“Don’t think. Just walk.” — a fellow hiker. Last week I returned from climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Africa. I’ll start with the bottom line: I made it to the top! That’s three of us at sunrise on the sixth day. We took the Machame route, which takes seven days. In theory, you could march right up the mountain, but you need time for your body to acclimate to the altitude, so after ascending for a couple days, you spend several days hiking around below the main summit getting used to the altitude. We did something that 95% of people don’t do: we hiked up to the crater at the top of Kilimanjaro (18,000+ feet) and camped there overnight. There are some pros and cons to this approach. One big advantage is that you do the 6+ hour slog up to the summit during the day instead of starting at midnight. Hiking during the day is leagues better than at night, in my opinion. The other big advantage is that you get to explore the crater. For example, this was the view out the front of our tent: That glacier was just a five minute walk away, and then you could pet the glacier all you wanted. I gave this one a big hug: There’s a disadvantage to camping in the crater though: you’re just below the summit, and so your body isn’t getting all the oxygen it wants. Most people hike to the top, stay for twenty minutes, and immediately descend. You’re spending most of a day at that altitude. We heard people throwing up in the morning, and later we recognized a couple people from Crater Camp going by us in a stretcher: That’s a normal stretcher with a single all-terrain wheel mounted underneath, and it helps get people down faster. Our guide jokingly called it the “Kilimanjaro Express.” Some people reading this post might wonder, “ Can I climb Kilimanjaro? ” I read that about 50% of people make it to the summit. Kilimanjaro isn’t like rock-climbing; it’s like walking 5-7 hours a day, mostly uphill. If you’re reasonably fit, you’ve got a decent chance. I did a couple triathlons last year and did similar stamina training before the climb. That meant the Kilimanjaro hiking was more of a grind than grueling or arduous. But it’s not really the walking that gets people–it’s the altitude. If you’re lucky, you’ll get a headache that Aleve can solve or possibly other mild symptoms of Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS). If you’re unlucky, you might get High Altitude Pulmonary Edema (HAPE) or High Altitude Cerebral Edema (HACE). One book I read said that for climbers of Mt. McKinley, which is about 1,000 feet higher, 3% of climbers experienced symptoms of HAPE, e.g. extreme shortness of breath, while 0.5% of climbers experienced symptoms of HACE, such as ataxia–think poor coordination or the inability to walk a straight line. As long as you’re aware of the symptoms and descend if things get bad, you should be fine. But you’ll want to read up on altitude illness if you decide to climb. In my experience, the guides on Kilimanjaro are very well-trained to spot HAPE and HACE. Fitness training doesn’t really help with AMS, HAPE, or HACE, so I was lucky to be in the “only got a mild headache” set of folks. A better question is “ Do I want to climb Kilimanjaro? ” And that depends. Do you like camping and hiking? You’ll be camping without a shower for several days. You’ll face some real difficulties–several people told me it was the hardest thing they’d ever done. And it can be expensive (besides the airfare and the trip itself, you’ll probably end up spending hundreds of dollars on various gear). But it can be immensely rewarding to test yourself and see what your limits are. I think maybe we don’t do that enough sometimes. No matter what, it’s definitely an adventure. By the way, the best shower I ever took was the first shower after Kilimanjaro. After a week on the mountain, I looked like this: During that first shower, I think the phone rang, someone knocked on the door, and at some point the power went out. I didn’t care. I just kept on showering. A few tips in case you decide to go: - I’ve read lots of Kilimanjaro books, and the best one to start with is the book by Henry Stedman . - I never walk with hiking poles, so I almost didn’t bring poles. Trust me: you should bring hiking poles. I definitely recommend the FlickLock or thumb lock poles over the “twist to unlock” poles. These poles worked very well for me. I’d opt for black handles if you can, because the gray handles got pretty grubby-looking by the end of seven days. - Get good hiking boots and wear them all over the place for a month or two. - Take care of your lips with SPF 15 or SPF 30 lip balm or Chap Stick. I used regular Chap Stick, which is SPF 4, but the sun is much stronger at higher altitudes. My lips were pretty sunburnt by the end of the hike. - We flew into Kilimanjaro International Airport (JRO, but sometimes written as KIA) from Amsterdam on KLM. But a lot of people flew into Dar Es Salaam (DAR) via Dubai on Emirates. The people we talked to said that the Emirates flights were very nice. - You may the word “Mzungu.” Our guide told us that it means “guest,” but a more literal translation would be “white person.” As far as I could tell, people are saying it with affection though. - Hike at your own pace–ideally a slow, steady pace that you can maintain for hours. It’s Kilimanjaro, not Kilima Nascar . - Throw in a safari at Tarangire National Park, Ngorongoro Crater, or the Serengeti National Park. As long as you’re in Africa, why wouldn’t you want to see stuff like this? Or a sunset like this? I’d like to thank everyone who supported me with good wishes or a donation to charity:water to support clean water projects. If you’d like to donate, there’s still a few weeks left .

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Climbing Kilimanjaro

by Miriam Ellis If you own a local business and get a phone call from a rep identifying himself as contacting you from Google (even if the call is coming from India), don’t make the mistake of assuming it’s yet another annoying phone scam. Mike Blumenthal has just reported confirmation from Google that these phone calls are legitimate and are part of Google’s 2010 effort to clean up local business data quality. This unexpected new move from Google has three interesting aspects to it worth pointing out. The Good I fully support any efforts Google makes to clean up spammy issues in Google Maps and Place Pages. This latest phone call program apparently stems from a new policy of verifying community edits made to business listings. So, if someone tries to make an edit to your business listing, you may get a call from Google asking whether the edit that’s been suggested is an accurate one. Frankly, considering the great silence that has historically surrounded Google Maps, I was amazed to hear of Google reps calling business owners. This is really something new. This program may help prevent negative competitive editing and hijacking, to some extent, so that’s the positive aspect of this activity. The Bad The Google phone reps are not allowed to give out any type of contact information or call back number to the local business owners whom they are phoning. There goes a sense of trust in the legitimacy of the phone call! If I hadn’t read the news about this and a client phoned me saying they’d been contacted by a ‘Google employee’ who wanted their business data, I would tell the client this was likely a scam. Business owners are inundated with phishing and telemarketing calls. How many of them are going to trust that Google is really phoning them? It’s really unfortunate that Google didn’t come up with a more trustworthy way of implementing this program. The Ugly Saddest of all, one has to fear that real scammers will benefit from this scenario. Once business owners understand that Google might actually phone them, how easy would it be for the bad guys to pretend they are from Google (after all, they don’t have to provide any type of ID, thanks to Google not requiring this of their own employees) and get access to unsuspecting business owners’ data, Place Pages and more? The results of this could get ugly, indeed. In Conclusion It’s pretty easy for business owners to learn that certain entities will never contact them for particular types of information. For example, online banking entities warn their clients that the bank will never send them an email requesting their account details. Paypal provides similar warnings. Business owners learn not to respond to suspicious emails, once they have been advised not to. Now, here we have Google, whose reputation for silence has engendered the belief that no one would ever actually hear from them, suddenly phoning the public. It’s great that they are making these calls, but I would exhort Eric Schmidt to consider putting some type of safeguard in place so that business owners can identify that these calls are truly coming from Google. I would suggest that an email be sent out to the business owner, notifying them that a call will be coming in from a Google business rep within the next day, week, or something similar. This would enable the business owner to cross reference the email and the phone call, arriving at some semblance of validity. Of course, scammers could duplicate this process, but at least it would give the business owner something along the lines of a heads-up that a real Google rep needs to speak with them. I don’t know if Google is depending upon the element of surprise in these calls to see if a phone number is answered by a legitimate business, but we’re really looking at a problem if the business owner is trying to hide details from Google while Google is trying to hide details from the business owner. It starts to look like a strange boxing match, doesn’t it? It will be very interesting to start hearing more anecdotes from SMBs who receive these calls as time goes by. If you run a local business, I’m glad you are reading this article; per usual, Google hasn’t done much to educate their public regarding this new policy. At least, having read this, you will know that a call from Google may be the real thing. May I suggest that you use this unprecedented opportunity to ask some of your most burning questions about Maps and Places? The chance may not come again. Be sure and visit our small business news site.

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Don’t Hang Up! Google Really Phoning Local Businesses.

Humans have always been fascinated by the night sky. And Googlers are no exception. Over the years, Google engineers have used their 20 percent time to create Google Sky, Moon, Mars and most recently Google Sky Map for Android . This handy app, built by engineers in our Pittsburgh office , turns your Android-powered phone into a live map of the night sky. You just point your phone to the sky and it gives you information about the stars and planets that you’re looking at. Since we introduced the app a year ago, Sky Map has been downloaded more than 5 million times. On Sunday night we had a wonderful opportunity to share our passion for astronomy with our community in Pittsburgh at the Deep Sky Urban Star Party , held in the abandoned swimming pool at Leslie Park in Lawrenceville . We loaded up a bunch of Android phones with Sky Map and joined the Amateur Astronomers Association of Pittsburgh —who brought along their telescopes—and several hundred local residents for a night of stargazing. As a Sky Map engineer the biggest thrill I get is when we get emails from people who have used our app to show a planet to their children for the first time. At the Star Party we were delighted to have the chance to show people around the night sky in person. It was great to meet so many people who were both excited by astronomy and interested in Google’s technology. Thanks for all of your ideas for new features, and a big thank you to the Leslie Park Pool Collective and all involved for organizing such a fun event. Photos by Jason Parker-Burlingham Posted by John Taylor, Software Engineer

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Stargazing in Pittsburgh

Humans have always been fascinated by the night sky. And Googlers are no exception. Over the years, Google engineers have used their 20 percent time to create Google Sky, Moon, Mars and most recently Google Sky Map for Android . This handy app, built by engineers in our Pittsburgh office , turns your Android-powered phone into a live map of the night sky. You just point your phone to the sky and it gives you information about the stars and planets that you’re looking at. Since we introduced the app a year ago, Sky Map has been downloaded more than 5 million times. On Sunday night we had a wonderful opportunity to share our passion for astronomy with our community in Pittsburgh at the Deep Sky Urban Star Party , held in the abandoned swimming pool at Leslie Park in Lawrenceville . We loaded up a bunch of Android phones with Sky Map and joined the Amateur Astronomers Association of Pittsburgh —who brought along their telescopes—and several hundred local residents for a night of stargazing. As a Sky Map engineer the biggest thrill I get is when we get emails from people who have used our app to show a planet to their children for the first time. At the Star Party we were delighted to have the chance to show people around the night sky in person. It was great to meet so many people who were both excited by astronomy and interested in Google’s technology. Thanks for all of your ideas for new features, and a big thank you to the Leslie Park Pool Collective and all involved for organizing such a fun event. Photos by Jason Parker-Burlingham Posted by John Taylor, Software Engineer

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Stargazing in Pittsburgh

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed. Speed is a common theme at Google—the notion of speed is baked into all of our products, from Google Chrome to web search. Often, we also simply develop features that help deliver answers fast. Whether by displaying the exact content you’re looking for at the top of your search results page or by optimizing the way you search, many of these speed enhancements save you keystrokes—and time. This week, we released two new features: Sunrise and Sunset Search feature Whether you’re looking to find the best time for a morning jog or trying to plan that perfect moment for a wedding proposal, knowing exactly when the sun rises or sets can always be helpful. This week, we were happy to launch a Sunrise and Sunset feature for search. It gives the precise times of sunsets and sunrises for any location around the world. Unlike the weather, sunrises and sunsets are quite predictable , and as a result, we don’t use a data source. Instead, we calculate sunrise and sunset times based on latitude, longitude and the current time. This calculation has been of interest to astronomers and mathematicians for millennia, so they’ve had time to get it just right. And for most locations, it’s accurate to within a single minute. Example searches: [ sunrise port jefferson ny ] or [ sunset cancun ] Google Search by Voice expanded to more languages Google Search by Voice enables people to search the web faster than ever before—getting you answers with fewer keystrokes. This service was originally launched in English, and was offered in the U.S., UK, India, Australia and New Zealand. We later introduced Japanese and Mandarin to expand the number of possible users. Just a week ago, we launched the service in French, Italian, German and Spanish. Given that local dialects are a factor in the performance of speech recognition, we first launched our service in the four countries most closely associated with these languages: France, Germany, Italy and Spain. This week we followed with Korean and the launch in Taiwan of Traditional Mandarin. To get started with Google Search by Voice, visit the Google mobile page in your country’s domain (for example, in France go to m.google.fr ) and download the application for your phone’s operating system in your locale. You’ll find this available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry phones. Ultimately, our goal is to bring Google Search by voice to speakers of all languages, so stay tuned for more announcements here. We’ll see you back here next week for more new announcements. Posted by Johanna Wright, Director of Product Management, Search

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This week in search 6/27/10

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed. Speed is a common theme at Google—the notion of speed is baked into all of our products, from Google Chrome to web search. Often, we also simply develop features that help deliver answers fast. Whether by displaying the exact content you’re looking for at the top of your search results page or by optimizing the way you search, many of these speed enhancements save you keystrokes—and time. This week, we released two new features: Sunrise and Sunset Search feature Whether you’re looking to find the best time for a morning jog or trying to plan that perfect moment for a wedding proposal, knowing exactly when the sun rises or sets can always be helpful. This week, we were happy to launch a Sunrise and Sunset feature for search. It gives the precise times of sunsets and sunrises for any location around the world. Unlike the weather, sunrises and sunsets are quite predictable , and as a result, we don’t use a data source. Instead, we calculate sunrise and sunset times based on latitude, longitude and the current time. This calculation has been of interest to astronomers and mathematicians for millennia, so they’ve had time to get it just right. And for most locations, it’s accurate to within a single minute. Example searches: [ sunrise port jefferson ny ] or [ sunset cancun ] Google Search by Voice expanded to more languages Google Search by Voice enables people to search the web faster than ever before—getting you answers with fewer keystrokes. This service was originally launched in English, and was offered in the U.S., UK, India, Australia and New Zealand. We later introduced Japanese and Mandarin to expand the number of possible users. Just a week ago, we launched the service in French, Italian, German and Spanish. Given that local dialects are a factor in the performance of speech recognition, we first launched our service in the four countries most closely associated with these languages: France, Germany, Italy and Spain. This week we followed with Korean and the launch in Taiwan of Traditional Mandarin. To get started with Google Search by Voice, visit the Google mobile page in your country’s domain (for example, in France go to m.google.fr ) and download the application for your phone’s operating system in your locale. You’ll find this available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry phones. Ultimately, our goal is to bring Google Search by voice to speakers of all languages, so stay tuned for more announcements here. We’ll see you back here next week for more new announcements. Posted by Johanna Wright, Director of Product Management, Search

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This week in search 6/27/10

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed. Speed is a common theme at Google—the notion of speed is baked into all of our products, from Google Chrome to web search. Often, we also simply develop features that help deliver answers fast. Whether by displaying the exact content you’re looking for at the top of your search results page or by optimizing the way you search, many of these speed enhancements save you keystrokes—and time. This week, we released two new features: Sunrise and Sunset Search feature Whether you’re looking to find the best time for a morning jog or trying to plan that perfect moment for a wedding proposal, knowing exactly when the sun rises or sets can always be helpful. This week, we were happy to launch a Sunrise and Sunset feature for search. It gives the precise times of sunsets and sunrises for any location around the world. Unlike the weather, sunrises and sunsets are quite predictable , and as a result, we don’t use a data source. Instead, we calculate sunrise and sunset times based on latitude, longitude and the current time. This calculation has been of interest to astronomers and mathematicians for millennia, so they’ve had time to get it just right. And for most locations, it’s accurate to within a single minute. Example searches: [ sunrise port jefferson ny ] or [ sunset cancun ] Google Search by Voice expanded to more languages Google Search by Voice enables people to search the web faster than ever before—getting you answers with fewer keystrokes. This service was originally launched in English, and was offered in the U.S., UK, India, Australia and New Zealand. We later introduced Japanese and Mandarin to expand the number of possible users. Just a week ago, we launched the service in French, Italian, German and Spanish. Given that local dialects are a factor in the performance of speech recognition, we first launched our service in the four countries most closely associated with these languages: France, Germany, Italy and Spain. This week we followed with Korean and the launch in Taiwan of Traditional Mandarin. To get started with Google Search by Voice, visit the Google mobile page in your country’s domain (for example, in France go to m.google.fr ) and download the application for your phone’s operating system in your locale. You’ll find this available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry phones. Ultimately, our goal is to bring Google Search by voice to speakers of all languages, so stay tuned for more announcements here. We’ll see you back here next week for more new announcements. Posted by Johanna Wright, Director of Product Management, Search

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This week in search 6/27/10

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed. Speed is a common theme at Google—the notion of speed is baked into all of our products, from Google Chrome to web search. Often, we also simply develop features that help deliver answers fast. Whether by displaying the exact content you’re looking for at the top of your search results page or by optimizing the way you search, many of these speed enhancements save you keystrokes—and time. This week, we released two new features: Sunrise and Sunset Search feature Whether you’re looking to find the best time for a morning jog or trying to plan that perfect moment for a wedding proposal, knowing exactly when the sun rises or sets can always be helpful. This week, we were happy to launch a Sunrise and Sunset feature for search. It gives the precise times of sunsets and sunrises for any location around the world. Unlike the weather, sunrises and sunsets are quite predictable , and as a result, we don’t use a data source. Instead, we calculate sunrise and sunset times based on latitude, longitude and the current time. This calculation has been of interest to astronomers and mathematicians for millennia, so they’ve had time to get it just right. And for most locations, it’s accurate to within a single minute. Example searches: [ sunrise port jefferson ny ] or [ sunset cancun ] Google Search by Voice expanded to more languages Google Search by Voice enables people to search the web faster than ever before—getting you answers with fewer keystrokes. This service was originally launched in English, and was offered in the U.S., UK, India, Australia and New Zealand. We later introduced Japanese and Mandarin to expand the number of possible users. Just a week ago, we launched the service in French, Italian, German and Spanish. Given that local dialects are a factor in the performance of speech recognition, we first launched our service in the four countries most closely associated with these languages: France, Germany, Italy and Spain. This week we followed with Korean and the launch in Taiwan of Traditional Mandarin. To get started with Google Search by Voice, visit the Google mobile page in your country’s domain (for example, in France go to m.google.fr ) and download the application for your phone’s operating system in your locale. You’ll find this available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry phones. Ultimately, our goal is to bring Google Search by voice to speakers of all languages, so stay tuned for more announcements here. We’ll see you back here next week for more new announcements. Posted by Johanna Wright, Director of Product Management, Search

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This week in search 6/27/10

by Mike Moran I am constantly talking to business people, with companies large and small, and I often give them the same advice about Internet marketing, and search marketing in particular: Tell what you know so your customers can learn from your expertise. You can put that expertise on Web pages, on a blog, in tweets, in a YouTube video, a podcast–I don’t really care how you do it, but do it. Too often, the response is something like, “But I don’t have anything to say.” I suspect that you do have something to say, but you are just not giving yourself permission to say it. Image by DavidErickson via Flickr Now, don’t get me wrong. I realize that you might not be a world class expert, but you are probably an expert in something or else you wouldn’t be in business. You at least know more than your customers about it, don’t you? If a customer asked you a question, would you be struck mute because you aren’t a world expert? Or would you give them your best answer, knowing that it might not be THE best answer in the world, but it it will be better than what your customer knows now? Of course you’d answer the question. So why can’t you put that same answer out on the Internet? I think that you don’t give yourself permission. I think that you are intimidated by the Web. I think that you are fearful that someone will say you are wrong. I think that you don’t want to have the answer out there in public. I think you are scared. And honestly, you can stay in your store behind the counter and answer the questions privately of anyone who walks in. You can answer the phone and help one customer. You can respond to e-mail questions and be relatively secure that your expertise will not be subjected to any public scrutiny. But you are selling yourself short. Anytime a customer asks a question, that is something that other people probably want to know. And you can decide to put it out there, or not. If you put it out there, a few things happen. First, you help people that have the same problem. Second, you attract attention to yourslef as knowledgeable in the field, perhaps bringing you more sales. But it’s the third thing that might happen that gets us all hung up. Someone might criticize us. Or (horrors!), even prove us wrong about what we said. And after we get over the awful, excruciating, humiliation of that embarrassment, guess what? We have learned something. We can graciously thank the other person for correcting us. We can then answer that question better for all of our customers from now on. And, every time that happens, we become even more of an expert. Maybe even a world class expert. So, it’s up to you. You can excuse yourself from the Web and from social media by claiming you have nothing to say. Or you can put yourself out there, helping people with what expertise you have and learning from others when you fall short. If you do, your customers will be helped, your business will grow, and so will your expertise. You just have to get over your fears. Not completely. Just enough to do it. Be sure and visit our small business news site.

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Why you think you have nothing to say

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed. We work hard to consistently develop new tools, features and algorithmic changes to help us better understand what you mean when you enter a query into the Google search box—and we ultimately use that understanding to get you the information you’re looking for as fast as possible. Understanding is core to our mission —particularly as we strive to be as useful in your everyday tasks. For example, if you search for a local sports team, and there’s been a recent game, we’ll show you scores. If you’re visiting Boston and looking for a restaurant, you’ll find tailored search suggestions based on the best Beantown spots. It’s these features that enhance the experience of searching and help you find exactly what you’re looking for. This week, we’ve made a few changes that we hope will make Google search even better for you. Spelling Corrections in Suggest Since we first launched Google Suggest, we’ve offered spell-corrected search completions to provide you with similar search queries from other users. With this feature, not only does Suggest help you rest your fingers because you don’t have to type out a full query—you can also catch a mistake quickly and easily. An example of old spelling correction in Google Sugge st This week we launched an update that makes Google Suggest even more intuitive and simple. If you’re typing a query for which there are no search completions to offer, and yet some of your search terms do seem to be misspelled, Google Suggest will now offer a “Did you mean” suggestion for your query—giving you an option to correct your spelling right away and get on with your search. These spelling suggestions already exist on the results page, but by moving them to an earlier point in the search process, we hope we’ve made it faster and easier to get to the results you’re looking for. Right now, this feature is offered only for google.com in English, but we’re working to roll this out internationally in the near future. Google Suggest with the new spelling corrections feature Mobile app results in mobile search With tens of thousands of apps available for both Android and iPhone phone, there are plenty of options to choose from when you’re looking for new apps. And it makes sense that if you hear about a great new app while you’re out and about, you’ll want to download it then and there. In an effort to make apps even easier to find, this week we launched a new feature for mobile search that helps users on Android-powered devices and iPhones find and download mobile apps. So the next time you’re looking for the latest action game, multimedia app or travel tool on your phone, we’ll show you a special result at the top of your mobile search results showing basic information about the app you’re looking for, including title, price and publisher. You’ll also find a link that will take you directly to the app’s installation page in the Android Market or Apple’s App Store. Example mobile searches on your iPhone or Android device: [ download pandora ] or [ bank of america app ] A new look for the Google homepage Search is more fun when it’s personalized. That’s why I was delighted to announce our new feature that allows you to personalize your Google homepage with a favorite photo. Whether you choose a picture from your computer, your own Picasa Web Album or a public gallery of photos hosted by Picasa, Google is now yours to personalize. To get started, head to google.com and look for the “Change background image” link in the lower left-hand side of the page. Keep an eye out for more fun announcements with this feature! Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more next week. Posted by Marissa Mayer, VP Search Products & User Experience

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This week in search 6/6/10