With the new version of the app, people can conduct a Google search by simply speaking their query into their iPhones. “Voice Search” uses speech recognition technology to transform spoken words into text and then runs the query through Google web search as if it had been typed manually. Additionally, to provide an even faster and more natural experience, when the app is turned on, Voice Search will detect the phone’s movement and activate automatically when you want to do a search. This feature allows you to naturally bring the phone up to your ear and speak your search into the phone, just as if you were talking on the phone.

This update to the Google Mobile App also uses the iPhone’s location detection to further personalize your search results. Now you can just type (or speak) a query like “pizza,” “movies” or “weather” and you will receive results tailored specifically to your current location, without having to include a city or zip code in the search.

The voice and location features add to Google Mobile App’s existing tools that allow people to access all of Google’s mobile services from their phone. To learn more, please visit www.google.com/mobile or download the app from the iPhone App Store by searching for “Google Mobile App.”

While the implementation of the services agreement with Google would have enabled Yahoo! to accelerate its investments in its top business priorities through an infusion of additional operating cash flow, this deal was incremental to Yahoo!’s product roadmap and does not change Yahoo!’s commitment to innovation and growth in search. The fundamental building blocks of a stronger Yahoo! in both sponsored and algorithmic search were put in place independent of the agreement.

Yahoo! continually optimizes its algorithmic and sponsored search, and we have, in 2008 alone, developed and launched hundreds of improvements all designed to enhance search quality and deliver a more relevant search experience to the company’s users. To that end, Yahoo! has benefited from strong revenue per search (RPS) gains in the U.S. as discussed on the Q3 earnings call. Furthermore, Yahoo! continues to make substantial progress against its Open Strategy and in the deployment of its game changing APT from Yahoo! display advertising platform.

Going forward, Yahoo! plans to continue to provide the cutting-edge advances in products, platforms and services that the industry needs and expects, and intends to be the destination of choice for advertisers and publishers who want to reach one of the largest and most engaged populations of consumers on the web.

To continue to fuel the growth of online games for users and as part of our ongoing efforts to develop new ways for publishers to earn revenue, Google announced today the availability of AdSense for Games^TM, a program that integrates video advertisements into web-based games, complemented by text and image ads. The program helps advertisers reach its audiences in new ways. Google is working with select game developers and publishers including Konami, Playfish, Zynga, Demand Media, games network Mochi Media, as well as beta advertisers such as Esurance, Sprint, and Sony Pictures.

With this program, advertisers can now reach the growing number of gamers who are engaged in online play. For instance, in anticipation of a sporting event, an advertiser can use the technology of AdSense for Games to feature its logo within that sports event’s accompanying online game and reach its relevant demographic as a result.

AdSense for Games delivers video ads based on intended placements, as well as image or text ads based on contextual targeting with keywords and tags supplied by developers and publishers. Advertisers are charged on a cost-per-impression or cost-per-click basis, and ad revenue is split between Google and game developers or publishers.

AdSense for Games gives game developers a new way to monetize their games and advertisers additional tools to reach their audiences, ultimately benefiting users by spurring innovation in the online gaming space. AdSense for Games is currently available in beta to select partners in the U.S.

For more information, please see: http://adsense.blogspot.com/ and http://www.google.com/ads/games

Based on open standards, the new Yahoo! Calendar beta makes it easy for users to discover, share and keep track of events and appointments. Yahoo! Calendar is a popular feature within Yahoo! Mail, a key starting point for consumers on the Web and one of the most popular Web mail services in the world with more than 278 million users per month.

Leveraging last year’s acquisition of Zimbra, a leader in open source messaging and collaboration software that brought Ajax functionality to online calendars, the new Yahoo! Calendar is built on the Zimbra platform using the iCalendar (iCal) and CalDAV standards. The new calendar is interoperable with other online calendar services including those from Mozilla, Apple, Microsoft, AOL and Google, so users can share their calendar data with friends who use other online calendaring services and subscribe to any iCal-based public calendar.

Other new easy-to-use features allow consumers to keep track of activities through color-coding, drag and drop appointments for easy scheduling, and “zoom-in and -out” from a monthly “wall calendar” view to a single event — all from within a Yahoo! Mail account. In addition, images from the Flickr photo community can be included to create a visual, unique-looking online calendar with interesting photos.

“With the new Yahoo! Calendar, we’ve taken the concept of a traditional paper calendar and transformed it into a smart, yet simple online tool that helps people to keep track of their schedules, stay organized and be more productive,” said John Kremer, vice president, Yahoo! Mail.

“We’re executing against our vision of a smarter inbox, and this is just a preview of what’s to come in terms of integrating other network properties into the Yahoo! Mail experience. In the coming months, users will see additional features in Yahoo! Calendar to help them discover and keep track of their favorite events — like sports team schedules and concert dates — and even more features to enhance their overall communications experience.”

Key features in the new Yahoo! Calendar include:

– Sharing — Layering functionality that makes sharing events and keeping track of group activities easier

– Zoom — Calendar zoom capabilities make it easy to add and view new Calendar entries

– Photos — Integration with Flickr adds an interesting visual component to the Calendar and gives it the feel of a classic wall calendar through interesting public, Creative Commons designated photos on Flickr

– Alerts — Reminder feature makes it simple to set email, IM or SMS reminders for important Calendar activities

– Drag and Drop — Web 2.0 drag and drop functionality makes it simple to move appointments to new times — all without refreshing the Web page

– “To Do” List — A simple and handy “To List” feature makes it easy to keep track of important chores and tasks

When the Yahoo! Calendar beta becomes generally available in the coming months, it will include additional synching features and the capability to discover events of interest through tight integration with Upcoming.org and other Yahoo! properties. The Yahoo! Calendar beta is currently being rolled out in five markets: the United States, Brazil, India, Taiwan and the United Kingdom. Plans for global general availability will be announced later this year.

Openness is a major aspect of Yahoo!’s overall strategy, and open standards like CalDAV and iCalendar are key components. Yahoo! is a member of CalConnect, the Calendaring and Scheduling Consortium that helps further the development and adoption of these standards, and is hosting the CalConnect XIII members’ meetings at Yahoo!’s offices October 6th-10th.

Users will now be able to access station and schedule data for every service provider overseen by the MTA: New York City Transit (which includes subway and bus service), Long Island Rail Road, Long Island Bus, Metro-North Railroad, and the MTA Bus Company. Other connecting services also provide data via Google Maps, including NJ Transit (commuter rail, light rail and bus), Staten Island Ferry, and The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey (PATH Rail, AirTrain JFK, and AirTrain Newark). The trip planner can create trips across multiple agencies.

Being able to plan public transit trips in Google Maps makes it easier than ever to take advantage of all that New York has to offer. With this new partnership, users can get detailed itineraries that utilize any MTA services across its 5,000-square mile service area. Itineraries will include three routing options, complete with station locations, schedule times, transfer information, total trip time, and step-by-step walking directions. Icons for MTA train and bus stops will now be visible on Google Maps which heightens awareness of the availability of public transit options for users who are exploring an area; when clicked, the icons will display the routes serving the stop and upcoming departures. Additionally, when a user searches for driving directions within the MTA service area, a public transit itinerary will appear as an alternative. Need directions while on-the-go? Transit routing is also available on many mobile phones via Google Maps for mobile.

The MTA joins more than 75 other transit agencies spanning 12 countries that have joined the Google Transit program. To learn more about today’s announcement, head to maps.google.com/nyc.

On the national level, NBCU will offer advertising time from several of its cable networks to Google’s TV Ads platform. Inventory from Sci Fi, Oxygen, MSNBC, CNBC, Sleuth, and Chiller will be made available to Google in the coming months, with potential to expand onto other NBCU properties in the future. With the addition of NBC Universal inventory, advertisers using the Google TV Ads platform can reach NBCU Cable’s national audience and gain access to viewership data at an unprecedented scale. With this data, advertisers can better understand what consumers are responding to and make real-time adjustments to their campaign to maximize their ROI.

“We’re extremely pleased to join forces with Google on this effort, which will help us develop better accountability and ROI metrics for our advertisers and attract an entirely new group of clients to television advertising,” said Pilot. “This is another step in our commitment to trying innovative advertising approaches and testing new technologies that can help benefit our clients.”

“The Google TV Ads platform is making television advertising more accountable and measurable and we’re pleased with our progress to date,” said Armstrong. “Our partnership with NBCU will help us bring the power of television to a broader set of advertisers as well as give our current advertisers increased reach through our system.”

On the local level, NBCU and Google have also agreed to work jointly on adapting the Google TV Ads platform for local market use.

“This is a great way to reach clients who are interested in buying television advertising but may not have previously had the resources or ability to do so,” said Frank Comerford, President, Platform Development and Commercial Operations, NBC Local Media. “A self-service ad platform will be a great complement to our existing sales efforts and help us further connect our clients to their customers.”

As part of the agreement, NBC Universal will maintain its direct relationships with agencies and advertisers and can set parameters around the purchase of the available ad time. NBCU will also gain access to the large base of advertisers using Google’s AdWords™ online advertising program, many of whom are not currently television advertisers. The two companies will share in all ad revenue and explore innovative ways to expand the partnership in the future, including adapting the platform to add local inventory.

As part of their effort to help drive value for advertisers, NBCU and Google will also collaborate on a series of custom marketing and research projects using the Google TV Ads platform. Through its partnership with DISH Network, the Google TV Ads platform can report second-by-second set top box data allowing advertisers to measure viewership of their ads more precisely than ever before. The two companies will also take advantage of joint research that will help advertisers and agencies better understand their media mix and optimize their ad campaigns.

“We’re pleased that NBCU will make some of its inventory available on Google’s TV Ads platform,” said Laura Desmond, CEO of Starcom MediaVest Group. “The partnership will generate real value for our clients by providing us with a more measurable–and actionable–understanding of how consumers engage with content.”

In the early days of the Internet, web pages were frequently little more than text. But today the web has evolved into a powerful platform that enables users to collaborate with friends and colleagues through email and other web applications, edit documents, watch videos, listen to music, manage finances and much more. Google Chrome was built for today’s web and for the applications of tomorrow.

“We think of the browser as the window to the web – it’s a tool for users to interact with the web sites and applications they care about, and it’s important that we don’t get in the way of that experience,” said Sundar Pichai, Vice President of Product Management, Google Inc. “Just like the classic Google homepage, Google Chrome has a simple user interface with a sophisticated core to enable the modern web.”

Making the web experience better for users
Google Chrome was designed to make it easy for users to search and navigate the web for the content they’re looking for.

Fire Eagle gives users a place to store and manage information about their location, and offers developers clear protocols for updating or accessing that information. Because it’s open, any networked service can use Fire Eagle to respond to a user’s location – to help them find their friends, annotate the world or find nearby services or local information.

“Fire Eagle is about making everything on the Internet more useful, fun or interesting by adding the element of location,” said Tom Coates, head of product at Yahoo! Brickhouse. “We’re here to help people take their location to the Web by giving them the ability to control how much detail about their location they want to share and which applications they want to share it with.”

Fire Eagle makes it much easier for both users and developers to create Internet experiences that are geo-aware:

– For users, Fire Eagle acts as a simple interface for managing location information and deciding how — and with whom — to share it. Users can authorize Web, mobile or desktop applications to update their location automatically, or they can do it themselves manually on the Fire Eagle Web or mobile sites. Then they can decide how much of that information to share with their favorite services. At any time they can hide themselves, change their sharing preferences or delete any of their stored information.

– For developers, Fire Eagle takes away much of the costly and complicated heavy-lifting of developing geo-aware applications. Developers can focus on how they can use location in their services without having to build the infrastructure to work out where their users are. Fire Eagle — combined with Yahoo!’s full suite of geo technologies — now makes it practical for any service to become location-aware easily and inexpensively.

Fire Eagle was built at Yahoo! Brickhouse, a home for start-up like projects inside Yahoo where small teams seize on new ideas and create products around them. Since its private beta launch in March of this year, Fire Eagle has been integrated into over fifty live applications, including Dopplr, Pownce, Movable Type, and Outside.in, through the platform’s well-received API.

“The combination of Outside.in’s new Radar feature and Fire Eagle’s amazingly simple and powerful API means that our users can now see all the news and buzz within 1,000 feet of their current location, updated from any number of applications and devices,” said Steven Johnson, co-founder of Outside.in.

“Fire Eagle allowed us to easily add location data to Pownce using their simple API,” Leah Culver, co-founder, Pownce. “Pownce users can now say where they are and geotag their notes which adds a new dimension to the service.”

Services built on Fire Eagle during the private beta period include:

– Brightkite: Brightkite is a location based social network that allows users to track their friends’ locations and meet new people in their area.

– Dash: Dash is a two-way, Internet-connected GPS navigation system offering an innovative solution to traffic monitoring.

– Dipity: Dipity is the easiest way to make and share interactive stories for the people and topics users care about.

– Dopplr: Dopplr is a service for intelligent travelers that helps them make the most of their trips by sharing their travel plans with the people they trust.

– ekit: ekit is the leading communications provider to international travelers, offering a range of services including mobile phones, satellite phones, SIM cards, global calling cards, and recently the ekit travel journal.

– Lightpole: Lightpole is a mobile application service provider that distributes location-specific information to mobile devices in real-time and engages mobile users in interactive communities.

– Movable Type: Movable Type is a fully integrated, scalable, proven social publishing platform for building highly interactive websites, blogs and social networks.

– Navizon: Navizon provides a software-only wireless positioning system that triangulates signals broadcasted from Wi-Fi access points and cellular towers to help users find their location.

– Outside.in Radar: Outside.in’s Radar is personalized local news with you at the center of the map. Radar shows you everything going on nearby, wherever you are, from the stories on your street, to the events in your neighborhood, to headlines in your city.

– Pownce: Pownce is a way to keep in touch with and share messages, files, links and events with your friends.

– Loki: Loki adds your location into your favorite social networks so you can share it with your friends. Loki, powered by Skyhook Wireless, automatically informs your friend of your whereabouts, using platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Fire Eagle, RSS Feeds and more.

– SPOT: SPOT, the world’s first satellite messenger, sends users’ GPS location and custom messages to family and friends or emergency responders over a satellite communications network from virtually anywhere around the globe – even the most remote places – independent of cell phone coverage.

– ZKOUT: ZKOUT enables mobile device users to create content — messages, photos, videos — on the ZKOUT network from any location, and share it instantly with the people near you.

Developers wishing to learn more about Fire Eagle can visit: http://fireeagle.yahoo.net/developer.

“Zimbra is focused on creating communication and collaboration solutions that ease the pain points of traditional e-mail, and switching between multiple e-mail accounts is one of the communication headaches that users encounter on a daily basis,” said Satish Dharmaraj, Zimbra co-founder and Yahoo! vice president. “With Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop, we have taken our world-class collaboration suite and made it available for everyone for use anywhere, anytime, with any email account.”

Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop gives users access to the same sleek Zimbra experience, and showcases the latest technologies that have until now only been available via Web-based applications including:

– “Mash-ups” with other services; for example, when viewing an e-mail, users can see their schedule by hovering over a date, or see the status of a flight by looking at a flight number;

– Powerful search that can quickly scan a user’s e-mail and pull up relevant content;

– Built-in organization capabilities including automatically converting e-mails into conversations and advanced tagging; and

– Advanced calendaring that gives users access to their most important appointments and schedule even when they are on the go.

Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop also includes a number of features designed to help users stay organized, such as document creation, spreadsheets, task management and document storage, giving users a robust alternative to other desktop applications. New features include online and offline access to:

– Zimbra Documents, a document and spreadsheet program, which gives users the ability to embed complex objects such as photos into documents and spreadsheets. With the addition of Zimbra Documents, Zimbra Desktop users can easily create and edit documents and simple spreadsheets without having to switch between desktop programs or e-mail large attachments.

– Zimbra Briefcase, which allows users to upload, store, and conveniently access any files including spreadsheets, documents, presentations and others. Instead of keeping all attachments in e-mail you can simply store them in the same place with Zimbra Briefcase, and access them from anywhere, online or offline.

– Zimbra Tasks, a task management system which allows users to manage to-do lists simply and easily by monitoring start and due dates, priority, progress and percent complete.

Pricing and Availability

Yahoo! Zimbra Desktop Beta Version 3 is available for free download at Zimbra.com/desktop. Anyone with access to Zimbra Collaboration Suite (ZCS), Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, AOL Mail, or an IMAP/POP enabled server can use Zimbra Desktop (www.zimbra.com/desktop ).

Zimbra’s Web client and server, the Zimbra Collaboration Suite 5.0 Open Source Edition is free. The commercially supported ZCS 5.0 Network Edition is available for a 60-day free trial on the Zimbra website. Zimbra’s Hosted Demo (www.zimbra.com/demo) is available for an immediate test drive of ZCS.

ZCS Network Edition includes product support as well as software subscriptions to new releases, updates and patches. ZCS is available on-premise or as a hosted service and is available at a significant educational or non-profit discount. Please contact sales@zimbra.com for information. Users can discuss topics related to the Zimbra Collaboration Suite and provide feedback at www.zimbra.com/forums.