Saintless

Google has introduced 2-way Calendar Sync!

Hopefully some of the hair I’ve pulled out will grow back now.

Now I can access my calendar at home or on my laptop, on Google Calendar or in Outlook. When I add an event to the Outlook calendar on my laptop, Google Calendar Sync syncs it to my Google Calendar — and since I also have Google Calendar Sync running on my desktop, the event then syncs from Google Calendar to Outlook calendar on my desktop. All of my calendar views are always up to date, and I can choose whichever one I want to use.

My only complaint is…why in the hell couldn’t they do this when the Obama Campaign was in full-swing here in Utah for the primary? Ah, well. I still love Google.

From Barack Obama’s official “My Policy Technology Blog”:

The first step in creating our transparent and connected democracy went live this morning. Everyone needs to check out the new Google for Government site (www.usaspending.gov). This site is the result of Obama-Coburn legislation and provides a searchable database of all federal spending. You can search either contracts or federal assistance and can search by recipients, congressional districts, types of products or services provided, type of competition, and a whole bunch of other criteria. The site also plans to have a wiki- forum for public comment.

I spent some time surfing around on the site this morning and it’s full of terrific data and amazingly user-friendly. In fact, it was kind of shocking that nothing similar had been available until now. Were I a reporter, I’d be having a field day. In the long line of open government attempts, this one is sure to be a milestone in using the internet to make government more transparent.

To cite just a few things I found with one or two clicks: unsurprisingly, the top four recipients of government largesse are military contractors; there have been $138 billion worth of no-bid contracts under Bush; and various agencies within the California education system dominate the top-tier of the government assistance list. But surely others will find more surprising and specific details with a little more poking around (and if anyone does find real eye-openers, please post them here so we can offer better examples of what the site can reveal).

The bottom line is that the tech plan is more than paper, it’s happening. It’s a good example to show others that this campaign doesn’t just talk the talk, it walks the walk.

Don’t forget to note that, in the spirit of the Decider-In-Chief, there’s a nice warning at the bottom of the page:

WARNING: This is a United States Federal Government computer system that is “FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY.” This system is subject to monitoring. Therefore, no expectation of privacy is to be assumed. Individuals found performing unauthorized activities are subject to disciplinary action including criminal prosecution. Click here for more information.

This was also an effort of the Sunlight Foundation, who I adore just about as much as I adore Google.

Alt text: “I first saw this problem on the Google Labs Aptitude Test. A professor and I filled a blackboard without getting anywhere. Have fun.”

Ahhh, Google. If I ever got a job there, I have no doubts that I’d stay until retirement. My ultimate employer. Their job ads, and interview process, are a bit on the alternative side of things. I do think I’m OCD enough to make it through the recruitment, but I’m not entirely certain that I know math well enough. Ah, well.

Thoughts on Google or your dream job? Do share!

We all probably know how the tradition of NORAD tracking Santa began. But, we probably didn’t know that Colonel Shoup’s granddaughter works for Google:

It just so happens that Colonel Shoup is my grandfather, which is why I’m so excited that, 52 years later, Google is joining the effort. This holiday season, NORAD has partnered with Google to use technology including Google Maps, Google Earth, iGoogle and YouTube to track Santa. I can remember tracking Santa with my grandfather as a child, and I’m so proud to see my company carry on his vision of doing something this special for kids around the world.

The countdown begins December 1st on NORAD’s website, where families can find a new kid-friendly game or activity every day until December 24th. And starting at 1:00 am PST on December 24th, you’ll be able to track Santa’s trip in real time. You can download Google Earth and add the NORAD Tracks Santa iGoogle gadget to your iGoogle page anytime, but make sure to come back to http://www.noradsanta.org/ on December 24th to download the special Santa Tracking file for an enhanced 3D Santa-tracking experience.

If you don’t already have Google Earth, go download it. Those kids in 1955 may have been able to use the latest technology from NORAD to track Santa, but watching him in 3D is something I’ll bet they never dreamed of.

And for all you people out there who don’t like the Christmas season, I think you should let go a little, and remember what Christmas was like as a child, or at least what you think that it should be like. Let the magic in. And track Santa in 3D this Christmas Eve!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2wrFnhqcSw&rel=0&border=0]

Senator Obama spoke at Google earlier this week, just after unveiling his technology plan. This was the Senator’s second trip to Google, and it seemed to make quite the impression on the Googlers in attendance. You can read what the Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs for Google, Andrew McLaughlin’s, had to say in his blog. Here’s video of the “fireside chat”, or you can also watch the entire speech on Mr. McLaughlin’s blog.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1MGi12RspA&rel=1&border=0]

Interestingly, I also found this list of Technology Leaders who endorse the Senator. I’ve emphasized some of the ones I find the most interesting/important.

Stuart Benjamin, Professor of Law, Duke University
Robert Blackwell, Founder and CEO, Electronic Knowledge Interchange Consulting
Joseph Farrell, Professor of Economics, University of California, Berkeley; Chief Economist, Federal Communications Commission (1996-97); Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice (2000-02)
Lloyd Frink, President and Co-Founder, Zillow
Julius Genachowski, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Rock Creek Ventures; former Chief of Business Operations & General Counsel, IAC/InterActiveCorp; former Chief Counsel to FCC Chairman Reed Hundt
Don Gips, Executive Vice President, Corporate Development, Level 3 Communications; former Chief Domestic Policy Advisor to Vice President Gore
Rob Glaser, Founder and CEO, Real Networks
Mark Gorenberg, Managing Director, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Nick Hanauer, Partner, Second Avenue Partners; Founder, aQuantive
Adam Hanft, Founder and CEO, Hanft Unlimited
Reed Hundt, Former Chairman, Federal Communications Commission (1993-97)
Mitch Kapor, President, Kapor Enterprises; Founder, Lotus Development Corp.
Jed Katz, Managing Director, DFJ Gotham Ventures
Michael Katz, Professor, NYU and UC Berkeley; former Chief Economist, FCC; former Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice
William Kennard, Former Chairman, Federal Communications Commission (1997-2001)
Deborah Lathen, President, Lathen Consulting; former Chief, Cable Bureau, FCC
Steve Lerner, Managing Partner, Blue Hill Group
Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law, Stanford University
Blair Levin, Managing Director, Stifel Nicholas; former Chief of Staff, FCC
Andrew McLaughlin, Director, Global Public Policy and Government Affairs, Google
Ted Meisel, Elevation Partners
Jon Miller, Former Chairman and CEO, American Online, Inc.
Glenn Neland, Retired Senior Vice President, Dell
Robert Nelsen, Managing Director and Co-Founder, ARCH Venture Partners
Craig Newmark, Founder, Craigslist
Beth Noveck, Professor of Law, New York Law School
Chamath Palihapitiya, Executive Vice President, Product and Operations, Facebook
Deven Parekh, Partner, Insight Venture Partners
Sunil Paul, Founding Partner, Spring Ventures; Co-Founder, Brightmail
John Place, Retired General Counsel, Yahoo!, Inc.
Jeff Pulver, Founder, pulver.com
Arti Rai, Professor of Law, Duke University
John Roos, CEO, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Alec Ross, Senior Vice President, One Economy
Kim Scott, AdSense Director of Online Sales and Operations, Google
Carl Shapiro, Professor of Business Strategy, UC Berkeley; Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice (1995-96)
Howard Shelanski, Professor of Law, UC Berkeley; former Chief Economist, FCC
Steven Spinner, Executive, Danoo
Phil Weiser, Professor of Law and Telecommunications, University of Colorado
Kevin Werbach, Asst. Professor of Legal Studies and Business Ethics, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Tom Wheeler, Managing Director, Core Capital Partners
Tim Wu, Professor of Law, Columbia University
Ed Zander, CEO, Motorola

Of course, I’m not a “Technology Leader”, but I do work as a software developer, so I am involned in technology – and I endorse him! Do you?

Cliff Lyon, at One Utah, posted a new blog (Are We Under Martial Law NOW?) that has my attention. In fact, I decided to do some research on the information that he presents, because if he’s right, I’m damn scared of our government right now, and you should be, too. Hopefully, I’ll have my research posted soon, but for now, I want to point out something else I discovered.

Google has an Advanced Search feature that will allow you to search for pages that link to another page. So, if I wanted to find out if anyone has linked to a blog I have posted, I can put my link in that search box, and it will show me any pages they’ve found that link to it.

As an example of how this works, you can enter http://utahbloghive.org/, and you’ll be taken here, to all the pages that link to Utah Bloghive.

So, I thought I’d check to see who else might have done analysis on Bush’s Executive Order. I put the URL into Google’s advanced search, and it came up empty. I had tried this a couple of days ago, and it came up empty on that one, too. Giving it the benefit of the doubt, I grabbed an old link from an Executive Order in May, so there would have been plenty of time for Google to find pages that link to it. That, too, came up empty.

I’ve always admired Google, but this is rather bothersome to me. Why can’t they tell me who else might be linking to the page? Is it their policy, is there some type of law, did Bush just ask them not to?

If anyone has any further information on the reasons behind this, please let me know.