Google

This just in from the “Strange Bedfellows” department: apparently Nintendo has enlisted the help of Google to create a Wii game where players compete to guess the most popular search terms. The game, entitled Ando Kensaku, will be out in Japan on April 29 and won’t likely see much of a release elsewhere given its quirkiness. The screenshot above gives you an idea of the cutesy avatar style of the title, featuring 14 mini-games where several players can choose from a multiple choice search term spread. ...

Taken from Official Google: Let’s say that you have x different stocks, and the plots of their prices over time. You want to print them in newspaper, printing multiple plots on the same chart to save space. But here’s the catch: no two plots on the same chart can overlap, lest the readers be confused. Look at the plots and figure out the smallest number of charts required. Looking for a challenge like the riddle above? And I mean an exciting brain-twisting and turning kind of challenge. I mean competing with fellow coders from around the world for top bragging rights kind of challenge. ...

Google has released a new video aimed at teens about making Google Buzz a safer experience. The video was released in conjunction with the new Buzz privacy reset issued yesterday. This new focus on privacy and privacy options comes amidst class-action lawsuits and a request for FTC investigation regarding the service’s launch and explanation to consumers. Although aimed at teens, the tips are good for anyone using Buzz to keep in mind. ...

There’s at least one company that isn’t scrambling to get an iPad app ready for launch day, and that company is Microsoft. Stephen Elop, president of Microsoft’s business division, said in an interview with Bloomberg that the company will “wait and see” how iPad sales perform before adapting Microsoft Office 2010 for the device. “We never say never, but we have no current plans [to develop a version of Office for the iPad],” Elop claimed. ...

Google today announced its strategy for delivering services on the iPad, and unveiled a new mobile Gmail interface optimized for bigger touchscreens. Since the iPad lies somewhere between a notebook and a smartphone, the Mountain View search company is taking a hybrid approach, offering some services in their desktop format, some in their mobile format, and some as standalone apps. “We’re particularly excited by how tablet computers create the opportunity for new kinds of user interaction,” Punit Soni, Product Manager for Google Mobile wrote in the official Google blog. “Here on the mobile team, we often talk about how mobile devices are sensor-rich: they can sense touch through their screens, see with a camera, hear through a microphone, and they know where they are with GPS. The same holds true for tablet computers, and we’re just starting to work through how our products can become even better on devices like the iPad.” ...

Spyware/DDoS malware combo Google’s security team member Neel Mehta has blogged about yet one more spyware attack on Google users from Asia. This time forces in Vietnam apparently are trying to spy on and stifle dissent from those opposed to the expansion of bauxite mining in the country’s central highlands. The dissenters are opposed to the environmental impact, the involvement of Chinese in the venture and the displacement of people who live in the mining area. Bauxite is the ore that aluminum is extracted from. ...

Google has revealed that users can now transfer files via chat in iGoogle and Orkut. This is good news for web users with a preference for software-free chatting, but the better news is that Google promises to bring the same functionality to Gmail, which already supports voice, video and group chat. The iGoogle and Orkut file transfers will work for photos, documents and presumably small video files. In addition, web users can exchange files with users of Google Talk — the more robust desktop version of Google’s chat client — without any hiccups. ...

With Google owning YouTube, the Internet’s principal delivery system for Flash-based video, it was perhaps inevitable that the company would bundle the Flash plug-in with its Chrome browser. The announcement came today from both Google and the team developing the open source Chromium component on which Chrome is based. The move now officially places Google in contention with proponents of HTML 5, who had held out a glimmer of hope for a non-proprietary, non-plug-in video format for the standard’s new [VIDEO] element. In its blog post today, the Chromium team indirectly blamed the standards process for not having solved what it perceives as the problem of specifying how plug-ins should operate, and credits Mozilla — which makes Firefox — with helping to rectify that issue. ...

Have you ever wanted to quickly send a file to a friend who’s online? Now you can share pictures, documents and other files directly with your friends while chatting in iGoogle and orkut, without having to switch to email to send the file as an attachment. File transfer works directly in the browser so you don’t need to install anything. Just start a conversation with a friend and click “Send a file…” in the “Actions” menu. After you select a file, your friend will be asked if they want to accept the transfer. You can learn more on the Google Talkabout Blog. ...

Google Inc., owner of YouTube, said an outage of the popular video-sharing site Thursday was technical and not caused by outside tampering. “YouTube is up again following a technical issue which has now been resolved,” a spokeswoman for Google said in a written statement. “We know how important YouTube is for people and apologize for any inconvenience the downtime may have caused.” The outage apparently lasted for just over an hour, from roughly 7 to 8 a.m. ET. ...