Anybody interested in this interesting job?

Seems really interesting job.. It will be really challenging and fun job!!! Once electric cars become commodity, Autonomous cars are going to be next battlefield for Car manufacturers.. Essentially, this could become great potential job creator in Silicon Valley. Google is already in lead in this area and with TESLA jumping this bandwagon, it will force all these traditional Car manufacturers to further augment there silicon valley labs with this autonomous driving system development..

What is Apple doing? It will be interesting to see them coming to this area.. They are king of User Experience.. moreover, if Google takes lead into these Autonomous Driving Systems they will embed Android into it.. Come on Apple.. you also need to do something in this next big thing.. They can atleast start with integrating their iPhone/iOS into rudimentary Vehicle control and display systems..

TESLA HIRING ENGINEER FOR AUTONOMOUS PUSH 

Tesla Motors has an interesting job description on its website: “Advanced Driver Assistance Systems Controls Engineer.” The full-time job, based in Palo Alto, seeks an engineer responsible for “developing vehicle-level decision-making and lateral and longitudinal control strategies for Tesla’s effort to pioneer fully automated driving.” In May, CEO Elon Musk told Bloomberg that he was talking to Google about “autopilot” systems. Tesla also has the ability to constantly update Model S features. Tesla’s chief technical officer, J.B. Straubel, is working on a “sensor suite” of safety features for the driver, which could include pedestrian detection, collision avoidance technology and additional cameras to monitor blind spots or obstructions while driving. 

Not up your alley? There are 836 jobs listed on the Tesla website. — Dana Hull 

Is independent Internet possible?

By name itself, Internet in network of networks.. how can you make it independent? I guess, you can only do it by creating island and controlling gateways for inbound and outbound traffic from your country to another if there is any such well defined things..

I totally understand President Dilma's anger on US. Is she also angry at China (her biggest buyer of raw materials) and Russia and many other countries/nations who do it all the time? Instead of getting angry at US, she should focus on more emphasis on technological build up in Brazil... then she can launch her counter offensive against any country she would like to as most of the other countries do it to her country..

Build infrastructure in your country so Google/facebook like companies are created in your own country rather than relying on silicon valley for all such critical to time passing applications and infrastructures.. Attack at fundamentals.. don't try to dress up the fact that your country let go the golden time of minting money on your natural resources without fixing core issues like infrastructure and education.. Now that you are facing the anemic growth music again, you are creating issues out of almost non-sense issues..

Work on fundamentals.. rest nature will take care of you..

---

Angered over espionage, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff is postponing a visit to Washington.


Brazil seeks online independence

President angered over revelations of U.S. spying

By Bradley Brooks and Frank Bajak

Associated Press

RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazil plans to divorce itself from the U.S.-centric Internet over Washington’s widespread online spying, a move that many experts fear will be a potentially dangerous first step toward fracturing a global network built with minimal interference by governments.

President Dilma Rousseff ordered a series of measures aimed at greater Brazilian online independence and security following revelations that the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted her communications, hacked into the state-owned Petrobras oil company’s network and spied on Brazilians who entrusted their personal data to U.S. tech companies such as Facebook and Google.

The leader is so angered by the espionage that on Tuesday she postponed next month’s scheduled trip to Washington.

Internet security and policy experts say the Brazilian government’s reaction to information leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden is understandable, but warn it could set the Internet on a course of Balkanization.“The global backlash is only beginning and will get far more severe in coming months,” said Sascha Meinrath of the Washington-based New America Foundation think tank. “This notion of national privacy sovereignty is going to be an increasingly salient issue around the globe.”

While Brazil isn’t proposing to bar its citizens from U.S.-based Web services, it wants their data to be stored locally as the nation assumes greater control over Brazilians’ Internet use to protect them from NSA snooping.

The danger of mandating that kind of geographic isolation, Meinrath said, is that it could render inoperable popular software applications and services and endanger the Internet’s open, interconnected structure.

The effort by Latin America’s biggest economy to digitally isolate itself from U.S. spying not only could be costly and difficult, it could encourage repressive governments to seek greater technical control over the Internet to crush free expression at home, experts say.

In December, countries advocating greater “cyber-sovereignty” pushed for such control at an International Telecommunications Union meeting in Dubai, with Western democracies led by the United States and the European Union in opposition.

U.S. digital security expert Bruce Schneier says that while Brazil’s response is a rational reaction to NSA spying, it is likely to embolden “some of the worst countries out there to seek more control over their citizens’ Internet. That’s Russia, China, Iran and Syria.”

Brazil is now pushing more aggressively than any other nation to end U.S. commercial hegemony on the Internet. More than 80 percent of online search, for example, is controlled by U.S.-based companies.

Most of Brazil’s global Internet traffic passes through the United States, so Rousseff’s government plans to lay underwater fiber optic cable directly to Europe and also link to all South American nations to create what it hopes will be a network free of U.S. eavesdropping.

Can Google counter NSA?

I don't think so.. They can try to counter novice hacker at the most... There is no doubt that folks at Google are smart.. very smart.. but nothing can beat the brute force and power of these national government run agencies..

Whatever their justification may be.. whatever noble cause or dreadful scenario they may be outlining as their justification to snoop into your inbox.. nobody is perfect and ultimately humans are humans.. These agencies like NSA, they are run by mere mortal humans and whenever these mortal humans get extreme power, they get corrupted.. there is misuse of these powers beyond original cause or motive and powerless mortals are crushed.. biggest example of this corruption is our Dear Mr. President Obama.. What not was promised by him before he got his role.. He painted Bush as evil person who has taken all the rights of Citizens in the name of war on terrorism.. part of the war (Iraq) which in-fact turned out to be one of the greatest and costliest mistake for US.

Nevertheless, we had thought that things will be restored back to normal when our Dear Mr. Obama comes to white house.. but we forgot the addiction of power part.. with white house comes unprecedented powers which whitewashed our Dear Mr. Obama's memory of promises to restore balance back to citizens rights.. What a fool we were??? thinking that everything will be back to normal..

At first that wiki-leak case.. which finally culminated in 35 years of prison for Mr. Manning and kind of permanent asylum status for Julian Assange. Then this case of our Snowden bhayyia.. I don't know, neither do I care about technicalities of these cases.. I only know that these individuals got truth about sleaziness of government run and supported dirty laundry.. Off-course, government officials whose laundry came out in open ought to go after these individuals.. But not our Dear Mr. President Obama.. Et tu Obama???? 

I would have appreciated if Mr. Obama would have come out in open and accepted that these operations are running and they are for whatever blah blah reasons.. and let go these daring individuals who just got truth out in public.. 

I seriously thought that Dear Mr. President Obama will initially give some supporting statements for his officials but after few weeks he simply forget about these individuals and pardon them or drop cases against them on some stupid technical reason which is not hard to create.. but relentless persuasion against these individuals who dared to bring out truth and only truth about sleazy operations of our own government funded by our money??? Whether you pardon them or not.. Dear Mr. President Obama.. we will never.. Whatever your justification for this stupid relentless persuasion of  so called criminal justice.. We will never pardon  you.. I hope in the history of presidents also.. your name will come as Bush part two.. 

NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY

Google hurries to slow spying

Tech giant accelerates encryption in backlash against surveillance


By Craig Timberg

Washington Post

Google is racing to encrypt the torrents of information that flow among its data centers around the world in a bid to thwart snooping by the NSA and the intelligence agencies of foreign governments, company officials said Friday.

The move by Google is among the most concrete signs yet that recent revelations about the National Security Agency’s sweeping surveillance efforts have provoked significant backlash within an American technology industry that U.S. government officials long courted as a potential partner in spying programs.

Google’s encryption initiative, initially approved last year, was accelerated in June as the tech giant struggled to guard its reputation as a reliable steward of user information amid controversy about the NSA’s Prism program, first reported in the Washington Post and the Guardian that month. Prism obtains data from U.S. technology companies, including Google, under various legal authorities.

Encrypting information flowing among data centers will not make it impossible for intelligence agencies to snoop on individual users of Google services, nor will it have any effect on legal requirements that the company comply with court orders or valid national security requests for data. But company officials and independent security experts said that increasingly widespread use of encryption technology makes mass surveillance more difficult — whether conducted by governments or other sophisticated hackers.
“It’s an arms race,” said Eric Grosse, vice president for security engineering at Google. “We see these government agencies as among the most skilled players in this game.”

Experts say that, aside from the U.S. government, sophisticated government hacking efforts emanate from China, Russia, Britain and Israel.

The NSA seeks to defeat encryption through a variety of means, including by obtaining encryption “keys” to decode communications, by using supercomputers to break codes, and by influencing encryption standards to make them more vulnerable to outside attack, according to reports Thursday by The New York Times, the Guardian and ProPublica, based on documents provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

But those reports made clear that encryption — essentially converting data into what appears to be gibberish when intercepted by outsiders — complicates government surveillance efforts, requiring that resources be devoted to decoding or otherwise defeating the systems.

Among the most common tactics, experts said, is to hack into individual computers or other devices used by people targeted for surveillance, making what amounts to an end run around coded communications.

Security experts said the time and energy required to defeat encryption forces surveillance efforts to be targeted more narrowly on the highestpriority targets — such as terrorism suspects — and limits the ability of governments to simply cast a net into the huge rivers of data flowing across the Internet.

“If the NSA wants to get into your system, they are going to get in. … Most of the people in my community are realistic about that,” said Christopher Soghoian, a computer security expert at the American Civil Liberties Union. “This is all about making dragnet surveillance impossible.”

The NSA declined to comment for this article. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a statement Thursday saying: “Throughout history, nations have used encryption to protect their secrets, and today terrorists, cybercriminals, human traffickers and others also use code to hide their activities. Our intelligence community would not be doing its job if we did not try to counter that.”

The U.S. intelligence community has been reeling since news reports based on Snowden’s documents began revealing remarkable new detail about how the government collects, analyzes and disseminates information — including, in some circumstances, the emails, video chats and phone communications of U.S. citizens.

Many of the documents portray U.S. companies as pliant “Corporate Partners” or “Providers” of information. While telecommunications companies have generally declined to comment on their relationships with government surveillance, some have reacted with outrage at the depictions in the NSA documents released by Snowden. They have joined civil liberties groups in demanding more transparency and insisting that information is turned over to the government only when required by law, often in the form of a court order.

In June, Google and Microsoft asked the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to allow them greater latitude in reporting how much information they turn over to the government.

On Friday, Yahoo issued its first “government transparency report,” saying it had received 12,444 requests for data from the U.S. government this year, covering the accounts of 40,322 users.

Google has long been more aggressive than its peers within the U.S. technology industry in deploying encryption technology. It turned on encryption in its popular Gmail service in 2010, and since then has added similar protections for Google searches for most users.

Yet even as it encrypted much of the data flowing between Google and its users, the information traveling between its data centers offered rare points of vulnerability to potential intruders, especially government surveillance agencies, security officials said.

User information — including copies of emails, search queries, videos and Web browsing history — typically is stored in several data centers that transmit information to each other on high-speed fiber-optic lines.

Several other companies, including Microsoft, Apple and Facebook, increasingly have begun using encryption for some of their services, though the quality varies by company. Communications between services — when an email, for example, is sent from a user of Gmail to a user of Microsoft’s Outlook mail — are not generally encrypted, appearing to surveillance systems as what experts call “clear text.”

“If the NSA wants to get into your system, they are going to get in … . Most of the people in my community are realistic about that. This is all about making dragnet surveillance impossible.”

— Christopher Soghoian, computer security expert, American Civil Liberties Union 

Chromebook - Pixel - Can it shake Apple?

I think it will definitely put pressure on Apple about medium / long term future and hopefully make them work harder for next set of innovations on their Mac Book Pro/Air line of laptops. At present personally I only see Google's pride in this release of Pixel. I am sure they will find some niche buyers for sure but it is not going to make any dent in market yet. It may inspire Samsung and other Korean/Japanese manufacturers who are investing their time in Chromebook. Hope to see more practical chromebooks from Samsung in near future..

Now coming back specifically to Chromebook reviews.. I agree that its price to performance ratio is yet to catch up with MBA/MBP. Personally, I would be inspired or let us say willing to entertain the idea of buying Pixel if it's price was in $700-800 range. Though, I have to admit that these do have clean look and great appeal.. kind of inspired by Mac Book Air and may be Legendary Thinkpad..

Regarding other limitations such as non availability of Skype and other applications... I am very hopeful that they will go away in matter of time. I am sure that most of applications will start running in browser (or Cloud) if they already don't. In worse case we have cloud based virtual desktops already there, which will take care of these emergencies and exceptions..

I think that Chromebook could be excellent choice for Enterprise customers. If Google can find some partners who can offer Virtual Desktop (VDI) kind of service on Chromebook and if they fix/add/enhance their VPN/Tunnel connectivity.. this device could be great choice for enterprise customers who don't want to keep any data on local disk but want to give seamless experience and connectivity to their employees. Since this device is built from scratch for this type of activity, it could be great option for such enterprise customers. If google can natively fix and divide personal and enterprise traffic and let personal traffic go to their google drive and enterprise traffic tunneled to enterprise Data Center they can potentially make killing in this segment.

It already comes with three years of 1 TB Google Drive which is ideal for enterprise leasing terms. In-fact Google itself can offer VDI type of service in their own Data Center or create hybrid cloud for enterprise customers they can make significant dent in this market... and this is huge market and generally with higher margin than direct consumer market. If they can do this.. then it can be a big threat to Apple who is making bigger inroads in Enterprise Laptop market right now.. as it is more or less fashion statement to carry Mac in office...

So Google just need to do minor tweaking in their offering and they will be ready for prime time with Pixel and it can become next fashion statement..

I am not really worried about connectivity or even LTE upgrade for Chromebook.. In fact I can't understand.. why anybody even buys 4G/LTE enabled Tablets  or even Chromebooks.. All the folks who will buy these things typically have smartphones and almost all smartphones including iPhone has this feature of hotspot. Essentially, this feature turns your smartphone as wi-fi access point and you can piggy back on Cellular data to provide connectivity to your other devices. Anyhow.. that is not main point.. main point is that we are almost ready for such cloud based devices..

Welcome to another round of upgrades or device refreshes!!!

Google’s Chromebook Pixel is pricey, limited

Intended as a flagship for its Chrome operating system, Google’s new Chromebook Pixel feels too much like overkill.

Chrome OS was conceived of as a simple and inexpensive computing platform.

The software is built around a Web browser and cloudbased applications; everything you do on a Chrome device is done through a browser window.

Previous Chromebooks were basic and inexpensive. They generally lacked the latest processors and didn’t come with any high-end features.

By contrast, offering premium features is the Pixel’s reason for being. It’s purpose is to show that Chrome doesn’t have to be relegated to low-end machines and to inspire Google’s partners to expand the range of their Chromebook offerings. Google representatives said the Pixel is their attempt to create a Chromebook that the boss would be proud to take home. 

In terms of design, the Google folks have achieved their goal. The Pixel is thinner and lighter than Apple’s comparable Mac-Book Pro, but feels just as sturdy. Like the Apple laptops, the Pixel’s case is made from aluminum, not from the plastic found on the less-expensive Chromebooks. The Pixel has sharper edges and is much more rectangular than the MacBook Pros, which gives it a sleek, modern look. 

The Pixel takes another page from Apple by including a high-resolution screen similar to Apple’s “Retina” display. 

In fact, the Pixel’s screen is even higher resolution than those in Apple’s new MacBook Pros. It’s beautiful and bright, making text and pictures super-sharp. 

But Google has also looked beyond Apple for inspiration. The Pixel features a touch screen like those found in many of the latest Windows laptops. 

And it includes a powerful Intel Core i5 processor, which is standard fare on Apple and Windows-based notebooks, but is unique for a Chromebook. 

The processor makes a difference. While the Samsung Chromebook I recently tested felt sluggish, the Pixel is snappy and responsive, instantly resuming from sleep and quickly switching among tabbed Web pages. The Pixel also offers some uncommon features. One model includes an LTE radio, which provides a fast Internet connection when you aren’t near a Wi-Fi hotspot. That model also includes a limited amount of monthly broadband access from Verizon for two years. All models of the Pixel come with 1 terabyte of space on the Google Drive cloud storage service for free for three years. That’s a bargain, because Google typically charges $50 a month for that much space. 

But despite all of its bells and whistles, the Pixel is still a Chromebook and suffers the same limitations as the others. 

Because Chrome is designed to run Web-based apps, the operating system lacks many popular PC applications. You won’t find Skype, for example, or Photoshop or many high-end video games. And if you need to use special software for work or to connect to a device in your house, you can almost be certain that software won’t be available for Chrome. 

That lack of applications means you simply can’t do as much with a Chromebook as you can with a Mac or Windows PC. If you’re spending only $250 for a basic Chromebook, that shortcoming is acceptable. 

But it’s not when you’re spending $1,300, which is the starting price of the Pixel. For that money, you can get a very nice Windows machine or Apple’s MacBook Air. 

And some of the Pixel’s embellishments that help to drive up its price seem unnecessary. The touch screen in particular seems to have little use. 

Google hasn’t redesigned Chrome’s interface to take advantage of the touch screen. And unlike some of the new Windows notebooks, the Pixel’s screen doesn’t detach or fold back on itself, so you can’t use the device like a tablet. 

While the screen is wonderful, it has one huge drawback: it drains the device’s battery. Google says users should see up to five hours of battery life from the Pixel. That’s already less than you’d get on many of the latest Mac or Windows laptops. But in my testing, the battery life wasn’t even as good as advertised; I got around 4  1 ⁄ 2 hours of use at best. So while I understand Google’s impulse and appreciate the Pixel’s design and display, I’m not convinced that anyone yet needs a premium Chromebook. 

Contact Troy Wolverton at 408-840-4285 or twolverton@mercurynews. 

com. Follow him at www.mercurynews.com/troywolverton or Twitter. com/troywolv. 

Can this save Yahoo? NO TELECOMMUTING!!

This call by Yahoo CEO Marissa started fierce discussions on merits of WF-Office or WF-Home.. In my view, it depends... It depends on the group.. it depends on the phase of work you are in.. it depends on your personal condition.. it shouldn't be either one way or highway.. We are all adults and should be capable to decide about it..

Though, I also agree that in general, working in the office is better for collaborative type of work. If there is collaboration needed, then there is no way you can replace face to face discussions or meetings with any kind of tool.

At the same time, depending on phase of work, you may need some un-interrupted space to work and focus.. There is tons of value in that as well.. Depending on your personality and kind of work you are doing, you may simply produce thousand times better quality work when you are left alone.

Finally, flexibility.. that is key issue.. Telecommuting is important tool which allows you to be flexible and helps you balance personal and professional life. In case you have to pick up or drop your kid and it is 15 min job from your home, but if you have to come all the way from work and spend hours in traffic to do it.. then you are better off with WFH. That is one corner case.. but then there are multiple corner cases like this..

Overall, I am in favor of working in the office even though it does creates problems like traffic and lost commute time etc.. In offices, you meet more people face to face and definitely will have better ideas or refinement in your own ideas by simple act of discussing it casually.. Our current economy is all about intellectually brilliant ideas.. and in that case, it is always One + One is Eleven.. mostly.. and this mostly makes me say that there has to be flexibility..

Finally, I am also big fan for great and free lunch at cafeterias.. Honestly.. think about it.. how much it could cost.. may be $10 or $20 for best of best meal served there.. How much is hourly rate in technology.. anything between 50-100 or even more.. If this great lunch saves you even 30 minutes (instead of going out for lunch) this is more than break even... I can't understand why some corporations can't figure this simple math..

Lastly (Finally.. Finally), I am dead against these shut downs or forced vacations.. to save some few penny.. bloody hell.. if you want to save money then close company for entire money.. won't it be better.. in that case you will save all the money on salary and office space and utilities.. and what not.. Amount of productivity loss due to forced shut downs actually sends your company even closer to death spiral..


Cheers!!! enjoy this article..

NO TELECOMMUTING

Yahoo CEO calls workers back to office

Order stirs an impassioned debate over a long-standing perk in valley

By Brandon Bailey

bbailey@mercurynews.com 

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer’s decision to order telecommuting employees back to the office has sparked a passionate debate over the increasingly common practice of working from home.

Criticism from some workers, especially working parents, portrayed Mayer as abandoning a modern, enlightened approach that helps employees juggle conflicting demands.

Supporters said she may have reason to shake things up at the once-vaunted Internet company, which earned a reputation in recent years for falling behind in both innovation and competition.

The firestorm ignited Friday when Yahoo’s human resources chief sent a memo announcing that all employees will be asked to work in company offices starting in June. The memo quickly leaked to a prominent tech news blog, All Things D. 

It’s an issue that resonates sharply in Silicon Valley, where companies like Google, Cisco and others make Web-based software, videoconferencing systems and other high-tech tools that can help workers be productive at home. Yet some of Yahoo’s biggest competitors, including Google and Facebook, have spent heavily to design work spaces that encourage in-person collaboration, while providing free meals and other amenities that make it easier for employees to spend long hours at the office. 

‘Time together’ 

When people ask how many Google employees telecommute, Chief Financial Officer Patrick Pichette told an Australian tech audience last week, he replies, “As few as possible.” Pichette explained, according to an account in the Sydney Morning Herald, that Google wants workers to talk informally over meals or coffee. “There is something magical about spending the time together, about noodling on ideas, about asking at the computer, ‘What do you think of this?’ ” Google and Facebook allow employees to work from home, relying on the judgment of employees and their managers, according to sources at both companies, which declined to comment on Yahoo’s policies. But both companies have said they see a benefit in the creative sparks that come with random meetings in corridors or cafeterias. When Facebook moved into the former headquarters of Sun Microsystems, it remodeled the buildings to create open clusters of desks, as well as “living spaces” with couches and kitchen equipment, where workers can talk shop and trade ideas. Google has similar features in its buildings. And both Facebook and Google are famous for offering all kinds of free treats, from gourmet meals to massages and yoga sessions, for workers on their respective campuses. 

Yahoo appears to be seeking the same kind of synergy. “We need to be working side by side,” Yahoo human resources chief Jackie Reses wrote in her memo last week. 

Reses cited the importance of “decisions and insights” that can arise from impromptu meetings. But in what some view as an indication that Yahoo’s new boss isn’t satisfied with telecommuters’ performance, Reses added that “speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home.” 

A Yahoo spokeswoman declined to comment, so it’s unclear how many workers will be affected, but the company has not disputed the memo’s authenticity. 

Mayer, a former Google executive, has previously taken steps to improve work conditions at Yahoo, giving employees new smartphones and providing free meals, among other amenities. But critics said the Reses memo seemed hamhanded and oppressive. 

“A desperate move by a desperate company that has trouble trusting their employees,” Stewart Bauman, who works in tech but not at Yahoo, wrote in a post on the Mercury News Facebook page. 

Others said they saw hypocrisy by Mayer, who is both a new mother and a wealthy CEO — and who used her own funds to install a nursery next to her office, according to All Things D, which noted that other employees don’t have that option. 

Experts warned the memo could backfire. “The question is whether this move will result in an exodus among the company’s top talent,” John Challenger, CEO of the outplacement firm Challenger Gray & Christmas, said in an email noting that “many Silicon Valley tech firms are battling each other to attract and retain the best talent.” 

A matter of skill level 

Surveys show telecommuting is increasing across the United States and elsewhere. In a paper published last week, Stanford economics professor Nicholas Bloom described a recent nine-month study of a Chinese online travel firm, CTrip, which found call-center employees were more productive and performed at a higher level when allowed to work from home. But Bloom drew a distinction between call-center workers and higher-skilled professionals, such as executives or software developers. He said the latter can benefit from the flexibility of working at home but also from collaboration in the office. 

“It’s typical for high-end employees to work from home one or two days a week,” he said. “They get time away to think and time to be creative and to have a work-life balance. But it’s not helpful to have them permanently absent from the workplace.” 

Contact Brandon Bailey at 408-920-5022; follow him at Twitter.com/ BrandonBailey. 

“The question is whether this move will result in an exodus among the company’s top talent.” 

— John Challenger, CEO, Challenger Gray & Christmas 

Is it really a Triumphant Return or Forced Return?

Before I begin on my main topic.. I am really happy that Google map is back. I hope Apple will update iOS so that we can use Google map as default map on iPhone. I was/am totally fine with Apple maps in US. However, during my India trip, I did felt pain. As most of you know, I still enjoy and love driving in India (it is just much more thrilling to drive in India..).. So during my last trip I borrowed my Sister-in-law's car and was on my own. As I was in Delhi / Noida after a while, I did needed navigation system. Asking "paan wala" was beneath my reputation.. I had my International roaming data plan and was confident with iPhone.. However, Apple maps royally screwed me over there.. It simply didn't worked. I could only get some overview out of it but no navigation or real good help.. Chrome/Google maps on safari were mostly non functional.. So bottom line.. I am really happy to have it back..

Having said that.. I still feel that it was Apple map which forced Google to update their mapping feature.. otherwise there was no way they were going to add turn-by-turn navigation. It was literally competing with their Android's base feature. Whatever we say about Apple maps.. it did forced them to update and helped us all by making Google Maps on iOS much better then what it used to be. Moreover, in US, I really like Apple maps.. it is totally fine with me while driving... I tested it and liked much better..

It will be good lift for Google. still I feel that we will see its usage on iPhone much less than before. While you are browsing or searching in safari and you get some address.. if you click on that address it is going to open native Apple maps only.. unless you copy that address or go back to Google maps application and search it again there.. you are not going to get Google maps.. same is true with address book.. if you click on saved address it will still open Apple maps.. Unless.. Apple makes some setting updates and integrates with Google maps as it has integrated with Facebook and Twitter.. Let us see..

Bottom line.. if Google had played nicely.. we would still have them as native mapping service in iPhone. At least I think so..

TRIUMPHANT RETURN

Google Maps app back on iPhone

Service provides lift for Apple, big gain for search giant

By Brandon Bailey

bbailey@mercurynews.com 

Eager iPhone owners rushed to download Google’s new Maps app, driving it to the top of the most-popular list in the iTunes store Thursday and marking a triumphant return for one of Apple’s biggest rivals. The new app, which became available in the iTunes store Wednesday night, may be a short-term boon for Apple if its release helps soothe the many complaints that Apple has heard from iPhone users over the last six months — ever since Apple replaced an earlier Google Maps application with Apple’s own flawed mapping service on the most recent version of its signature smartphone.

But analysts said the upgraded Maps app is also a powerful tool for Google, as the Mountain View Internet giant seeks to cultivate a profitable relationship with millions of smartphone owners who have chosen Apple’s iPhone over competing devices that run on Google’s Android operating software. “Thank you, Google!” read the first of more than 12,000 mostly favorable reviews that iPhone users posted after downloading the new app Thursday. 

---

ASSOCIATED PRESS

The new Google Maps app, which became available as a download Wednesday, is shown on an iPad.

---

Even so, Cupertino-based Apple will undoubtedly keep working to improve its own mapping technology as it battles Google for supremacy in the mobile computing market. More than half of all smartphones used in the United States are Android devices, while slightly more than a third are iPhones, according to the research firm comScore. 

Analysts say location based services are increasingly important for both tech giants, as more people access the Internet on mobile devices. But Apple’s homegrown maps service was widely criticized for offering buggy responses and inaccurate information, in contrast with the mapping technology that Google has developed and refined over more than a decade. 

“If anything, this puts more pressure on Apple to sort out their own maps,” said Carolina Milanesi, a consumer technology analyst with Gartner. “Maps are a key part of the future of mobility. They can’t just throw in the towel now.” 

Google doesn’t charge consumers to use its Maps app. But Milanesi said data from the app provides Google with valuable insights into its users’ interests and travels. It also could help Google introduce them to other services and ultimately show them paid advertising. 

Unlike Google’s old Maps app for iPhones, the new version invites users to log in with their Google Gmail account, which would help Google exchange more information with them. While the login is optional, Milanesi said she expects many people will use it. 

Google also announced it will release a software development kit that independent app builders can use to incorporate Google’s mapping technology into other mobile services. 

Google’s old mapping service was extremely popular with independent developers who build apps for the iPhone and iPad, said Nolan Wright, co-founder of Appcelerator, a Mountain View firm that makes software used by app builders. The IDC research firm reported over the summer that 80 percent of all mobile software applications have features that are keyed to the user’s location. 

Wright cautioned that “it remains to be seen” whether developers will embrace the new Google app for Apple’s IS platform. Apple’s own maps are still the default service on iPhones and iPads, which means users must take the extra step of downloading Google Maps if they want to use it. Wright said some developers may be cautious about using Google’s maps until they see how many people use it. 

Apple also has an advantage over Google because Apple’s maps are embedded into Apple’s operating system, which means other Apple services such as Siri will use Apple maps by default, said Charles Golvin, a mobile-technology expert at Forrester. 

Golvin said that means Google’s new app still won’t provide “as fluid an experience” when compared with the Apple service, or even the old Google app, which was the default service on iPhones until it was replaced. On the other hand, Google’s new app includes popular features, such as turn-by-turn directions, that Google has long offered on Android phones but were not part of Google’s old app for iPhones. 

Apple has apologized for the flaws in its maps and replaced an executive who oversaw the project. But Golvin said “the maps problem continues to be a black eye for Apple. It remains to be seen whether Apple’s customers will return to using Apple’s maps once they address all the problems there.” 

Investors seemed to agree with Golvin’s assessment that the new iPhone app is “a win for Google.” Google’s stock rose $5.14, or 0.7 percent, to close at $702.70 Thursday. Apple’s stock fell $9.31, or 1.7 percent, to close at $529.69. 

Contact Brandon Bailey at 408-920-5022; follow him at Twitter.com/ BrandonBailey. 

Mini lines for Mini!!!

This headline caught my immediate attention.. and details are also funny.. at the same time, they affirm my faith in Apple's marketing hoopla about online waiting lists and other sold outs. I strongly believe that even Microsoft is applying same theory for their newly launched surface tablet. I think it has become mandatory requirement for any product launch to declare that you are sold out within few hours of your online launch... or start giving your waiting list as 3-4 weeks.

Coming back to iPad mini.. I think I have wrote a lot about it in my previous posts. In my view it is great product except for two things:

• High Price or I should say low value for money
• Non-Retina Display

Price.. is relative.. depending on your valet size. But in general, media has hyped it so much that value for money factor has come in and it dead sure that by thanks-giving Apple will heavily discount mini. and I am assuming that those discounts will become permanent till next release or may be forever. I am hoping that it will be definitely $299 or below.

Non-Retina display will go away by Jan/Feb/March upgrade refresh cycle. Current Mini release was scheduled in Oct/Nov mainly for investors. Otherwise there wasn't enough growth for wall street. It was more or less catch 22 situation for Apple. Most likely, they simply didn't had enough retina display capacity for mini. Or it could be engineering requirement.. with resolution same as iPad2, there was relatively very less engineering needed on software/iOS side.

This holiday season, I think, even iPad4 price will be under pressure as Google launches Nexus 10 with $399 price. Let us see, how it goes.. I hope two things coming out of mini's launch..

1. It has broken myth of Apple's product launch success. It is loud and clear message to Apple that customers are not going to buy garbage (sorry about this extreme term) for price of gold. 
2. Increased competition to an extent that we will really see some great products in coming months not only from Apple but many other competitors. 

Google Nexus and Amazon needs to work harder and invest more resources in tablets and more importantly in OS (Android) and refine them to give better user experience and integration with different display form factors. I was literally disappointed with Amazon's Kindle Fire HD.

Enjoy this article...

DOWNSIZED IPAD CROWD 

The lines are Mini, too

Excitement is a bit more subdued than usual as Apple’s small-tablet entry carries big price


By Heather Somerville

hsomerville@mercurynews.com 

PALO ALTO — The turnout for Apple’s release of the iPad Mini on Friday morning was — just like the new 7.9-inch tablet — noticeably downsized.

The early-morning lines outside stores in Silicon Valley and across the world were uncharacteristically short for an Apple launch, leading some to speculate that Apple fanboys and fangirls are growing weary of frequent and hyped product upgrades. Since the first iPad hit stores more than two years ago, competitors have emerged with 7inch tablets priced $100 cheaper.

Analysts project modest sales for the Mini this weekend, and for the fourth-generation iPad also released Friday. By 7:30 a.m. Pacific time, a half-hour before the Palo Alto store opened its doors, about 35 customers had lined up — a fraction of the number who scooped up the third-generation iPad on its launch day.

Brad Peterson, of Los Altos, was first in line at 2 a.m. When he saw the empty sidewalk outside the Apple Store on University Avenue, he thought he had the wrong day.

“I go to these things all the time, and (2 a.m.) usually gets me somewhere in the middle of the line,” he said. 

---

GARY REYES/STAFF PHOTOS

Christian Lindholm, of Helsinki, Finland, exits the Apple Store in Palo Alto carrying the pair of iPad Minis he just bought.

---

Brad Peterson, of Los Altos, holds a stack of iPad Minis and regular iPads he just purchased.

Peterson said he was surprised to be first in line when he arrived for the iPad Mini launch at 2 a.m.

Friday.

---

So he pulled out his third-generation iPad — one of about eight tablets he owns — to confirm the date, and with a quick Google search discovered that turnout was low at stores across the world. Reuters reported that crowds waiting for the newest iPad were smaller than for previous launches from Sydney to Amsterdam, with staff at the Hong Kong Apple Store appearing to outnumber customers waiting in line. 

Jeff Wang turned around and went home after he found the Palo Alto store deserted at 10 p.m. Thursday night. Wang, of Saratoga, came back at 2:30 a.m. to secure the second spot in line, bewildered that there weren’t already hundreds waiting by that hour. 

“The last couple of times I came around 11 p.m. the night before and the lines were long,” Wang said. 

Mike Smithwick, a San Jose app developer who waited toward the end of the line, suspected that some Apple fans had their fill with the first three releases. 

“I think everyone is lined out,” he said. 

The iPad Mini is Apple’s answer to popular 7-inch tablets like Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Google’s Nexus 7. But Apple priced its smaller tablet entry much higher than those competitors — the device starts at $329, while other 7-inch tablets can cost as little as $199. 

For some customers, the bigger turnoff is that the Mini is available only on Wi-Fi; the company will release a version that connects to cellular networks in a couple of weeks, when some expect to see an uptick in sales. 

Analysts doubt Apple will perform as well with this launch as it has previously, with Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster — an Apple bull who typically offers the highest projections for Apple sales — forecasting opening-weekend sales of about 1 million to 1.5 million for the Mini. 

BTIG research analyst Walter Piecyk said the sales total Munster predicted would be a disappointment. 

“We believe Apple’s first weekend sales of the iPad Mini needs, at a minimum, to top the 3 million first weekend sales of the iPad 3 in order to demonstrate that the management team can execute on ramping supply of new products and to provide some evidence that there is adequate demand for a smaller iPad at these price points,” he wrote in a note Friday morning. However, lower opening-weekend sales could help Apple avoid disappointing consumers. When the iPhone 5 debuted in September, Apple sold a record 5 million of the devices in the first weekend, but still couldn’t meet demand because of production delays. 

IDC analyst Ryan Reith cautioned Friday not to dismiss the Mini’s popularity because of short store lines. Many customers will probably order online, he said, and others will wait until closer to the holidays. 

Short lines didn’t mean Apple fans were short on excitement. The modest crowd in Palo Alto joined Apple staff with loud cheers when the store opened its doors two hours early for the event. Many walked out minutes later with a grin and two Minis — the limit for each customer. Peterson said the Minis were an early Christmas gift for his two teenage daughters — although he had a few hours to play with the tablets while the girls were in school. 

“December 25 is pretty arbitrary,” he said. “Apple decides when Christmas comes in our house.” 

More than a few New Yorkers can expect a Mini under the tree this year. About 600 fans braved the power outages, gas shortages and hobbled transit systems left by Superstorm Sandy to line up early outside the Fifth Avenue store, according to a Bloomberg News report. The New York flagship sold out of the Mini just hours after opening, and blogs and tweets indicated that a smattering of stores across the globe had sold out by the afternoon. However, it’s unclear how much stock the stores had to begin with. 

Friday was the first Apple launch event for Christian Lindholm, of Finland — the startup developer couldn’t resist picking up a couple Minis while in California on business. 

“I have to do it in Silicon Valley,” he said. “This is the store to do it. It’s the grandfather store; sort of in Steve’s hood.” 

Like others at the store, he owns a third-generation iPad — released just seven months ago — and won’t be buying the fourth anytime soon. Several customers said they were unimpressed with the upgrades and unwilling to pay another $499 to $699 just months after the previous version was released. 

Said Lindholm: “It doesn’t feel like a fourth generation. It feels like a 3.2. Staff writer Jeremy C. Owens contributed to this report. Contact Heather Somerville at 925-977-8418. Follow her at Twitter.com/ heathersomervil. 




GARY REYES/STAFF 

Apple employees greet customers Friday inside the company’s Palo Alto store. Far fewer people were in line this time than the hordes who queued up for the release of the third-generation iPad. 

Amazing peek into one of the World's biggest new manufacturing facilities..

Great pictures of their Data Center.. Most of them are classic pictures even from photography point of view.. you have to visit to enjoy these breathtaking pictures.. definitely reminded me of thermal power plant where I used to visit as child with my dad..  although 90% of that plant was really dirty and ugly.. still used to fascinate me at that time.. now these newer cleaner..

Off course these Data centers also have ugly side.. which is hidden in those power plants who churn out thousands of megawatts of electricity to power them.. Here we only see cleaner part.. but behind the scene there is whole lot ugly and dirty pictures in power plants (whatever kind of it may be).. mines.. I think, Google should also post pictures of power plants and mines for the power sources of their Data Centers. Some stats on their power consumption and how much CO2 they emit annually (even with +/-20% range to hide actual real numbers is okay.. ). I don't know how much CO2 will be emitted to host this blog?

It makes me go on internet dieting... forces me limiting my time on internet and bytes I transfer or host.. That will be something like going on Oxygen dieting (consume less Oxygen and emit less CO2 from your own body..).. I don't think that will be possible as long as humanity is their on this planet earth.. Whatever we do, our energy consumption is bound to increase.. let us see what is limit of this planet..

http://www.google.com/about/datacenters/gallery/#/all/12

Virtual window looks

into Google data centers

Search giant gives an online tour of its computer sites

By Michael Liedtke

Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO — Google is opening a virtual window into the secretive data centers where an intricate maze of computers process Internet search requests, show YouTube video clips and distribute email for millions of people.

The unprecedented peek is being provided through a new website unveiled Wednesday at www.google. com/ about/ datacenters/ gallery. The site features photos from inside some of the eight data centers that Google already has running in the U.S., Finland and Belgium. Google is also building data centers in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and Chile.

Virtual tours of a North Carolina data center also will be available through Google’s “Street View” service, which is usually used to view photos of neighborhoods around the world.

The photographic access to Google’s data centers coincides with the publication of a Wired magazine article about how the company builds and operates them. The article is written by Steven Levy, a journalist who won Google’s trust while writing “In The Plex,” a book published last year about the company’s philosophy and evolution.

The data centers represent Google’s nerve center, although none are located near the company’s headquarters in Mountain View.

As Google blossomed from its roots in a Silicon Valley garage, company co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin worked with other engineers to develop a system to connect low-cost computer servers in a way that would help them realize their ambition to provide a digital road map to all of the world’s information.
Initially, Google just wanted enough computing power to index all the websites on the Internet and deliver quick responses to search requests. As Google’s tentacles extended into other markets, the company had to keep adding more computers to store videos, photos, email and information about their users’ preferences.

The insights that Google gathers about the more than 1 billion people that use its services has made the company a frequent target of privacy complaints around the world. The latest missive came Tuesday in Europe, where regulators told Google to revise a 7-month-old change to its privacy policy that enables the company to combine user data collected from its different services.

Google studies Internet search requests and Web surfing habits in an effort to gain a better understanding of what people like. The company does this in an effort to show ads of products and services to the people most likely to be interested in buying them. Advertising accounts for virtually all of Google’s revenue, which totaled nearly $23 billion through the first half of this year.

Even as it allows anyone with a Web browser to peer into its data centers, Google intends to closely guard physical access to its buildings. The company also remains cagey about how many computers are in its data centers, saying only that they house hundreds of thousands of machines to run Google’s services.

Google’s need for so many computers has turned the company a major electricity user, although management says it’s constantly looking for ways to reduce power consumption to protect the environment and lower its expenses.

The company’s data centers are in: Berkeley County,S.C.;CouncilBluffs, Iowa; Douglas County, Ga.; Mayes County, Okla.; Lenoir, N.C.; The Dalles, Ore.; Hamina, Finland; and St. Ghislain, Belgium.

The Web link coincides with aWiredmagazine article on how Google builds and operates its data centers.

---

CONNIE ZHOU/GOOGLE VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS

A Google technician works on some of the computers in The Dalles, Ore., data center. A website gives viewers a tour of Google’s nerve centers.

formulae to list your name in legends

Create the Crisis..
Take BOLD Blame for the Crisis..
Solve the Crisis..

Register your name as legendary CEO or executive in the history of Management..

I am sure Mr. Cook is really sincere in his apology.. everyone is saying same thing about him.. and they way Apple has handled these crisis it will be a great case studies for B Schools.

However, couple of cents from my side on all this..

Initially, listening to all this crisis.. I was hesitant to upgrade to iOS 6.0 on my iPhone 4S. I didn't wanted to loose my Google Maps app.. then I tested Google maps on Chrome browser.. found it good enough.. for me.. Google map was mainly used to check traffic and search local things any how.. it didn't have that turn by turn voice navigation... I was using Mapquest for that and despite very poor reviews about mapquest application, I was really satisfied and happy.. mostly..
I liked my status quo..

But, my inner Geek finally won over this map issue and I took a plunge.. I upgraded my iPhone 4S to iOS 6.0 and first thing I did was to create Google maps in my Google Chrome application.. and then also download You-Tube application..

While coming back from office.. I thought of testing Apple's Map.. I fed my home address and it provided me map using freeways etc.. with decent indication of traffic hot spots.. I took my standard route which avoided the freeways which are always recommended by all the maps..

Honestly, I was really surprised at nimbleness of Apple's map to provide me updated route with updated traffic information.. at least on the road.. it was amazingly fast and correct in adjusting to my new route and showing updated route every time I digressed from my route.. I also searched for some places like my favorite Costco etc. and it was all together great experience.. At least ten times better than Mapquest and zillion times better than Google Maps (it should be infinitely as Google maps on iPhone didn't even have this true navigation system..)..

I was literally blown away by Apple Maps..

What could be the reason..  I think short answer is simply:

"Expectations"..

my expectations were so low with Apple Maps.. as my frame of reference was Mapquest.. which I feel like deleting from my iPhone.. and then all this bad mouthing about Apple Maps.. it really made me a super fan of apple maps.. Despite all this negative publicity about Apple Maps.. Apple Maps is The Maps I am using for all the purpose..

Now.. the my conspiracy theory version.. I really feel that all this negative publicity is kind of self inflicted or at least driven by Apple itself.. I very strongly feel that they have tendency to create controversy after launch.. and use this controversy to get free advertisement from media and social networks.. BTW, I am also doing same thing.. isn't it..

Now, coming back to my title of this topic.. I have no doubt about Mr. Cook's sincerity and boldness of asking own users to use competing products.. but.. but.. but..... In my view Apple Map is much better than most of their competitor.. except may be from Google's app on Android phones itself.. So in a way what Mr. Cook is asking their users.. please try out our competitor's applications.. do some comparison.. and decide for yourself.. most likely you would like our Apple Maps much better despite (may be) one percent errors in maps in some locations.. This is sure shot way of making your customers your die hard fans.. just like I am.. for now till I hit major snag which makes me loose 15-20 minites on the road.. I hope by that time Google will come up with native iOS app for their maps..

Overall.. really nice strategy.. Great Job Mr. Cook..

A CHANGE IN DIRECTION

Apple finds itself apologizing for Maps app flap

By Patrick May

pmay@mercurynews.com 

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea Mapplegate culpa.

Apple, CEO Tim Cook said in a statement released Friday, is sorry. Sorry its new Maps app for the iPhone and iPad sucks at times. Sorry that scores of users have been led on wild goose chases using the thing. Sorry Apple did not quite live up to its “incredibly high standard” this time around.

And while Cook did not say Apple was sorry for booting Google Maps off its iPhone’s home screen and replacing it with its own directionally challenged version, he may as well have. In his statement, the CEO encouraged users to download other apps and mapping tools to find their way around town, at least until Apple works out the kinks.  The Maps app’s flaws haven’t been lost on customers, eliciting online backlash. 

From Tim Cook: “At Apple, we strive to make world-class products that deliver the best experience possible to our customers.
With the launch of our new Maps last week, we fell short on this commitment.” 

“I’m used to more functionality from Apple, not less,” said Jeremy Kemp, a lecturer at the School of Library and Information Science at San Jose State, adding that he got so frustrated using Maps the other day to find a transit route home that he “ended up putting the iPhone in my pocket and asking someone at the train station for directions. It’s good that Cook has apologized; it’s actually noble. But I’d rather have functionality than nobility.” 

While the blogosphere worked itself into a fine lather all week agonizing over Maps’ shortcomings, analysts cautioned that the map flap will have little effect on the company’s solidgold bottom line. They said Apple makes most of its money selling gadgets, not software. Some pointed out that most new apps, including Google Maps when it was introduced in 2005, had bugs. But over time, as more users essentially trained the software to navigate even smarter, the apps improved. 

Pointing out that Twitter sentiment in the week since the iPhone 5’s debut was 71percent positive versus 49percent for the iPhone 4S, analyst Gene Munster with Piper Jaffray said in a note to investors that “the bottom line is that consumers do not seem to be overly concerned about the shortcomings of Maps.” 

Users who dislike Apple Maps can download other map apps, or access sites such as Google Maps through the browser. But because non-Apple apps aren’t native to the device, clicking an address in an email on an iPhone 5 would still call up the Apple mapping tool, not the alternative. 

Cook’s public apology stood in stark contrast to how his predecessor, the late Steve Jobs, might have handled the brouhaha. After problems arose with the iPhone 4’s antenna and its impact on signal strength — a saga dubbed “Antennagate” — Jobs was ridiculed for suggesting users simply alter the way they hold the devise. Although Jobs admitted at a news conference that “we’re not perfect and phones aren’t perfect, either,” some interpreted his response to Antennagate as defensive, even a bit sarcastic. 

Cook’s approach was far more conciliatory. 

“At Apple,” the CEO said, “we strive to make worldclass products that deliver the best experience possible to our customers. With the launch of our new Maps last week, we fell short on this commitment. We are extremely sorry for the frustration this has caused our customers and we are doing everything we can to make Maps better.” 

Some analysts speculate that Apple dumped Google Maps because of the growing rivalry between the two tech giants. But in his statement, Cook said Apple’s primary aim is to “provide our customers with even better Maps including features such as turn-by-turn directions, voice integration, Flyover and vector-based maps.” 

Ever since the Cupertino company released an update to its iPhone and iPad operating system that replaced Google Maps with its own app, the Internet has been deluged with complaints that the new software offers fewer details, lacks public transit directions and puts landmarks in the wrong places. One reviewer pointed out that when he fired up Maps, the Washington Monument was misplaced, and a search for Cleveland, Ga., took him to Cleveland, Tenn. 

The grousing has not let up, filling repositories like the one at the http:// theamazingios6maps. tumblr. com with embarrassing examples of Apple Maps run amok. Motorola even piled on, creating an ad with the caption “#iLost” placed beneath the ill-fated iPhone app. 

But Analyst Shaw Wu with Sterne Agee praised Cook, saying “at the end of the day, Apple’s goal is to deliver the best user experience possible, and that’s exactly what they’re doing, even if it means sending users to other vendors for the time being. 

“What they care about is: Are you happy with the hardware? If you are, fine,” Wu said. “But if you want to use other software, go ahead. Apple’s in the business of selling phones and tablets. And this won’t hurt that.” 

Contact Patrick May at 408-920-5689. Follow him at Twitter.com/patmaymerc. 

How do we make these Social sites Green?

Long time back (Couple of years..) one of my colleague mentioned to me that every search on google generates enough heat that you can boil water for your cup of a tea.. I thought that he was joking or at least exaggerating..  but reading all this news.. doesn't surprise me that it was right information.

Worldwide.. Data Centers now consume around 30,000 MW at any point of time... Just for comparison, India's total power generation capacity must be around 200,000 MW.. California's total power generation capacity is around 70,000 MW (give and take 5-10K MW here and there..)..

Google alone consumes 300MW for their Data Centers(DC)/Server farms.. Poor Facebook.. just 60MW.

One MW is Mega Watt and equals to One Million Watts. Your iPhone charger consumes 5W when charging your iPhone. MW or Mega Watt is common terminology for utility industry to calculate generation capacity or consumption capacity.. either way they are more or less same as you really can't store electricity at this level. Now a days we have started using GW (Giga Watts) which is equal to 1000 MW or one Billion Watts. that means.. that you can charge 200 Million iPhones in 1000MW :-)

Okay.. back to main topic.. Agreed that Facebook, Gmail or Google search are as necessary as "Roti", Kapda" & "Makaan" (Food, cloth and house). and this is the reason.. all these big data center monsters are not only consuming 30K MW all the time but also wasting almost 90% of their capacity in anticipation of surge in demand or in anticipation that grid will fail and there will be power outage which will make their site down.. Mostly for user's like you and mine's satisfaction!!! or in other words to protect their reputation!! Nobody wants news that their web site was down for this many hours or slow today.. etc..

First of all, I think, this claim of 90% wastage.. I think it is way to exaggerated.. I agree.. There is lot of wastage but I don't think that it will be close to 90%.. Still.. there is no smoke without fire.. so let us assume that there is 50-60% wastage.. Which is still huge.. 15,000 MW!!!

Then secondly, can we do something to cut down this wastage. As per these Data Center / Server Farm Monsters.. all this wastage is for me.. and bad news is that these guys have made me addicted to instant web/information so much that I can't live without it.. I can try to cut it down or go on web diet.. That will make some dent or not.. not known.. but definitely.. if every one decides.. then it will.. I will be boiling lesser number of tea pots.. Honestly, I don't think that it will be possible to cut my Google/Facebook usage... they have become more or less my lifelines.. (that was too much..). but I can try..

Lastly, major reason for all this high level of consumption and this alleged wastage is that service level expectations for me as an user are really high.. do I care if Google returns search results in some 0.0003 seconds (just kidding) or whatever number they show.. or do I care if FB page loads slightly slower or shows my friend's updates in 10 minutes instead of 0.0000000004 seconds (again just kidding..).. What will happen if Google or FB or other such  monsters give me option of being "Green User" I get classified for most of my work in Green category which could have SLA issues here and there and instead of returning search results in 0.0003 seconds can return results in 0.3 or even 3 seconds... or at least wait for me to completely type my search request instead of searching for each and every letter I type and thus boiling a whole barrel of water instead of a tea pot..

I won't mind these SLAs.. I waste enough time all around here and there and I could be fine.. If I am under pressure to perform.. rarely but possible.. then I should be able to change my profile from Green to Red Hot user who would like super fast response like I get today..

They can give me some kind of special green badge (the kind of green ranger badge kids get in yosemite national park for attending some environmental session by rangers ;-) ) in lieu and I can proudly use it in my email signature to let the world know about it.. so that the world would stop expecting immediate email response or immediate FB like or comment on their post!!!

Let me know what all you guys think about it.. I was thinking about this article for couple of days and wanted to write it so it comes out effective. I tried my best to keep it simple and humorous where possible..

depending upon the response from web (It is okay if we boil few more barrels of water.. we will save some tankers later on..), I was thinking that we can start some Google+ or FB+ page for this cause and start some awareness.. so we can get some kind of petition for Google and FB and other web monsters to start some kind of "Green User" concept who will not complain of average or below average SLAs for their services as long as this user is not part of this wasteful Data Center (DC) or Server Farm.

I will be happy on some kind of green and energy efficient server farm or data center, where electricity is consumed to serve but wastage is significant lower.. I will take little bit of performance hit on my side.. I am sure.. with technological advancements.. this will be a short lived  process.. Very soon DC technologies will improve significantly where they can add or reduce computing capacity on demand without significant hit on performance SLA.

But for the time being.. I am ready to take this hit.. are you joining me in this?

DATA CENTERS’ DIRTY SECRET

Wasting electricity 24/7

Server farms run full-bore even when demand is low

By James Glanz

New York Times

SANTA CLARA — Jeff Rothschild’s machines at Facebook had a problem he knew he had to solve immediately. They were about to melt.

The company had been packing a 40-by-60-foot rental space here with racks of computer servers that were needed to store and process information from members’ accounts. The electricity pouring into the computers was overheating Ethernet sockets and other crucial components.

Thinking fast, Rothschild, the company’s engineering chief, took some employees on an expedition to buy every fan they could find — “We cleaned out all of the Walgreens in the area,” he said — to blast cool air at the equipment and prevent the website from going down. 

---

The number of data centers is surging.

Google alone uses 300 million watts.

RICHARD PERRY/ NEW YORK TIMES ARCHIVES
=========================================================================

That was in early 2006, when Facebook had a quaint 10 million or so users and just the one main server site. Today, the information generated by nearly 1 billion users requires outsize versions of these facilities, called data centers, with rows and rows of servers spread over hundreds of thousands of square feet, and all with industrial cooling systems. 

They are a mere fraction of the tens of thousands of data centers that now exist to support the overall explosion of digital information. Stupendous amounts of data are set in motion each day as, with an innocuous click or tap, people download movies on iTunes, check credit card balances on Visa’s website, send Yahoo email with files attached, buy products on Amazon, post on Twitter or read newspapers online. A yearlong examination by The New York Times has revealed that this foundation of the information industry is sharply at odds with its image of sleek efficiency and environmental friendliness. 

Most data centers, by design, consume vast amounts of energy in an incongruously wasteful manner, interviews and documents show. Online companies typically run their facilities at maximum capacity around the clock, whatever the demand. As a result, data centers can waste 90 percent or more of the electricity they pull off the grid, the Times found. 

To guard against a power failure, they further rely on banks of generators that emit diesel exhaust. The pollution from data centers has increasingly been cited by the authorities for violating clean air regulations, documents show. In Silicon Valley, many data centers appear on the state government’s Toxic Air Contaminant Inventory, a roster of the area’s top stationary diesel polluters. 

Worldwide, the digital warehouses use about 30 billion watts of electricity, roughly equivalent to the output of 30 nuclear power plants, according to estimates industry experts compiled for the Times. Data centers in the United States account for onequarter to one-third of that load, the estimates show. 

“It’s staggering for most people, even people in the industry, to understand the numbers, the sheer size of these systems,” said Peter Gross, who helped design hundreds of data centers. “A single data center can take more power than a medium-size town.” 

Energy efficiency varies widely from company to company. But at the request of the Times, the consulting firm McKinsey & Co. analyzed energy use by data centers and found that, on average, they were using only 6 to 12 percent of the electricity powering their servers to perform computations. The rest was essentially used to keep servers idling and ready in case of a surge in activity that could slow or crash their operations. 

A server is a sort of bulked-up desktop computer, minus a screen and keyboard, that contains chips to process data. The study sampled some 20,000 servers in about 70 large data centers spanning the commercial gamut: drug companies, military contractors, banks, media companies and government agencies. 

“This is an industry dirty secret, and no one wants to be the first to say mea culpa,” said a senior industry executive who asked not to be identified to protect his company’s reputation. “If we were a manufacturing industry, we’d be out of business straightaway.” 

These physical realities of data are far from the mythology of the Internet: where lives are lived in the “virtual” world and all manner of memory is stored in “the cloud.” 

The inefficient use of power is largely driven by a symbiotic relationship between users who demand an instantaneous response to the click of a mouse and companies that put their business at risk if they fail to meet that expectation. 

Even running electricity at full throttle has not been enough to satisfy the industry. In addition to generators, most large data centers contain banks of huge, spinning flywheels or thousands of lead-acid batteries — many of them similar to automobile batteries — to power the computers in case of a grid failure as brief as a few hundredths of a second, an interruption that could crash the servers. 

“It’s a waste,” said Dennis Symanski, a senior researcher at the Electric Power Research Institute, a nonprofit industry group. “It’s too many insurance policies.” At least a dozen major data centers have been cited for violations of air quality regulations in Virginia and Illinois alone, according to state records. Amazon was cited with more than 24 violations over a three-year period in Northern Virginia, including running some of its generators without a basic environmental permit. A few companies say they are using extensively re-engineered software and cooling systems to decrease wasted power. Among them are Facebook and Google, which also have redesigned their hardware. Still, according to recent disclosures, Google’s data centers consume nearly 300 million watts and Facebook’s about 60 million watts. 

Many of these solutions are readily available, but in a risk-averse industry, most companies have been reluctant to make wholesale change, according to industry experts. Improving or even assessing the field is complicated by the secretive nature of an industry that is largely built around accessing other people’s personal data. 

For security reasons, companies typically do not even reveal the locations of their data centers, which are housed in anonymous buildings and vigilantly protected. Companies also guard their technology for competitive reasons, said Michael Manos, a longtime industry executive. “All of those things play into each other to foster this closed, members-only kind of group,” said Manos, now a senior vice president for technologies at AOL. 

That secrecy often extends to energy use. To further complicate any assessment, no single government agency has the authority to track the industry. In fact, the federal government was unable to determine how much energy its own data centers consume, according to officials involved in a survey completed last year. The survey did discover that the number of federal data centers grew from 432 in 1998 to 2,094 in 2010. 

To investigate the industry, the Times obtained thousands of pages of local, state and federal records, some through freedom of information laws, that are kept on industrial facilities that use large amounts of energy. Copies of permits for generators and information about their emissions were obtained from environmental agencies, which helped pinpoint some data center locations and details of their operations. In addition to reviewing records from electrical utilities, the Times also visited data centers across the country and conducted hundreds of interviews with current and former employees and contractors. 

Some analysts warn that as the amount of data and energy use continue to rise, companies that do not alter their practices could eventually face a shake-up in an industry that has been prone to major upheavals, including the bursting of the first Internet bubble in the late 1990s. “It’s just not sustainable,” said Mark Bramfitt, a former utility executive who now consults for the power and information technology industries. “They’re going to hit a brick wall.” 



STEVE DYKES/NEW YORK TIMES ARCHIVES 

A row of backup generators, inside the white housings, line the back exterior of the Facebook data center in Prineville, Ore. They’ll keep servers on in a power outage.