Free Image Search Tool
September 16, 2011
One of our clients asked us about a service called Free Image Search Tool. FIST is Magnus Manske‘s solution to the multiple queries one has to run to locate an images on a number of publicly accessible repositories. The system makes it easy to search for what are called “free images.” (We licensed the image we use for Augmentext.com and in Beyond Search we make an effort to point to a source of an image in our free Creative Commons news stream.) Images are a tough problem, often getting less attention from those concerned with copyrights for motion pictures and music.
If you want to give the service a try, click this link or the image of the search query page below:
More information about the service is available from Wikimedia, Meta Wiki.
Stephen E Arnold, September 16, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Next Generation Ads: Laser Dots on Your Forehead
September 13, 2011
Targeted broadcasts may be the next step in maintaining our ever-increasingly niche specific interests. With real-time analytics, news writers and editors now have another tool to use to construct our generation’s version of journalism. Wired reports on this with their article “Real-Time analytics Turn the Web into a Targeted Broadcast.”
Analytics obviously are not a new concept. Anyone with a WordPress blog can check out how many users view their site and other related statistics.
Chartbeat has been offering analytics to mainly e-commerce sites since 2009. Now, the same company tailors this service for reporters with Newsbeat, the brand-new real-time analytics tool.
We learned the following information from the Wired article:
News editors want to know where their readers are coming from, what content they’re engaging with, whether their social media campaigns are working, which new headlines are luring readers in and which new advertisements may be turning them off.
All of this data allows news sites to match their stories to interested readers—sounds great.
However, it would be interesting to know if certain content is filtered. If this is the case, then how will people not involved in an event or activity receive information?
Megan Feil, September 13, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
WebM Patent Fight May Be in Google’s Future
September 9, 2011
Streaming Media asks whether there is a “WebM Patent Fight Ahead for Google?” So, Google may be in hot water. Does Google have any cool or temperate water at the Googleplex?
WebM is a free and open Web video format that Google has adopted for use in streaming media. However, its royalty-free status is threatened by a call by MPEG LA for patents related to the format’s underlying VP8 video codec. Writer Jan Ozer explains:
Twelve parties have stepped forward with patents that they believe are essential to the VP8 standard, on which Google’s WebM is based, though no patent pool has been formed yet and MPEG LA is not releasing the patent holders’ names at this time.
For Google’s part, the company insists WebM and VP8 are community-developed and, as such, supported by the majority of the industry. They formed their own channel for the license of relevant patents, called WebM CCL (Community Cross-License).
We’ll see whether this, and the threat of Google’s giant and increasingly experienced legal team, are enough to fend off MPEG-LA.
Cynthia Murrell, September 9, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Catching Up with Visual Bing
September 8, 2011
We are not tracking visual search with the assiduity we use for POTS or plain old text search. We use a system to show us approximate matches and then we browse. Visual search is, for us here at the goose pond, more like a “close enough for horse shoes” experience than a search experience.
We do want to document the fact that “Bing Delves Deeper into Visual Search,” announces Search Engine Journal.
We’re now used to getting images and videos in our search results. These projects at Bing, however, aim to put pictures at the other end of the process. Writer Rob D. Young explains”
Bing currently has 88 ‘visual searches.’ Those searches range from the top books to dog breeds to yoga poses and well beyond. Each of these searches comes with an advanced left navigation that lets you see only the images and info that interests you. The Yoga Poses visual search, for example, lets you choose the level of difficulty, the therapeutic purpose, the targeted anatomical area, and more.
Optimization for visual search, says Young, is different from that for text-based searches. Bing taps third parties to decide what content is worthwhile. I think we’ll have to keep an eye on those low-visibility players.
Young envisions a time when the public will be able to create and curate these visual searches. I’m looking forward to it, but my colleagues here at Beyond Search are not impressed. Visual images drag along some interesting copyright and fair use issues. If we use an image for our free blog, we try to provide a link to the source of the image and a happy quacking thank you. If someone objects, we delete the image. Will image search improve by leaps and bounds? Nope, more like a few tentative waddles, then a bit of a rest.
Cynthia Murrell, September 8, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Google Study Finds Web Banners Ineffective
August 31, 2011
On Saturday, one reader sent us a link to this story: “Is Google’s Search for Quality Content a Ruse for a Massive Diversion of Cash to Its Own Sites?” We are not sure if the points in the write up are spot on, but the theme of the article connected to another story we noticed.
According to a 2010 survey by Google, the average click through rate for banner ads this past year was 0.09 percent which is down from 0.1 percent in 2009. This decrease leads me to believe that attempts to make banner ads more inviting to potential customers are failing miserably. However, the article Google: Click-Through Rates Fell in 2010 [Study] states:
[The study] found that the format of a display ad can make a difference. A 250×250 pixel ad using Flash got the highest CTR of any format — 0.26%. The worst performers were vertical 120×240 banners with Flash and a full (468×60) banner with Flash, which both got rates of 0.05%.
As with television ads, it’s difficult to determine the effectiveness of digital advertising by only looking at click-through. It is important that we recognize that banner-ads are not created inside a vacuum, but are rather one small part of a larger complex advertising strategy. Needless to say, if studies continue to come out showing any aspect of this strategy to be failing it could lead to major implications for Google.
At lunch on Sunday, I discussed these two items with two people immersed in Web advertising. Three observations stuck in my mind:
First, if there is a softening in click through or online ad revenue, Google will have little choice but find ways to pump up its revenue.
Second, the notion of social media fatigue seems germane. People may be tired of online ads. The result is to shift to a more low profile “pay to play” model. Overt ads may be on the down side after a long run up.
Third, the urgency for organizations like Google and Flipbook to find a way to inject rich media is an indication that the ad revenues flowing to television advertisers are the next Klondike.
I am not sure what to think, but this notion that online ad revenue may need some xoskeletal supports is fascinating. There are significant implications for objective search results as well.
Jasmine Ashton, August 31, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
SkylineGlobe Nudges Google
August 22, 2011
It’s surprising how many people will simply go for the big name geospatial visualization services like Google Earth and rave about how far our technology has come, without even realizing there are bigger fish in the sea. Directions Magazine, at least, recognizes one of the leading products out there with their article, “Skyline Software Announces the Release of New TerraBuilder and TerraGate v6 Products.”
SkylineGlobe Enterprise’s TerraBuilder and TerraGate programs boast features that enhance the performance and usability, following suit after the recent TerraExplorer upgrade to v6.
Notably, Skyline introduced the TerraCatalog as a supplement to Terrabuilder, allowing users to store and organize data sources.
In the article, Directions Magazine revealed the following:
With the…new MPT v3.0 terrain format, data production time [has] been decreased significantly (from prior versions) allowing faster handling of large imagery and elevation data sets and the new architecture allows users to better utilize distributing computing capabilities to share the processing load across multiple servers and processor cores.
The potential for using Skyline products even extends to enterprise level management and scalability with the newest TerraGate v6.
This suite of geospatial visualization, data fusion, and dissemination products offers far more than the average person even knows exists. Our population’s knowledge needs to keep up with our increasingly digitized world’s services. We think when one of the giants falls behind, the quickest way to regain technical initiative is to write a big check. That’s how Googarola came into being. Wait. That was about patents, lots of patents, some of which are of a certain age.
Megan Feil, August 22, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
MetaCarta Offers Geotagging Plug-In
August 19, 2011
Geospatial context is the linch pin for cultural and human ecosystem modeling and analysis. Concept templates can guide models, allowing professionals to consider economic, religious, political and geographic features simultaneously. “Geotagging with MetaCarta” explains the Thetus blog, is a new plug-in solution for creating such models.
MetaCarta’s GeoSearch Toolkit plug-in for Apache Solr, an open source high performance search and index, gives us the ability to combine geographic search constraints such as bounding boxes and heat maps with the many other semantic and text-based search inputs that we have built up using Solr. This toolkit from MetaCarta allows us to run geo-aware searches through one unified and high performance search engine, rather than needing to conglomerate geographic search results from one data source with semantic search results from another source.
The GeoSearch plug-in by MetaCarta makes a lot of sense for professionals seeking ease and speed when incorporating geographic data into their work. Geography is certainly a specific field, and those not well versed in its intricacies often choose to stay away all together. Perhaps software such as this offering by MetaCarta can make geography a user-friendly affair. Thetus keeps a low profile, but the company continues to move forward with commercial and government work.
Emily Rae Aldridge, August 19, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
Google TV Experiences Consumer Dimming
August 13, 2011
Who would have thought a search engine company would have more success with their social networking platform as opposed to TV service? Technology Review reports “Google’s Vision for TV Proves a Turnoff.”
Despite public perception that it would be impossible for any social networking site to rival the giant Facebook, it seems that it is fact harder to reinvent the wheel when people have been enjoying it comfortably and complacently for half a century.
Distributors and stores selling single flagship Google TVs actually returned more than they sold. We learned from Technology Review that Google’s search features couldn’t cut it for consumers:
Google TV devices have gained little traction. They launched to poor reviews citing them as difficult to use, and met opposition from broadcast and cable networks wary of the Web content might undermine their hold on viewers.
Without a user following, Google TV is proving that search is not the killer app for rich media. Assuming demand will remain low, what does this mean for Google’s advertising efforts?
If they can add value to the largest social media site and convert users, they must be able to rethink how to add value to something as archaic as a television set.
Logitech has cut prices. We learned that Sony is also rethinking its pricing tactics for Google TV. Interesting. WalMart failed in online music. Could Google suffer a similar fate?
Megan Feil, August 13, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
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
Rich Media Search May Become Expensive and Slow
August 5, 2011
Bandwidth hogs, watch out! ReadWriteWeb warns, “AT&T to Start Data Throttling, How Will It Affect Users?”
The impending throttle will begin on October first. AT&T 3G users who have “unlimited” data plans (hah!) will see their speeds artificially reduced if they reach a certain bandwidth threshold. Just what that threshold will be is still a mystery, but writer Dan Rowinski dug up some details:
“9to5Mac gives some guidelines on to what kind of usage will achieve reaching the throttling threshold. The site says 12,000 emails or website visits, four streaming movies or five hours of streaming music. That all makes sense except for the last bit, which may be a typo as five hours of music certainly will not eat anywhere near 2.5 GB of data that is expected to cue the throttling.”
AT&T helpfully points to some activities that tend to gulp down data: streaming video, remote web camera apps, sending large files (like uploading to cloud storage), and online gaming. In other words, everything that makes the Web what it is today.
Bottom line: tiered data plans (you know that’s where this leads, right?) are a money machine and AT&T wants to have its share. Ironically, better search leads to more data flow, so more search is good for AT&T; what’s good for AT&T is good for America.
Consumers who just let background processes update, download rich media without much thinking, and gobble up chunky online apps will be paying a lot for their data gluttony. Users will just have to cope.
What are the implications for rich media search? “Free” will come with a price. Welcome to the new datasphere!
Cynthia Murrell August 5, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com, publishers of The New Landscape of Enterprise Search
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