Free Google Tools?

The blog on ALA Techsource describing some of Google's new features is worth a read. I've been playing around with several of them including the docs and spreadsheets for group editing, picasa for photo sharing and storage, and of course YouTube and GoogleVideo. In general, I like them and they work pretty much as advertised. Now, there's an easy webpage creation tool and free hosting. Free for now, anyway. It's clear that Google has a cohesive strategy in mind after reading how they are bringing these things together both for education and for commerce. The question is, what is the business model?

Most people think Google is in the Search business, but then, most people think Rolex is in the watch business. Wrong on both counts. Rolex is in the lifestyle business and doesn't compete with watch companies. In a way, it's the same with Google. Google is in the advertising business and don't you forget it!

All the talk in the click-through user agreements about being beta and extending some of the freebie tools for beta testers at no charge after the beta period is over tells me that at some point, the beta period will be over and it won't be quite as free. What are they up to? It looks to me like Google is taking a page right out of Microsoft's book. Hmm.

Thoughts?

Do-it-yourself metasearch

The new Google co-op platform is interesting. Among other things, it allows one to create a custom search by entering a list of sites upon which a query will be executed. I have previously done this with excel spreadsheets (e.g. entering a list of sites, a cell to hold a search term, and a little bit of macro magic) but Google coop makes it easy. One search came back to mind immediately -- I put all the home pages from LIS schools as listed on the ALA web site into the source file. Enter a search term (e.g. "tuition") and all the LIS school pages are searched. These searches can be shared or embedded in web pages. You can try my LISSchoolSearch and let me know what you think.

If I have some time, I'd like to put together a simple-minded search using the pathfinders and subject guide pages of top libraries as the restricted set of resources. If you get to it before I do, let me know.

John Berry blogs

Former Library Journal editor John Berry has forayed into the blogosphere with his own column, Blatant Berry. I took a writing class from John as part of my MLS program at the University of Arizona School of Information Resources and Library Science. John doesn't pull any punches and he knows as much about the real world of libraries and librarianship as any. Needless to say, it's on my subscription list.