The bitter dispute between Google and China rumbles on. In the latest episode, the company has released a white paper urging the international community to fight internet restrictions, which it calls the “trade barriers of the 21st century”.
Naturally, Google officials denied that the report was targeted at a specific country. Bob Boorstin, Google’s director of public policy, told the FT: Read more
Facebook says future is chat not email
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the future of messaging was online conversations not email, as he unveiled an upgraded browser-based email and messaging service at a news conference in San Francisco on Monday.
With more than half a billion members, such a service could turn Facebook into a serious webmail challenger to Microsoft, Yahoo and Google overnight.
Our live coverage from the news conference is after the jump: Read more
Putting Google answers first
Google has never been shy about the fact that it automatically puts results from some of its own services at the top of search results pages if these help answer a users’ query faster. If you type in an address, a map from Google Maps might give you the instant answer you need.
But how often does Google do this, does it always result in superior results, and what effect does it have on companies that offer rival services? Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School, has tested what he calls “hard-coding” by the search engine – that is, where it overrides the normal algorithmic results to put a Google answer first – and concludes the practice is now common. Read more
| About this blog | Blog guide |
Richard Waters has headed the FT's San Francisco bureau since 2002 and covers Google and Microsoft, among other things. A former New York bureau chief for the FT, he is intrigued by Silicon Valley's unique financial and business culture, and is looking forward to covering his second Tech Bust.
Chris Nuttall has been online and messing around with computers for more than 20 years and since 2004 has reported from the FT's San Francisco bureau on semiconductors, video games, consumer electronics and all things interwebby.
Maija Palmer has been writing about technology for the FT since 1999 and is fascinated by cybercrime, privacy and all the other issues of the information society. Based in London, she covers European tech companies and hopes that they won't all get acquired by American rivals.
Robin Kwong is the FT's technology, media and telecoms page editor in London. Formerly he was the Taipei correspondent and wrote about the companies that manufacture the vast majority of the world's computers and gadgets. He is interested in the intricacies of the technology supply chain and how China is increasingly changing the tech landscape.
Tim Bradshaw is the FT's digital media correspondent, and has just moved from London to join our team in San Francisco. He has covered start-ups such as Twitter and Spotify, as well as the online ambitions of more established media companies, such as the BBC iPlayer. He also covers the advertising, marketing and video-game industries. Tim has been writing about technology, business and finance since 2003.
