Friday, September 25, 2009

Google SideWiki - What do you think ??

I am not a google fanboy, (well i work in microsoft, so that makes sense) but cant help saying that they come out with interesting products. The latest in line is the Google SideWiki . It comes with the google toolbar and is basically a sidebar which allows you to post comments about the site. The comments that you make are connected to your google account and so there are no anonymous comments. Plus the comments that you make are also sorted according to relevance so that the topmost comments make sense. It works with IE and Firefox currently and also allows you to share your sidewiki exploits via Facebook and twitter.Pretty cool right ?

However this has managed to irk some people. The content is owned by google and not by the website. So you cant modify what will appear to be a part of your site and google will effectively change the appearance of your site. It also can eat away at the monetization models of some sites. Plus the potential of having derogatory/inflammatory comments on sensitive topics is also something people are concerned about. Leading the charge is Jeff Jarvis the author of What will Google do ?

I think its a pretty interesting development. It takes a step further to socialize the web ,however i think the concerns of people like Jeff jarvis need to be answered. Well what do you think ?? Do you think Google's moving away from its "Do no evil" motto ? Or are you excited by this latest goolgle exploit ?? Let me know for sure.
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1 comment:

  1. SuyashJollySeptember 28, 2009 at 2:13 AM

    Interesting article, I just wanted you to also go through this paper:

    "Ex ante identification of disruptive innovations in the software industry
    applied to web applications: The case of Microsoft's vs. Google's
    office applications"
    Keller et al,2009(Journal of Technological forecasting and social change).You can download it from www.sciencedirect.com

    In order to understand the entire dynamics one also need to understand theory of disrutive innovations and how the incumbent firms react to them.This is a more innovation perspective of looking at things,may be which the techncial people do not mention.May be it is interesting for you.

    In case you cannot access the journal then let me know your EMAIL id,I can send the paper to you.

    ReplyDelete

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