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January 30, 2008

What the evicted leave behind; Google exhumes CueCat barcodes; Vivid 'shroom photos

It's a tale of misery and cruelty, broken lives, trashed pasts and compassionate recycling.

Cleanup crews often can tell why eviction happened. Rick Armon of The Akron Beacon Journal finds the lives folks leave behind after the sheriff comes.

And then there's,

For whatever reason, they also find a lot of abandoned bowling balls.

Short memories: Google's Newspaper Ads: Big Hopes For Small Barcodes. Yes, boys and girls, Google has reinvented the CueCat barcode concept.

Silicon Alley Insider reports, with a straight face,

Google's efforts to get into the newspaper ad business have yet to yield much. One tool it hopes will eventually change that: Small, square barcodes, like the one at the right, at the bottom of print ads. When a person scans the barcode with a compatible camera phone, it takes their phone's browser to a mobile Web address encrypted in the graphic.

What's the point? This has three benefits: First, it saves the reader the trouble of typing in a Web address into their phone -- an annoying process for the majority of wireless subscribers that don't have phones with QWERTY keypads. Second, it can take the reader to a very specific page, based on an individual ad -- like a coupon or a map to the advertiser's store. And third, it ties into Google's analytics tools, so advertisers can get a very specific sense of which ads work and which don't, when people are viewing them, where they're standing (GPS), etc.

People, if you're looking at a newspaper, do you want to go online to print out a coupon? Why isn't the coupon in the newspaper you already have in your hands?

The technology aims to take readers to a specific page, overcoming the hurdle of long URLs. It's a marketing grail. They just haven't figured out a reason for readers to want to use it yet.

Cortinarius iodes

Stunning: FungiPhoto.com.

Over 4,000 high resolution image files available of Morels, Chanterelles, Boletes, Wild Mushrooms, Edible Mushrooms, Medicinal Mushrooms, Mushrooms Cooking, Mushrooms on the Cuttingboard and many more.

Mushroom videos, too. Unfortunately, most of the specimens aren't identified, so they remain eye candy unless you're willing to browse a list of their botanical names, and click each name to go to its photo.

It's the collection of mushroom photographer Taylor F. Lockwood.

Posted by Sheila Lennon  at 7:37 AM | Permalink

Comments

Posted by: streetstylz on January 30, 2008 2:28 PM

Posted by: Swampthing on January 30, 2008 5:39 PM