Google wants to be your PA

</figure> One of Google's top engineers and the world's foremost expert on search engines says his next challenge is to turn Google into everyone's personal assistant capable of making suggestions and guiding users through their day without them having to lift a finger.

Google fellow Amit Singhal who has studied search for 20 years said what many would relegate to the realms of Star Trek was only a few years from becoming a reality. Already our always-connected phones can tell Google where we are (thanks to the built-in GPS) and our appointment schedule; they can speak to us and take instructions by voice. Google also knows a lot about the world around us and our own preferences based on past searches - all that's needed now is an "intelligent glue" to tie everything together.

Mobile becomes your robot helper
Soon Google's systems would know your appointments and be able to tell you what time to leave based on traffic and other information.Furthermore if Google knows you like Thai restaurants and that you drive past the best one in your city every day on the way to work Google will soon be intelligent enough to suggest that you go and eat there. "My son breitling windrider cockpit watches when I was coming to the US said: 'Dad bring me a Japanese baseball.' I coach little league to my son and my calendar knows today that I have 15 minutes between my last appointment here and my dinner appointment at my hotel " Singhal said in an interview. "If you combine my calendar time with my geography which is the path from here to my hotel and you combine the information atom 'baseball shops' or 'sports shops' between here and there what you have is the beginning of that personal assistant that can proactively tell me three blocks down the road turn right tissot watch pick up a Japanese baseball for your son and then you can go to your dinner." Singhal who was an academic researcher in search before joining Google in 2000 replica zenith foudroyante paypal watches calls this "search without searching".

Alan Eustace head of Google's engineers worldwide pointed to a recent prediction that mobile phone searches would overtake desktop searches in 2012. "There will be new things that you do on a phone that never occurred to you; just like navigation right now [and] augmented reality " he said in an interview. "I never thought voice search was ever going to work. I supported voice search my entire career as a research director but I never thought that it would reach a point where an untrained user could walk up to a device and input a query and have it correctly find the output."

Search dreams become reality
Singhal described how the five major dreams he had around search two decades ago had already become reality thanks in part to high-powered mobile phones with GPS navigation.

1. Searching outside text - Google's search engine can now search images and video files. Copious amounts of information that was never in digital form is now searchable thanks to initiatives such as Google Street View and book scanning. Google Goggles lets users search for information just by submitting a photo of a landmark and translate text just by taking a photo of it.

2. Search beyond language - Users can now translate any pages and even conduct "cross-language searches" allowing those who are for instance travelling to Japan to search information on Japanese-language websites and have the results and web pages displayed in English. Coming soon is the ability to have a conversation with someone who doesn't speak your language and have translation performed on the fly.

3. Search that knows me - If you're a cricket fan and have conducted searches on the game on Google and you search for "lords" the top result will be the Lords cricket ground in London. The old results would list the Lords multiplayer online game first. Google search can also tailor results depending on your location while another newer Google feature throws up a section of results containing pages published by people you have identified as being in your online or offline social circle. "Imagine if I had told you 20 years back that each and every one of you would have a tailor-made search engine for you? We have come a long way in realising that dream " he said.

4. Search the present moment - Google's "real-time search" compiles content that is being generated by the minute on sites such as Twitter and other services. "There was an earthquake in California and Google's real-time search beat the US Geological Survey in telling the world that there was an earthquake in California by a whole eight minutes " Singhal said.

5. Search that understands me - The "holy grail" of search engine technology is enabling machines to understand language like human beings do. Google has already come a long way in this regard by allowing its search engine to run voice searches and recognise that words mean different things depending on their context. For instance the keyword "change" could mean "adapt" "convert" "exchange" "install" or "switch" depending on the query and Google's search engine was already able to intelligently deduce this meaning.

Key pieces missing
But Singhal said there were still several pieces of the puzzle to put in place before his dream of "searching without search" could become a reality. "Today some of the critical pieces that actually senses my environment to guide me through my day are missing - [my mobile] doesn't know that I need to buy a baseball " said Singhal. "I don't expect people to record everything they say that would be fairly invasive. What I expect to happen is I just turn on my phone and say 'buy baseball' that's it ... right now I don't do that because the best I can use that input for is to put a sticky note on my screen - that's not that big a deal." Of course such a high level of personalisation is bound to send privacy advocates and regulators into a spin. Just ask Mark Zuckerberg the chief executive officer of Facebook who has been raked over the coals several times by attempting to personalise advertising and other site features by forcing users to make more personal details available publicly. Singhal said the key to solving these issues was transparency and control. Already Google Dashboard allows users to view and manage the information stored about them on Google's servers and this would be critical for the new "personal assistant" feature."I really really believe that privacy is critical to a successful product ... users should have a right to divulge whatever they want and definitely a right to keep private whatever they want private " Singhal said.

Asher Moses travelled to Tokyo as a guest of Google.

by Asher Moses

New images from Jane Eyre

</figure> Charlotte Brontë's famed novel has again been reworked.

This time it's starring Australian Mia Wasikowska (The Kids Are All Right ulysse nardin quadrato gmt perpetual fake watch Alice in Wonderland) as the much-loved heroine Jane so it's more exciting than ever before.

Just released are a great many images from the film; they feature beautiful settings waist-cinching period clothing Jamie Bell all grown up with big sideburns chronoswiss watch replica rolex yachtmaster watch Michael Fassbender and Judi Dench emoting and more.

Take a look above and at the trailer below.




Jane Eyre will open in cinemas on Thursday August 11.

Overall, retailers report positive sales growth i

December holiday retail sales were largely positive with some notable exceptions according to a roundup of retailers and analysts.

Market-research firm ShopperTrak said total retail sales grew 4.4 percent in December compared with the same month in 2004. A flood of shoppers in the week leading up to Christmas salvaged what it called a "relatively flat holiday season."

Visa USA said charges on its credit and debit cards rose 17.5 percent this holiday season over the same period in 2004.

The International Council of Shopping Center which tracks chain store sales said it expects a moderate increase of 3 percent to 3.5 percent for the month.

Meanwhile Wal-Mart Stores Inc. the world's largest retailer baume & mercier hampton for ladies replica watch saw its sales rise only 2.2 percent on sales of $40.8 billion in December and its same-store sales rise just 1.9 percent. It's chief rival Target Corp. said its sales increased 11.6 percent to $8.42 billion in December with same-store sales rising 4.7 percent.

Wal-Mart has become such a large part of the industry that if its sales were removed overall same-store sales reportedly rose a 4.3 percent for the month according to a Retail Metrics index of 65 publicly traded retailers. Put Wal-Mart back in the mix and overall retail comparable-store sales rose 2.2 percent.

Among department store retailers Nordstrom Inc. reported December same-store sales growth of 7.7 percent over December 2004 replica watches and J.C. Penney Co.'s sales rose 2.2 percent. December same-store sales at Federated Department Stores Inc. increased 3.4 percent.

Same-store sales rose 2.4 percent last month at luxury retailer Saks Inc. and same-stores sales increased 8.6 percent at Neiman Marcus Group Inc.

Sears Holdings Corp. reported an 11.9 percent decline at Sears stores and a sluggish 1 percent increase at Kmart.

Many retailers that attract younger consumers had a very good December. Among them Abercrombie & Fitch Co. said December same-store sales skyrocketed 29 percent over December 2004. Aeropostale Inc.'s sales jumped 11.4 percent and American Eagle Outfitters Inc. rose 9.8 percent. Wet Seal Inc. reported sales growth of 38.5 percent last month compared to a drop of 11.8 percent in December 2004.

The Gap Inc. posted a 9 percent drop in same-store sales in December compared to a 1% decline last year. All three of the Gap’s retail brands suffered with Old Navy and Gap stores each down 10% and Banana Republic declining by 5 percent.

A rival mall-based chain New York & Co. less than one-sixth the size of Gap Inc. with 527 locations saw its same-store sales rise 10.9 percent in December.

In the wholesale club sector Costco Wholesale the nation’s largest wholesale chain with 346 U.S.-based stores and 125 international locations saw its same-store sales in the U.S jump 6 percent and internationally 8 percent for the five weeks ended Jan. 1. Overall sales increased 10 percent to $6.37 billion during the period.

Costco said a strong Canadian dollar helped lift international same-store sales. Top sellers included food computers fake jacob co watch audio and video equipment televisions sporting goods jewelry and clothing.

Wal-Mart Stores’ Sam’s Club saw December same-store sales rise 3.6 rise on sales of $4.6 billion.

Sell Them Both

Here's a short quiz: What happens when two customers come into your store together? Do your salespeople (a) Find out who the buyer is and sell only that customer? (b) Ignore the friend because he or she could ruin the sale? (c) Try to sell them both? The correct answer is (c) but I bet you answered (a) or (b).

I have rarely seen a salesperson try to sell both customers. When I ask why they say: "The store may have been too busy and customers were waiting and besides I hate it when two ladies come in together. The lady who is not buying usually ruins the sale."

Those answers make no sense to me. Salespeople must keep in mind that any person who comes into the store represents a selling opportunity.

The customer who's shopping motivates her friend. All the salesperson has to do is inquire. Chances are that the friend is thinking of a diamond gift she'd like to receive. If it's two men the friend might be thinking of a diamond gift for his wife. Don't let the friend leave without at least asking.

If you were the friend and the salesperson ignored you how would you feel? Would you want to stay? Would you return to that jewelry store? Is being ignored the way you like to be sold?

One of the most frequent questions I get asked in my sales seminars is: "Why do friends of customers torpedo sales?" My answer is: "Because you ignored the friend and two other jewelers before you probably did the same thing." The friend was already upset when she walked in. By ignoring her swiss replica watches the salesperson added gasoline to the fire and she reacted by ruining any chance of making a sale.

Salespeople tell me they try to avoid two women who come in and hope someone else approaches them. They were surprised when I told them that if I were selling in their store I would ask for all those customers. I would sell both customers not just one piece of jewelry but more because many times if one customer goes for an add-on sale the other will follow. I would also find out when their next occasion is what they would like to be surprised with and ask permission to call their husbands. I would have their trust harry winston replica watches replica rado florence and I'd have them and their husbands as repeat customers.

Tell your salespeople to do the same and you'll see a big increase in your sales.

Ghostbusters 3 is good to go

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Who's saying what

This can mean one thing only (potentially): GB3 FOOTAGE AT SAN DIEGO COMIC-CON.

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After much conjecture it seems that the second Ghostbusters sequel may become a reality. In a recent interview Egon Spengler himself Harold Ramis confirmed that after two decades of speculation the project is not only progressing nicely but is ready to start production. 

During the interview he also gave a few more details regarding the possible plot:Well introduce some new young Ghostbusters replica seiko and all the old guys will be in it replica tag heuer monaco watches too. Think Christopher Lloyd in Back to the Future ... GB3 is progressing with plans to shoot next summer and release in 2011.  

There have been quite a few rumours doing the rounds over the past few weeks as the stars of the original movies have been supposedly leaking vital plot points. This is the first time that anyone has spoken about a release date and now that long time hold out Bill Murray is on board replica franck muller master banker it looks like a third Ghostbusters chapter may become a reality.

My excitement is only matched by my nervous apprehension as to the possible quality of the new film. If the latest Indy chapter has taught us anything its that you really cant go home again. I guess we will all find out when the film is released next year.

In the meantime I think we should revisit the comic genius of the first film with this little clip. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/sBRuLeJdU4o&amp;hl=en_US&amp;fs=1&amp;"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true">

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