SEO Blog

As was rumored lately, talk.google.com was unveiled this evening.

The tool is in BETA, and requires a gmail account to operate.

As it is based on the Jabber open source standard, Google’s IM is designed to connect with users of competing services.

This is a great feature. I use IM2 for just that reason - I don’t want AOL, IM, and all the others running. It’s bad enough that I have two (IM2 and Skype).

This tool is still very much a BETA tool. Danny Sullivan wrote a review on it earlier today, in which he did point out some major weaknesses vis a vis competition, namely the lack of video chat among other things.

This launch comes just a day after Google rolled out its Desktop 2 software, and is a further sign of its intention to compete with all competitors in the marketplace of connections.

That’s right. Google’s not just a search service anymore.

Google has evolved dramaticaly over the last year. Today, they are all about connecting you with the people or information you seek.

That’s broader than search.

It was just pointed out to me that the search engine map page for Zeal was also added today.

Dave Sifry at Technorati, and Blake Rhodes at IceRocket, along with Matt Wells from Gigablast are three individuals who listen to their constituencies, and request constructive feedback to improve their search services.

We reviewed Gigablast a long time ago, and we’ll need to do an update shortly, but last week we added IceRocket, and this week we’re finally adding Technorati.

Once again, I hope you find these useful, and please feel free to send me comments,…

So I did not have time to follow up on my last post on the weekend, and yesterday I was snowed under with work. But I’m going to try and keep posting about my tribulations with Bell Canada / Bell Mobility for the Palm Treo 600, if only because I’m upset that I ever recommended that phone from that provider to anyone.

Late yesterday afternoon my Palm Treo was dead again, within 25 minutes of being off the charger. It made me miss a call with an important potential client. I’m very annoyed.

So, now I’ll share the rest of Friday’s story.

We left off with my call about the exceptionally insulting customer service I’m getting from Bell Mobility. The young lady on the line was very polite, and seemed quite clearly not to be empowered to provide any meaningful service.

The meaningful points of Bell Canada’s customer service for defective Palm Treo 600’s:

• They take absolutely no responsibility for the quality of the hardware they sell!
• They would not credit anyone for loss of service due to the defective hardware they provide