Google Instant announced. Mobile version coming this fall. (VIDEO)
Google’s logo was trying to depict what Google might announce today. As one typed, the Google logo turned from a dull grey to a coloured logo as one typed letters in search. Clever portrayal!
The news is out and Google instant hopes to save the world almost 3.5 Billion seconds! Google Says that Google Instant can save two to five seconds per search, and if everyone uses it globally, it could save 3.5 billion seconds a day.
There is search-as-you-type, i.e search results appear as you type! Google says instant is NOT THAT! Google Instant is search-before-you-type.
Search is now an AJAX application for Google. It’s traditionally been an HTML experience. Google sends autocomplete requests to servers, and its servers then reply with both predictions and search results.
Given that it is hugely browser dependent, the impact of this could be huge for Mobile searches, where keying in each letter is an exercise. We look forward to seeing a Mobile version of this launched sooner rather than later.
Update: Google has announced that the Mobile search will be launched this fall. 
The testing address for the Mobile version is here: http://jmt20.google.com/m?sky=psy
This link is straight from the presentation at the Google event today and was lifted by tc. Thanks Techcrunch!
Google acquires Admob for USD 750 Million.
Google has just announced that it has acquired AdMob, the mobile advertising company, for $750 million.
Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, DFJ and Northgate Capital will see a huge upside from this investment.
AdMob founder Omar Hamoui sent the following letter to customers:
Today we announced that AdMob has signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by Google for $750 million. We are extremely excited about this new partnership and what it means for our advertiser, developer and publisher partners.
AdMob’s people, products and tools will continue to work to deliver successful campaigns for you and to effectively monetize your mobile traffic no interruptions. Our product and engineering teams will keep building great products for our customers. Our sales team will keep working with our thousands of advertisers to deliver successful campaigns. Our business development team will keep working to maximize ad revenue for the more than 15,000 mobile Web sites and applications that make up AdMob’s publisher network.
After our deal closes, AdMob will work with Google to accelerate the pace of innovation in mobile and do an even better job for you. We believe this deal will benefit our advertisers, developers and publishers by:
- Increasing our investment in building innovative and engaging ad units across platforms and to further improve targeting and tracking.
- Building even more powerful relevance and optimization capabilities, and more powerful technology and tools to monetize mobile traffic.
- Increasing the effectiveness of display advertising on mobile devices by leveraging Google sales team, infrastructure and relationships.
- Improving the already high level of service and support we deliver to our advertisers, developers and publishers.
Google has written its own blog post announcing the Admob deal:
iPhone and Android users browse the Internet more often than anyone else [Morgan Stanley], contributing to Google’s 5x mobile search growth over the past two years..
And a quarter of these same iPhone and Android users spend nearly 90 minutes per day using applications on their devices [AdMob]
Google has also shown in its press section, what it has currently vis-a-vis where admob is popular today:
Google -Admob
As Google points out, the deal follows similar acquisitions by traditional online companies looking to move into mobile: AOL bought Third Screen Media more than two years ago, Yahoo picked up Actionality and Microsoft bought ScreenTonic.
Virgin Mobile: improving the off-portal experience
Mobile Internet must be made more accessible and user-friendly if it is to realize its full lucrative potential. Off-portal sites and the wider internet must be made available to users if they are to benefit from surfing on their mobiles; Moco News reports.
“Pretty rubbish” is how John Conlon, Virgin Mobile UK’s head of content, described the mobile search experience to attendees at the London conference. On-portal sites work a treat and off-portal sites are often a huge turn-off because they aren’t optimized for mobile. “It’s about driving search for on-portal revenues and discovering sites that work. The reality is there aren’t a lot of off-portal sites in the UK that are actually a great customer experience and work every time.” To turn this around, Virgin is “going to set some rules that we want our … partners to work to,” Conlon says. The aim is to deliver consistent quality across the sites and not to dictate to content owners. “We’re in discussions and they the partners haven’t said they’re going to meet all the rules … but they have the aspirations we do to deliver a good customer experience.” Virgin is also close to revealing the nuts and bolts of its mobile search strategy. It “sees merits in both branded and white-label solutions” so don’t be surprised if the operator launches a blend of both. Whatever the solution – it will have to support Virgin’s three-phase approach to search. First, capitalize on on-portal content. Second, monetize “friendly off-portal content” from operator content partners (where the user experience doesn’t disappoint). Third, allow users to explore the wider Web. That’s where Conlon believes the big ad money is – but there’s no cashing in until the user experience is top-notch.
Source- http://www.w2forum.com
Technorati : Mobile, UK, Virgin Mobile
Ice Rocket : Mobile, UK, Virgin Mobile
