrepid Beyond Search reader cares too much about search and content processing history. I find the past fascinating because the present state of online services leaves me with indigestion.
Let me highlight some nuggets from my Google Orkut file. None of these made the cut for my first study of Google, published a decade ago as The Google Legacy by a defunct publishing company somewhere in merrie olde England.
ITEM: Litigation between Affinity Networks and Google about the Orkut service and some of its code and functions. I lost track of the lawsuit in 2005, but it would not surprise me if it is still alive and kicking. You can get a sense of dispute by scanning this Justia document. Innovation is an interesting business for Google.
ITEM: In 2005, Information Week ran a story which I assume is semi accurate. “Brazilian Police Bust Dope Ring Built Around Google’s Orkut” asserted:
Police in Brazil arrested a gang of drug dealers who were using Google’s popular Orkut social networking site to sell ecstasy and marijuana…
I recall learning at one of the police and intel conferences that Orkut was a go to service in Brazil for some fascinating activities. As Facebook was ramping up with college students, Orkut seemed to be appealing to a different type of social network maven.
ITEM: “Intermediary Liability in Latin America” reported in 2010 that Google faced in 2010 “faces at least 600 lawsuits in Brazil. The most famous of those cases was filed by two Brazilian teenagers against the Google-owned social networking site Orkut over dirty jokes that allegedly offended them.”
Orkut is a gone goose. For some, the announcement will be bittersweet.
Stephen E Arnold, July 1, 2014
Elasticsearch: A Platform for Third Party Revenue
July 2, 2014
Making money from search and content processing is difficult. One company has made a breakthrough. You can learn how Mark Brandon, one of the founders of QBox, is using the darling of the open source search world to craft a robust findability business.
I interviewed Mr. Brandon, a graduate of the University of Texas as Austin, shortly after my return from a short trip to Europe. Compared with the state of European search businesses, Elasticsearch and QBox are on to what diamond miners call a “pipe.”
In the interview, which is part of the Search Wizards Speak series, Mr. Brandon said:
We offer solutions that work and deliver the benefits of open source technology in a cost-effective way. Customers are looking for search solutions that actually work.
Simple enough, but I have ample evidence that dozens and dozens of search and content processing vendors are unable to generate sufficient revenue to stay in business. Many well known firms would go belly up without continual infusions of cash from addled folks with little knowledge of search’s history and a severe case of spreadsheet fever.
Qbox’s approach pivots on Elasticsearch. Mr. Brandon said:
When our previous search product proved to be too cumbersome, we looked for an alternative to our initial system. We tested Elasticsearch and built a cluster of Elasticsearch servers. We could tell immediately that the Elasticsearch system was fast, stable, and customizable. But we love the technology because of its built-in distributed nature, and we felt like there was room for a hosted provider, just as Cloudant is for CouchDB, Mongolab and MongoHQ are for MongoDB, Redis Labs is for Redis, and so on. Qbox is a strong advocate for Elasticsearch because we can tailor the system to customer requirements, confident the system makes information more findable for users.
When I asked where Mr. Brandon’s vision for functional findablity came from, he told me about an experience he had at Oracle. Oracle owns numerous search systems, ranging from the late 1980s Artificial Linguistics’ system to somewhat newer systems like the late 1990s Endeca system, and the newer technologies from Triple Hop. Combine these with the SES technology and the hybrid InQuira formed from two faltering NLP systems, and Oracle has some hefty investments.
Here’s Mr. Brandon’s moment of insight:
During my first week at Oracle, I asked one of my colleagues if they could share with me the names of the middleware buyer contacts at my 50 or so named accounts. One colleague said, “certainly”, and moments later an Excel spreadsheet popped into my inbox. I was stunned. I asked him if he was aware that “Excel is a Microsoft technology and we are Oracle.” He said, “Yes, of course.” I responded, “Why don’t you just share it with me in the CRM System?” (the CRM was, of course, Siebel, an Oracle product). He chortled and said, “Nobody uses the CRM here.” My head exploded. I gathered my wits to reply back, “Let me get this straight. We make the CRM software and we sell it to others. Are you telling me we don’t use it in-house?” He shot back, “It’s slow and unusable, so nobody uses it.” As it turned out, with around 10 million corporate clients and about 50 million individual names, if I had to filter for “just middleware buyers”, “just at my accounts”, “in the Northeast”, I could literally go get a cup of coffee and come back before the query was finished. If I added a fourth facet, forget it. The CRM system would crash. If it is that bad at the one of the world’s biggest software companies, how bad is it throughout the enterprise?
You can read the full interview at http://bit.ly/1mADZ29. Information about QBox is at www.qbox.com.
Stephen E Arnold, July 2, 2014
The Enemy Of My Enemy Is My Friend
July 2, 2014
Microsoft made the news some time ago when they added the Linux kernel to their program. It was a revolutionary moment when the two rivals set aside their differences to more or less make their systems compatible, but there’s a new headline to displace it: “Apple Installs Bing” says TechEye. No seriously, Apple really did decide to install Bing on its products instead of Google. The article points out that Microsoft and Apple both really dislike Google and as the saying goes: “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Now the technology companies are working together, but it doesn’t stop at installing Bing:
“Other signs have followed that Microsoft and Apple are chums. Recently Microsoft introduced a version of Office for the iPad, which suddenly made the keyboardless netbook useful. Now that the Bing search engine is well on its way to gain additional traction due to its integration with OS X, do expect its current partnerships with Siri and Windows 8 to also help see the search engine gain some market share in the long run.”
TechEye says that Apple fans will be lauding Bing search over Google soon, because Apple now uses it. That might be the case, but Google has become a verb. Bing does not even register a synonym for search. Microsoft and Apple teamed together could make a force to be reckoned with, but will their be able to put ALL their differences aside to take on Google? Do not hold your breath.
Whitney Grace, July 02, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Paying by the Page
July 2, 2014
“Pay as you go” is a service model that allows you the freedom to pay for the types of services you want to use when you want to you them. The idea is that it saves people time and money. Ola Sitarska introduces us to the concept that books can be applied to the pay as you go model in her blog post: “Experiment Results: Books In A ‘Pay As You Want’ Model.’” The book was published as part of her work at Makerland. Makerland is an open source company that teaches people how to code and use the Internet to their benefit. Their book, Makerland Tutorials, helps people understand basic Internet usage and navigate the many options to help them promote themselves.
Releasing the book as a “pay as you go” project was a complete experiment. They offered a downloadable PDF and a printed paper copy. They advertised is using regular channels: newsletter, blog post, Twitter, Reddit, and news Web sites. The PDF was more popular than the paper copy. The results for the PDF are below:
• “average book was worth $0.87
• 89 out of 490 people paid anything (18%)
• if we extract only people who paid anything, then we have average of $5 per book. median is also $5.
• the highest payment was $20, 4x paid average and 23x average. the lowest one was $0.99.
• we’ve got 4 mailinator emails (of course, they also didn’t pay)
•
I think this results make me happy. I know they might be better if we invest more time into promotion, but I like this two numbers: 18% of people who paid anything and almost 500 people who downloaded the book.”
For an experiment that relied on free advertising channels and with a minimal investment, the Makerland team as able to make a profit and learned how to improve the “pay as you go” book in the future. Will this be a new way people read books in the future? It is more plausible for non-fiction books than fiction, but why not? Why pay for a book that you don’t end up liking or reading?
Whitney Grace, July 02, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Using Search For Environment Protection
July 2, 2014
Environment protection organizations are always asking for support and most of the time that translates into money. Paying a few dollars might make you feel good for a short time, but what if you could donate hundreds of dollars instead of your pocket change? How? Simply by clicking your mouse. The Ecosia team have taken the economics of search and applied it to a new search engine type. The Ecosia search engine generates income whenever people use it. Eighty percent of the income from the searches is used to plant trees in Brazil.
Technology and nature are pitted against each other in the collective consciousness, but Ecosia pairs them together. Ecosia recently updated its search experience, according to the blog post “Search And You Shall Receive.” The update includes images, maps, videos, and latest news. Ecosia pulls its results from many places, including Google, so you can still search through Google results and plant a tree at the same time.
There are also other cool updates:
“What else? Get results tailored to the past day, week or month with the addition of chronological filters on the search results page. We were listening, too, when you asked about data privacy at Ecosia – so check out our updated Privacy Policy. Plus, donate for free when you shop just about anywhere on the web with the all-new EcoLinks browser extension.”
There are other search engines that use a similar model such as GoodSearch.com. Startups with a charitable goal never get enough attention. We encourage you to spread the word about Ecosia and plant a tree.
Whitney Grace, July 2, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Keeping Up with IBM: A New Daily Paper.li Is Available
July 1, 2014
I try to keep up with Watson, the billion dollar bet that is much loved by gourmets at Bon Appétit. If you want daily IBM news and information for free, navigate to the Paper.li “The THINQ Magazine Daily.” I think the THINQ is a modern version of the IBM sign I saw in the Federal Systems’ offices in 1973. That sign said, “Think.” Spelling aside, the Paper.li algorithm harvests information from Web sites and presents it in a zippy format. Vivisimo, now and IBM company involved in Big Data, offered a Paper.li service about enterprise search.
The issue I am viewing today (July 1, 2014) covers stuff I never heard of; for example, Bluemix and “world class analytics.” There are some stories with which I am familiar; for example, Watson crafts recipes. I wrote about tamarind as an ingredient not long ago too. The THINQ content includes links to IBM videos. I was not familiar with what is labeled “theCUBE.” I am not into videos because it takes too much time to watch talking heads and PowerPoint slides. Reading is quicker and easier for me, but I am old fashioned.
There is a selection of photos. Some of these come from sources other than IBM. I assume these are snapshots from IBM partners. A number of the pictures show really happy people looking at computing devices and somewhat baffling images with text asking me, “Why do you love social media?” I don’t love social media, but for certain type of law enforcement work, social media is darned useful. Facebook users often post snaps of themselves at crime scenes or capture their thoughts moments before taking some action I find disturbing.
There is an article telling small businesses how these small outfits can use Big Data. The link points to Inc. Magazine and an article with the title “What 3 Small Businesses Learned From Big Data.” The THINQ title does not quite capture what the Inc. article actually says, but I assume that most THINQ visitors will not pay much attention to the meaning adjustment.
If you are curious about IBM, take a look at THINQ. I will stick to my own system for monitoring the exciting world of IBM.
Stephen E Arnold, July 1, 2014
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