Google Will Get You For That.

Recently one of the candidates for the People's Party of Canada put up some campaign signs in a local park.  This morning I took at look at them.  They're for Guto Penteado.  The Guto on the signs is presented in a font similar to one Google has occasionally used, and the letters are in several colours, again reminiscent of Google.  Seems to me that crossing paths with Google like that is not a good idea.  It's unlikely Google will have a chance to take action before the campaign ends, but why take the risk?

As for the PPC it will interesting to see if they're around this time next year.  To date they've remained under the 5 percent range in the polls.

Google Knows My Birthday.

When I brought up Google's main page today I found it has a banner for my birthday.  Click on it and it has a bunch of stuff about October 18th.

You really have to wonder what all Google knows about its users.  I can see why some people avoid any sort of social media involvement, and use things like proxies to hide their online activities.

Google Likes Me.

Seriously, I've received quite a few hits of late attributed to Googlebot-image for various random posts here.  They must be doing some sort of archive updating or something.

Google Disturbs.

I'm sitting here reading a discussion about how rape is presented in fanfiction.  It reminded me of a piece of Ranma 1/2 fanfiction where a drugged Ranma is raped by Kuno.  The title escapes me, so I typed "ranma kuno rape" into Google in an effort to find it.  After I hit enter it came back with "Did you mean: ranma akane rape."  It's a disturbing enough topic to be searching for as it is, and Google comes back with that, which would seem to indicate that's a far more common combination of words.  Thanks for upping the discomfort factor.

Where Are You, Gene?

It sometimes seems like you find out about pretty much everyone on the Internet. But of course this isn't really true. People often fall through the gaps. For example I was listening to Soul Message by Richard "Groove" Holmes this afternoon, and decided to see what I could find out about the guitarist on that recording, Gene Edwards. Unfortunately although his name comes up via Google none of the references provide details about Edwards himself, just his involvement in various recording sessions. He is, or maybe by now was, Canadian, and that's about all I know. That, and that he often played with a rather distorted guitar sound, much to the chagrin of some listeners. Personally I think it's kind of neat to hear something besides the treble completely rolled back sound most often heard with straight ahead players.