(17 votes, average: 6.29 out of 10)
Loading ...GOOG-411 offers quick route to nearest Canadian clichés
Google has launched a Canadian version of its voice-recognition local search phone service, whereby users dial a hotline — 1-800-GOOG-411 — and respond to the questions posed by the voice-recognizing computer on the other end. This is a way to find a pizza place, for example.
According to Google engineers, the service has been tweaked to offer “Canadian English.”
“We incorporated some Canadianisms such as ‘eh,’ ‘Traw-na,’ ‘Cal-gry,’ and, of course, ‘aboot,’” a blog post said.
Well, it’s aboot time! We here in Traw-na wouldn’t know how to get to local businesses without the help of Google, eh? Perhaps Google will promote the service online and on TV with videos featuring animated beavers! Whoops, scratch that. Bell owns those cliches. Maybe something to do with maple syrup? (After all, Google is one of the stickiest sites out there.) Oh well. If it’s pandering and banal, we’re sure a search engine like Google will be able to find it.
Elsewhere on IT World Canada Blogs:
Google shouldn’t corner the market as an agent of organization
Dear customers: Microsoft addresses the XP outcry
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...Y on earth would you need another Yahoo! mail account?
Recruiters always say it’s a bad idea to include e-mail addresses like sexygrrrrl69@yahoo.com, on your resume and since many Yahoo! staffers are probably looking for new jobs, the company announced two new “global domains” for its consumer e-mail service.
The company said it was expecting a huge rush on users signing up for ymail.com and
rocketmail.com, but Shark Tales is pretty sure there will be a few names that will remain free for some time, including billgates@ymail.com, steveballmer@ymail.com and rayozzie@ymail.com.
Not to be outdone, however, rumour has it that Google is already at work on a beta test of geemail.com.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...Dot-ca domain not as dangerous as .hk, just deadly boring
McAfee came out with a report that maps the most dangerous places to surf the Web according to national domain name suffixes, with Hong Kong’s .hk beating out Tokelau, a tiny island of 1,500 inhabitants in the South Pacific where under-reported online crimes must have suddenly subsided.
Other wrong-side-of-the-domain-root-server locales included China, the Philippines and Russia. Where was Canada’s .ca, you might ask? Nowhere to be seen. Kind of like its presence on the Web itself.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...Self-confessed online dating addict scores a book deal
Because we all know unpopular people have nothing to do but read (no offence, readers), Jane Coloccia has decided to make the most of her failed love life by publishing a book about what it’s like to date online. Which is great, because absolutely no one has ever offered any advice on this topic, and certainly not online.
Coloccia confesses to going on dates for breakfast, lunch and dinner all in the same day, but with limited success. Although she’s now managed to keep a man for more than a year, it was a journey fraught with peril.
“She was once pawed on a first date, stood up on another, but over the years Coloccia said she honed her technique to ensure she did not waste time on men that were not suitable,” an AP story said. Good for her, but what’s with the old school approach? If you’ve found a way to pick the Web losers, honey, don’t write a book. Write an algorithm.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...Mobile phone-based coupons offer even greater opportunity for cheapskateness
Tired of fishing through their wallets for wrinkly, smudged (and, more often than not, expired) coupons, telecom providers in South Korea are offering retail customers the ability to access discounts electronically, through specialty bar codes that can be scanned at checkout.
The money you save can then be passed on to someone else, according to Reuters.
“SK Telecom rolled out a service a little more than a year ago called a ‘gifticon’ that allows users to send gift vouchers for items such as convenience store merchandise and pizzas via mobile phones. The sender is billed for the cost of the goods.”
Whoa, pizza and pack of smokes from the variety store? Thanks, big spender! Then again, the way data rates are going in Canada it won’t be long before we’re all more interested in clipping coupons, too. That’s why they always say that love — which is free — is the greatest gifticon of all.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...My broadband stinks
Ever the innovators, the English have gone where no broadband provider has gone before. H2O is installing fibre in Bournemouth, U.K., that will deliver 100-Mbps service to 88,000 homes. That’s enough bandwidth for on-demand HDTV, DVD quality downloads and high-definition gaming services.
And they’ll deliver it without digging a single trench or boring a sinle hole. They’re using the existing sewer system.
(Perhaps we should amend that bit about “where no broadband provider has gone before,” huh?)
I’ve always wanted 100 Mbps direct to my john. Imagine the work I’d get done.
There will always be the complainers, of course: there’s enough crap on TV; my connection stinks; flush twice, it’s a long way to the central office. However, thumbs up, says we. It’s a largely unused right-of-way (and with good reason) that could extend super high-speed access well into suburbia. Flush that fibre, boys!
Our rural neighbours are out of luck, however. At least until we can offer LTE-to-the-septic-tank connections.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...We’ll be happier when blogs are so addictive you need rehab
Researchers from the University of California-Irvine have presented a study which says checking blogs can become as regular a habit as checking for e-mail.
“They found that regular blog reading can become ‘an Internet ritual,’ with the content secondary to the process of checking for new posts. The researchers said this is much like the routine of checking e-mail regardless of whether a new message is expected or not.”
This is great news for Shark Tales, where content is also considered secondary to merely generating additional posts. As long as it creates an Amy Winehouse-style dependency for your Shark Tales fix, that’s fine with us.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...That’ll be one US$2.6M domain name, hold the anchovies
A guy who squatted on Pizza.com for 14 years managed one helluva payday, although “squatting” might not be the best term for someone who clearly didn’t realize what kind of asset he was sitting on. Chris Clark was maintaining the site for only $20 a year when he suddenly learned that Vodka.com sold for US$3 million.
“It will make a significant difference in my life, for sure,” he said of the windfall. That’s for sure. You could buy a lot of booze on Vodka.com with that.
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...No shoes, no shirt, no pants, no PayPal
Let’s make one thing perfectly clear: There’s a big difference between porn and pictures of ugly naked people.
So say the publishers of Going Natural magazine, which claims online payment service PayPal has abruptly stopped processing its subscription payments. E-mails from PayPal indicates the company considers Going Natural and its publisher, the Federation of Canadian Naturists, is selling sexual material and as such violates its acceptible use policies. Doesn’t PayPal realize that without its service, these nudists have no purchasing mechanism? Do we have to spell it out here? THESE PEOPLE HAVE NO PLACE TO CARRY A WALLET!
The FCN may dress lightly, but that doesn’t mean it’s taking this whole thing lightly. “”PayPal’s decision about Going Natural and its claims about the FCN are unfounded embellishments born of ignorance,” huffed Judy Williams, Government Affairs Director for the FCN. Oh, keep your shirt on, Judy. (Whoops. Too late.)
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(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...If you were really my friend, you would buy something
Facebook is taking a more serious step towards e-commerce with a program called Market Lodge, developed by a startup called bSocial Networks Inc.
Facebook users would use Market Lodge to build an online store where they would recommend products from a catalogue to their friends. Then, bSocial will pay Facebook members a 10 per cent commission on all sales made on their recommendations.
That’s right: Those people you don’t remember from grade school who send messages asking to join your network aren’t just irritating losers anymore. They’re now salespeople. Which some might say is the same thing.
