Google #3 topics

Today is hard to dissociate internet from Google. Google is one of the most admire and more innovative companies in this so call “information era”. But when I think about Google, there are 3 main topics that reach my mind:

· Privacy

· The cloud

· How to compete with Google?

About privacy, there is a big debate about this topic. Is clear to everyone that Google know more about our life, or at least has more information about our habits, than probably us. There is also the issue about copyrights. We can resume the Google Philosophy in this Eric Schmidt declaration: “If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place. If you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines - including Google - do retain this information for some time …”. Google has today several tools that follow this perspective. The Google Buz, where everyone can access your contacts and Google Earth, where you can see everyone’s house and backyards are simple examples of this lack of privacy. The 32 year cookie storage, show this obsession for information. Several countries and even USA authorities are aware of this potential/threat, and have being showing to Google their concern. The creation of Google Watch in 2002, and the effort to limit the time of retaining information by Google from their clients was a concern of UE and Norway, who impose new limits.

The clouding is getting more and more importance in today’s business. “What is Google's cloud? It's a network made of hundreds of thousands, or by some estimates 1 million, cheap servers, each not much more powerful than the PCs we have in our homes. It stores staggering amounts of data, including numerous copies of the World Wide Web. This makes search faster, helping ferret out answers to billions of queries in a fraction of a second. Unlike many traditional supercomputers, Google's system never ages. When its individual pieces die, usually after about three years, engineers pluck them out and replace them with new, faster boxes. This means the cloud regenerates as it grows, almost like a living thing.” in businessweek. So with the clouding companies don’t need to spend so much money in hardware and in unnecessary resources. The investment to start a business is much less. People and businesses save money by using applications hosted online instead of buying, installing and maintaining software on their own machines. Steve Ballmer says “"Cloud computing represents the next frontier…"

The last topic, how to compete with Google, is a great question that I don’t have an answer. It’s impossible to compete with a business that is completely free. Google has an incredible business model, that makes impossible a new entrant.

Foursquare

Hi,

today I'm going to talk about this site: www.foursquare.com. Explain how it works, and how they intend to be profitable.

as you can see, Foursquare is a social mobilenetwork, where we can find your friends, city guides, and kind of a game. Its user base surpass 300,000 people.

Dennis Crowley, created a Mobile social network, that gives to their members the opportunity of finding their friends in the city. They can also give feedback of the place where they are: restaurant, gym, or other. He was smart enough to create a game that supports this inflow of information.

“Foursquare has revealed that its two main methods of making money will be advertising and analytics. Foursquare started this with what it calls "Mayor" deals: small ads that offer up coupons to nearby businesses. Foursquare has also added sponsors to its leaderboards, and it has also created custom badges for companies like the Bravo television network and chip giant Intel ( INTC - news - people ). By turning the ad campaigns into a game, companies hope to increase customer engagement.” In www.forbes.com

This big potencial business is getting attention for big Venture Capitalists: “What do Accel Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, Khosla Ventures and Redpoint Ventures have in common? Besides being tier one venture capitalists, at least one thing: They are all fighting furiously to be the lead investor in Foursquare’s next venture round. All that competition is driving the valuation massively upwards, too. A couple of weeks ago we’d heard that the deal would likely be closed at around a $50 million valuation. Today we’ve confirmed that the final price will likely be $60 million – $70 million. They’re raising around $10 million, which means when it’s all over Foursquare will be worth up to $80 million on paper.” In www.techcrunch.com

Interview with its creator
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPtujpFHb_U

Links of interest:
How to make money in foursquare:
http://www.inc.com/guides/making-money-foursquare.html
Future business of foursquare:
http://econsultancy.com/blog/5381-staying-cool-and-making-money-can-be-hard-to-do
How foursquare intends to make money:
http://www.forbes.com/2010/04/07/iphone-mobile-android-technology-data-companies-10-foursquare.html

Fotos from portugal

Portugal

Some of the Portuguese facts:

Portugal /ˈpɔrtjəɡəl/ (help·info), officially the Portuguese Republic (Portuguese: República Portuguesa),^[4] is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east. The Atlantic archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira are also part of Portugal.

The population of Portugal has been relatively homogeneous for most of its history. A single religion (Catholicism) and a single language have contributed to this ethnic and national unity, namely after the expulsion of the Moors, Moriscos and Sephardi Jews.^[20]

Portugal was one of the last western European nations to give up its colonies and overseas territories (among them Angola and Mozambique in 1975), turning over the administration of Macau to the People's Republic of China in 1999. Its colonial history has long since been a cornerstone of its national identity, as has its geographic position at the southwestern corner of Europe looking out to the Atlantic ocean.

Native Portuguese are an Iberian ethnic group and their ancestry is very similar to other western and southern European peoples, particularly from Spain, with whom it shares ancestry and has cultural proximity. It is largely consistent with the geographic position of the western part of the Iberian peninsula, located on the extreme southwest of continental Europe. There are clear connections with Mediterranean people as well as with those of Atlantic and Western Europe.

world's first protected designation of origin

The history of Portuguese wine has been influenced by Portugal's relative isolationism in the world's wine market, with the one notable exception of its relationship with the British.^[1] While wine has been made in Portugal (and neighboring Spain) since at least 2,000 BC when the Tartessians planted vines in the Sado and Tagus valleys. By the 10th century BC, the Phoenicians had arrived and introduced new grape varieties and winemaking techniques to the area. Up until this point, viticulture was mostly centered around the southern coastal areas of Portugal. In later centuries, the Ancient Greeks, Celts and Romans would do much to spread viticulture and winemaking further north.^[2]

Portuguese wines were first shipped to England in the 12th century from the Entre Douro e Minho region (which today includes modern Portuguese wine regions such as the Douro and Vinho verde). In 1386, Portugal and England signed the Treaty of Windsor which fostered close diplomatic relations between the two countries and opened the door for extensive trade opportunities. The 1703 Methuen Treaty furthered advanced English economic interest in Portugal by reducing tariffs and give Portuguese wines preferential treatment in the British wine market over French wines. Around this time, the fortified wine known as Port was increasing in popularity in Britain. The lucrative trade in Port prompted the Portuguese authorities to establish one of the world's first protected designation of origin when Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, Marquis of Pombal established boundaries and regulations for the production of authentic Port from the Douro in 1756.^[1]

For centuries after wards, Portuguese wines came to be associated with Port (and to some extent Madeira which was a popular drink of British colonies across the globe, such as the American colonies.) In the mid to late 20th century, sweet, slightly sparkling rosé brands from Portugal (Mateus and Lancers being the most notable) became immensely popular across the globe-with the British wine market again leading the way.^[3] In the mid-1980s, Portugal's introduction to the European Union brought a flood of financing and grants to the stagnant Portuguese wine industry. These new investments paved the way for upgrades in winemaking technology and facilities. Renewed interest in the abundance of unique Portuguese wine grape varieties shifted focus to more premium wine production with a portfolio of unique dry red and white wines being marketed on a global scale.^[1]