"mockingbird" – where the heck did they get that codeame ??

AS for having page rank for every person, thats going to a long short. What happens if I am using an id that does not touch any property of google ? In theory the could be good,

   but what really interests me is "Google Maps location is set to where he lives, information which will be tied into his Google searches as well." – is this being done via mymaps and saved locations ?

From those last two paragraphs, I think they need to make sure that this tying in of other information about you is also optional. Maybe I want to search for new surfing locations that are not around me. It would be a hinderance in that case for my map information to be used to determine relevancy.

That's not a great example, but basically there will be times where you want the neutral results and times that you don't. I think it will be important to quickly and easily choose to change whether to personalize the results or not. So far they've been pretty good about that, but it'll be interesting to see how much of this kind of customization of results they can provide without slowing down the return of results too much. After all, if everyone wants personalized results, they can't cache ranking as effectively.

> "or instance, a Harvard student might be shown feeds from Boston newspapers, based on his IP." Yea, works fine with language, but not with location here.

Can't quite make out the URL in Jessica's Gadget Maker screenshot, looks like www.google.com/ig/gmcreator?moduleurl=gm_photo.xml but that doesn't load (yet, anyway)...

keep the updates coming..

This is fun :)

Cool! the logo is a bit off-ish and unimaginative though

yeah that gadget maker url sounds really interesting.. Cant find anything on on this component under the API section

Phillip

I think it is. If you go to another URL (ie. www.google.com/ig/thisisanexample) you get an error 404 page, however if you go to www.google.com/ig/gmcreator?moduleurl=gm_photo.xml it redirects to iGoogle

off topic:
how big this screen is? :P
http://blogoscoped.com/files/personalization-event/bringing-together-personalization-large.jpg

Length x width = big2 (thats big squared)

> but what really interests me is "Google Maps
> location is set to where he lives, information
> which will be tied into his Google searches
> as well." – is this being done via mymaps and
> saved locations ?

Pd, check the updated section on Sep's talk, it now includes another paragraph of information:
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2007-04-30-n90.html#toc2

The presentations and announcements are over, they're now doing hands-on demos, and dessert (2:00pm-3:00pm).

Ok got that Philpp, and yeah it works when defaulted!!

but the fan out of locations is not systematic.. that is, I have about 9 "library" around my location. Where as A and B libraries are closet to me and "F" is the next closes, yet it positions Libraries furthest away from me as "C, D E" . I would still prefer the closet one to my default location to be A and then the next to be B and so on and so forth....so the makers fan out based on distance :)-

From what I am seeing with Hompy, its all about localized data . even the mycommunity appers to be driven off this data sets!

> Cool! the logo is a bit off-ish and unimaginative though

Update: this was Jessica's wallpaper, not the new logo precisely (at least not necessarily?!).

Also see the new Gadget Maker screenshot...

Here are some examples of the actual iGoogle logo that will go live:

http://www.google.com/ig/images/skins/busstop/sunny/igoogle_logo.png
http://www.google.com/ig/images/skins/beach/midnight/igoogle_logo.png
http://www.google.com/ig/images/skins/sweetdreams/6am/igoogle_logo.png

(You can replace the theme names and times / weather conditions to see different versions...)

It's also worth noting that www.google.com/ig/community redirects to Google Gadgets Directory, I presume then that the new community feature will completely replace the existing gadgets directory (that has also recently gained some community based and personalization features).

Martin, you beat me to it! ;-)

tony

I wonder just how many 404s Google gets after it's announces new products that will be unveiled in the future. (Such as the community feature, or the iGoogle logos).

Heh...

*. logo.png
1. logo2.png
2. logo_new.png
3. logo_ig.png
4. logo_igoogle.png
5. igoogle.png
*. igoogle_logo.png

1. www.google.com/ig/mycommunity
*. www.google.com/ig/community

So that's 6 from me just tonight! :-)

Pretty much the same as me although I gave up on the logo after a while. Although while in the process of looking for it I did discover that iGoogle uses the Yahoo! User Interface JS library (well, I found a reference to it in a CSS file as well as a link to the Y!UI license).

(Added one of those to the post, thanks Tony!)

I think this could be the reason for the last week's troubles.

Added the links to the gadgets with thanks to Ionut:
http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2007/04/google-gadget-maker.html

Isn't the name "iGoogle" stomping upon Apple's grounds of names?

I love how they justify becoming a portal saying: "because of recent trends in content on the web, and recent technological advances in search algorithms"

Everything old is new again.

That's a reason for personalization. The portal is not that new. "Sepandar Kamvar (pictured) talks about Google’s personalization efforts. Why does Google invest in a “personal Google” now? Sep says it’s because of recent trends in content on the web..."

The My Community section for Gadgets will not replace the original gadget directory. It will be link somewhere near the "New Stuff" link on the Gadget directory page.

will this correct the theme sync issue? I will post a screenshot @ 9p PT if thats the time.

"Added correction: changes will go live around 9pm Pacific Time, not Eastern Time."
That's 12am Eastern time, BTW. (That's May 1st)

Looks like Pageflakes :-)

is this a real thread to the likes of protopage or pageflakes? sure, google always (seems) to stand for quality but frankly i don't see that much innovation anymore. they seem to become reactive rather than creative. a youtube widget and some others have been launched by smaller starups a long time ago. here's just one example: http://www.pageflakes.com/Community/Content/Flakes.aspx?Search=movies

...and by the way... 'igoogle' – are you kidding me? i mean, c'mon...

francois, SF

/pd said: "mockingbird" – where the heck did they get that codeame ??

...maybe because mockingbirds "do not harm, just give pleasure to us"? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Kill_a_Mockingbird

To counter negative connotations which usually come up in the context of personalized services, like invasion of privacy, big brother. Mockingbirds are beautiful and innocent. Microsoft has named its personalized search project "vulture". Go figure!

I dislike the new name and logo a lot. Can I personalize the old logo back? It doesn't seem like increased personalization should include a look that I like less.

After seeing mocking bird the first thing that came to my mind was that there was a song of the rapper Eminem, he had a song 'mocking bird'

the gadget maker went live just now

So are these new user made widgets hosted by Google? And will they be allowed to work with mobile devices (unlike currently for non-Google widgets as far as I can tell)?

gadget maker screenshot : http://picasaweb.google.com/hjr.photo/Google/photo#5059435030825362946

Page live @ 8:54pm PT.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v247/brinkeguthrie/untitled-1.jpg

http://www.google.com/ig/gmchoices?hl=en

The Google Gadget maker link at the bottom of your iGoogle page.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/183/479390006_aa0ffd0d37.jpg?v=0

They made an update to IGoogle but actually forgot to fix the 'search history' link at the top.

I am confused, did they really call it iGoogle internally? because the name in 'My Accounts' page says personalized homepage

Inferno – Your right, it still does say Personalized Homepage on the My Account page. What's also strange is the Personalized Homepage has a Google Labs icon next to it. But if you go to Google Labs it says that Personalized Homepage has graduated from the labs. So doesn't that mean it gets a new icon on the My Account page?

Thank you Colin ;)

PS :the link "make your own gadget" is shown only on English iGoogle

www.google.com/ig/community > I can see all Philipp's gadgets :)

a Mocking Bird copy the song of other birds. Just as Google copy Netvibes, PagesFlakes, Webwag & co...

The gadgets created by your contacts... This seems original. Can you find other Pers. Homepage that has the same feature?

The YouTube widget is not high enough here, it doesn't show the full video, and I can't stop a video once it's loaded (at least not by any normal means).

Another bug: I saw "No one in your community has written a gadget yet. You can be the first to write your own gadget." at one time accessing My Community. The other times it worked.

Some more bugs: in many places, iGoogle forgets about form labels and legends. http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2005-04-14-n77.html

Does anyone know why ' http://api.google.com/search/beta2 ' is down?
Has it been removed?

A few years ago inside a Playboy Interview, Larry Page quoted Users Search queries as , 'We want you to get out of Google and to the right place as soon as possible'

Now today they are looking for Users to set up camp with their iGoogle service.
Why do they keep on moving the goalposts when they have always have trouble scoring in the first place.

Come on guys show us something new and innovative.

Interested to know how Eric Schmidt will be greeted at the next Apple Board Meeting by Steve Jobs, especially as Apple are known for being the all seeing i.

I am the eggmen, they are the eggmen, i am the walrus, goo goo goo job.

Does anyone know why ' api.google.com/search/beta2 ' is down?
Has it been removed?

Is there a way to drop the "i" in iGoogle if we'd like to? I really like Google my personalized Google homepage but, don't really care for the logo change.

Phil, I'm hoping you may start a Post/Thread that migh more directly address this issue that would gain greater visibility on the web and perhaps at Google, where people might me able to directly respond to that with votes, thumbs up/down or positive v. negative comments tallied.

This is one veto I wish Larry and Sergey had stuck to their guns on. Or, at least made it optional for Customized Page users.

Thanks

Tom
  

Ive set up a forum for people who are interested in designing and showcasing their gadgets www.igooglegadgetmakers.com i hope it becomes a leading launch pad for many collaborations and experiments.

Anyone else have their Google Personalized homepage reset itself? Happened to me this morning.

My personalized page was also reset. I hope this is just a temporary problem because I spent a lot of time getting it setup just right – I was using every tab, and each was full of blogs and other "stuff".

Not again :(

yep... again...
it's been happening again and again since april 26th...

you'd think it would be fixed by now...
not necessarily restored... but at least fixed.

way to put a bad spin on a i+ name change

The personalization being reset to default bug is seemingly everywhere right now. Yes, I had this happen too ...

http://indy.vox.com/library/post/warning-beware-of-igoogle-personalized-homepage.html

http://www.google.com/ig/gmcreator?moduleurl=gm_photo.xml seems your url works now Philipp

Ugh, I escaped the problem last time, but my page just reverted back to how I had it months ago!

My iGoogle's still normal.

One other change that I see rolled out where I'm at is that the name "iGoogle" is now also shown on the classic Google homepage. Up until some hours ago it read "Personalized Home" or something for me.

Looks like a lot of people are complaining again:
http://groups.google.com/group/Google_Web_Search_Help-Personalizing/browse_thread/thread/59b3283837690de0/6e0ce9f2417b56a1

Is there any way to contact Google about it? I got lost in a maze of help pages that either walk through troubleshooting or point to the Google Group for help. Isn't there a feedback form?

can one run adsense in a gadget ? I just noticed a couple of gadgets (games) that have adsense in them.

Yes, you can... I do on the GamesfortheBrain gadgets!
http://www.gamesforthebrain.com/gadgets/

But these are round-based games, so you won't see AdSense unless you're actually playing.

When I uploaded my newly created iGoogle gadget this morning, my highly detailed, multi-tabbed homepage that I worked on daily for over a year disappeared. Now I only have the new gadget on the original "vanilla" page. Why would Google launch this new service without first testing its impact on current users? Has anyone heard if they know about these glitches? I can find no official response in Google Groups. I don't know whether to wait, replace or morve on. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! celia.washingtongmail.com

Your issue is most likely just because of a recurring issue with iGoogle that also affected a lot of people last week. I believe the best suggestion is to let Google fix the issue instead of re-creating your page.

After creating PersonRank (PageRank for people) I guess all that's left to do is actually create PigeonRank?

(I am aware that Phillip has a PersonRank system on here and that Google proberly won't call it PersonRank)

Interesting how just after this gets turned live a ton of people have problems with their homepages again (me included).

Doesn't appear everyone has been affected, but from looking at the help groups, a fair number of people have been hit again today.

http://groups.google.com/group/Google_Web_Search_Help-Personalizing/browse_thread/thread/59b3283837690de0/d9ddfa71c74dd84b#d9ddfa71c74dd84b

Hoping this all gets resolved soon. I wouldn't mind trying out some of the new features.

Forget (push) search; discover life as it happens!

web20friends.net

My page worked ok for most of the day. I looked at the google widget maker and the next time I looked, it was messed up with all my tabs missing and not all the information on one page but bits a pieces of it merged together. For example my new page is gone but some of it was still there. This site was MIA totally.

The personalised home page is starting to look pretty much like the long-denied Google Desktop under a different name.

(That's Google Desktop as in a desktop for the long-denied Google Operating System, not the current product called Google Desktop.)

Another iGoogle driven major change this morming. Now when I select iGoogle and then open Google in a new browser window/tab it reverts to the Classic Google homepage.Previously, when I selected Personalized Homepage, it did not revert back to Classic. Serious implications for pageviews for gadgets and iGoogle.

Is anyone else having the same problem? Thoughts?

http://www.google.ie/options/icons/igoogle.gif

This is the iGoogle image from the "more" page

Nice catch James! Its good to see they updated the 'more' page with a new icon and the new iGoogle name. But why can't they update the 'my account' page with the new name and logo?

More page partial screenshot:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/191/484164525_cc9d35cd86.jpg?v=0

My Account page partial screenshot:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/232/484164515_cffbf33ada.jpg?v=0

They 'My Account' page still shows a Google labs icon even though the product has graduated from the labs.

Also, the sign-in page for iGoogle still calls it the Personalized Homepage without having a single mention of the new name.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/182/484147944_1f561a8520_o.png

Google finally updated the icon for iGoogle on the 'MyAccount' page. But it still reads as 'Personalized Homepage' instead of iGoogle.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/214/489482947_d7d7d11e68.jpg?v=0

The rename of Personalized Homepage to iGoogle is officially complete.

The MyAccount page shows the correct name now:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/210/492748174_b5e5105cf8.jpg?v=0

Also, the login box now shows the iGoogle name:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/191/492748176_24914102b5.jpg?v=0