Andreas Dittes

Interesting video on Googles view on "the cloud" and Google Apps für collaboration.

Great TED talk by Derek Sivers about the little differences in our world. "Weird, or just different?"...

Pivot makes it easier to interact with massive amounts of data in ways that are powerful, informative, and fun. We tried to step back and design an interaction model that accommodates the complexity and scale of information rather than the traditional structure of the Web.

Cool data visualization tool...

How to create fancy Facebook fan pages...

Moscow-Vladivostok: virtual journey on Google Maps

Cool Google service

How Search Works at Google explained by Matt Cutts

As a company, Google focuses on three key areas: Search, Ads and Apps. Search is our core technology; ads are our central business proposition; and apps are the umbrella over our web-based software that you can access anywhere, any time. While each of these has a lot of technology under the hood, the basic tenets for Search, Ads and Apps are very simple. We've created some short videos explaining the principles behind our core services.

How Google works...

Lyrics:

You launch a campaign but thats not all you need,
your campaign not working if its not generating leads,
no contact forms no phone calls
no new sales man you destined to fall,
spent your money on words that was way to vague,
then optimized your site for the wrong keyphrase,
look, it's not easy but it can be fixed,
if you do it by the book, with no gimmicks and tricks,
google rules are strict, its a must you abide,
do it right and get rewarded that's how we survive,
first pause your ad's no more hits on your card,
money don't grow on trees at least not in my yard,
did you set up analytics please tell me you did,
gotta figure out whats generating them clicks,
take the time to go and search with the words you chose,
do any of your competitors show with any of those,
then what you do next,
check your ad text,
spice it up a little add some adjectives,
check your link display,
and check your CTA,
and check your site design it might be chasing them away,
and is your site complete and is your deal sweet,
competitive industry, can you compete,
you might be obsolete probably best to retreat,
before your finances deplete and then you face defeat,
but if you are elite,
then stay in your seat,
you client base cold I can show you to the heat,
lets start with your meat,
talking about your content,
it drives the search engine anything else is nonsense,
make it keyword dense, that's just common sense,
but don't write for the search write for your audience,
after all, they the ones grab the phone and call,
the search engine won't do anything but crawl,
now don't drop the ball, identify your goal,
set conversion tracking, remain in control
like a cop on patrol, evaluating traffic,
respond to your clients, reduce all the static,
when you get a lead, you should be ecstatic,
contact em immediately, that's just automatic,
ask em where they from and add it to your demographic,
ask em what they search but be charismatic,
then close the deal if you have sales skills,
they already qualified, just show em the appeal,
I'd rather get 100 clicks and close 35,
than get a 1000 clicks and I only close 9,
listen to my design, don't get caught up in the rhyme,
you don't have to be number 1, strive for top 5,
we can talk about positioning another time,
if you follow the guidelines you'll be just fine...

Lyrics:

Your site design is the first thing people see
it should be reflective of you and the industry
easy to look at with a nice navigation
when you can't find what you want it causes frustration
a clear Call to action to increase the temptation
use appealing graphics they create motivation
if you have animation
use with moderation
cause search engines can't index the information
display the logos of all your associations
highlight your contact info that's an obligation
create a clean design you can use some decoration
but to try to prevent any client hesitation
every page that they click should provide and explanation
should be easy to understand like having a conversation
when you design the style go ahead and use your imagination
but make sure you use correct color combinations
do some investigation, look at other organizations
but don't duplicate or you might face a litigation
design done, congratulations but it's time to start construction
follow these instructions when you move into production
your photoshop functions then slice that design
do your layout with divs make sure that it's aligned
please don't use tables even though they work fine
when it come to indexing they give searches a hard time
make it easy for the spiders to crawl what you provide
remove font type, font color and font size
no background colors, keep your coding real neat,
tag your look and feel on a separate style sheet
better results with xml and css
now you making progress, a lil closer to success
describe your doctype so the browser can relate
make sure you do it great or it won't validate
check in all browsers, I do it directly
gotta make sure that it renders correctly
some use IE, some others use Flock
some use AOL, I use Firefox
title everything including links and images
don't use italics, use emphasis
don't use bold, please use strong
if you use bold that's old and wrong
when you use CSS, you page will load quicker
client satisfied like they eating on a snicker
they stuck on your page like you made it with a sticker
and then they convert now that's the real kicker
make you a lil richer, your site a lil slicker
design and code right man I hope you get the picture
what I'm telling you is true man it should be a scripture
if it's built right you'll be the pick of the litter
everyone will want to follow you like twitter
competition will get bitter and you'll shine like glitter
if you trying to grow your company will get bigger
design and code right man can you get with it