Thoughts, opinions and fascinating discoveries by Elliot, a student at USC
I write about Google. Plus, I offer tips for using the Google search engine.
Fact: Tap water is more strictly monitored for contaminants than bottled water.
All the municipal water systems that bring you tap water in this country are regulated by the EPA and the Department of Health, which both have higher water quality standards than the FDA (the organization that monitors bottled water).
Tags: 24 hours, camelbak, drinking water, filtration, google all-nighter, green, open source, programming contest, project, weekend
Just wanted to point out a new post on my Technology blog, in case it might help someone:
It’s always bugged me that Yahoo! makes the exclamation point part of their name, but for now, I’ll give in. I discovered that they’re now offering unlimited storage for all Yahoo! Mail accounts, even free ones. Old ones, new ones, old interface, new interface, USA and abroad– they’ll all get unlimited storage.
It was Sunday, so I went to church. While there, a few people asked me about my internship with Google, so I talked about it. One thing that struck me is that people actually care about money. I can honestly say that I don’t. What matters about money is not how much you get, or how it compares with others. It’s what you can do with it. I was reminded of this idea when I finally got around to reading about Google as Fortune magazine’s #1 Company to Work For. In it, Fortune asks founder Sergey Brin:
As it gets bigger, does Google risk becoming less zany?
“Definitely,” Sergey replies, “At the same time, we have more resources. If we decided that we need to have a big island for some operation tomorrow, we could afford to buy an island. We have no such plans. But the resources do give us opportunities.”
Very true. And the magazine also quotes Sergey as saying, “It’s important for people to always ask, ‘Why not?’ What’s accepted is often arbitrary.”
My friend Phillip mentioned this article, too, asking whether it’s all true. You can do what you want? The company is flexible? There are swimming pools and great food?
I loved hanging out at Google so much that I stayed until 10 PM. Even so, there were a couple things I didn’t get a chance to do: take a picture of the white Google sign near Charlie’s Cafe and take a picture of the “pink dinosaur.” It probably wouldn’t've hurt to take a picture of the SpaceShipOne replica, too. But that’s okay– none of those are going away in the foreseeable future, and I’m sure they’ve been photographed in the past (and probably by more competent photographers).
There were some cool pictures I did manage to take, though. Like this one of the USC printer in building 40 at the Googleplex.
Read the rest of this entry »
As my time in Mountain View has approached its end, things have gotten bit more scattered. I’ve also been attending more intense classes here, which means information overload– and a lot of it is really interesting information, too.
Today was my second day at Google. It’s hard to believe it’s the end of my second day already. I’ve done so much, and yet there is so much I haven’t done. In particular, I think I should meet up with Hanah, who was my contact for the Google Ambassador Program. Also, I should meet up with the members of my team who work in Mountain View. It seems that there is just not enough time in one week. The Mountain View interns have less time, because they have hosts and may be assigned small projects already, but they also get to be here for the entire summer, so that’s less of an issue.
One thing I forgot to mention about yesterday are the t-shirts I picked up. As I mentioned in my first day post, I was randomly talking with Mike. In case it’s confidential, I won’t say what he works on. But it’s somewhat clear from the free t-shirts, which are totally awesome. Just take a look:
Here’s a summary of how I landed an internship with Google. I feel compelled to write this out for the first time because the vibe I got at Google is that people are really friendly, really honest, and one heck of a lot smarter than me. So the least I could do is be honest.
I didn’t actually get one of these Noogler hats, but they do consider us Nooglers around here. I saw a few of the hats around, although they weren’t generally being worn by anybody. It sounds like if they had TGIF this Friday and I went, I would get one. But unfortunately this Friday’s TGIF is cancelled due to Monday’s holiday. Maybe I’ll ask someone if I can still get the hat; they’re so cool. Although we did get a Google visor already, this Noogler hat has a propeller on top (which you can’t see in the photo), so it stands out.
Image by “Moblog” (source)
As I’m writing this down, I’m quickly finding that the connections are quite a bit more twisted than I thought! It’s really interesting to look for my old emails and reconstruct in my memory just what happened. I believe it started with submitting my resume on Google’s website for a summer internship. At the time, I was a freshman at USC. I received a reply from Heelie, who told me that no, the internship program requires at least two years of college. That’s fine, so I inquired about the Google Pizza Program which I discovered online somehow and read about on Google’s website. Read the rest of this entry »
If you’re a webmaster, chances are good that you’ve tried using the link: operator in the Google search box, and found that it doesn’t return complete results. Well, you can now get a ton of really interesting and useful information about your site and how Google and Googlebot look at it. The Google Blog and Google Webmaster Central Blog report that Google has added a new Links feature to their webmaster tools, allowing you to get a more complete list of who’s linking to you. Plus, you can filter and export this data.
