From the category archives:

google

iOS, Safari, and the Mobile Browser War

by Ian Rosenwach 1.2.2018

In the U.S., Chrome has 39% market share, behind Apple Inc.’s Safari browser, which has 52%. UC Browser has less than 1% market share in the U.S. – WSJ (subscription required) The article from the WSJ is about how Google Chrome lags UC Browser (owned by Alibaba) in Asian markets but wow — that stat […]

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What is “Fake News”?

by Ian Rosenwach 11.15.2016

Yesterday Google and Facebook both announced they were cracking down on “fake news” sites that are using their ad networks to make money. First some background: Google and Facebook have publisher networks that display ads sold by Google or FB on their site.  The revenue from those ads is split between the Publisher and Google/FB. […]

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Apple on the defensive?

by Ian Rosenwach 1.20.2014

Instead of the round-the-block lines that have greeted Apple product introductions in China and other countries in the past, only about a dozen customers showed up to buy iPhones at the opening of a store in Beijing – despite the presence of a special guest, the Apple chief executive, Timothy D. Cook. (NYT) I admire […]

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An Icons Tale, a.k.a demystifying the tiny images on the lower right hand corner of Gmail theme preview icons

by Ian Rosenwach 11.5.2013

Most of you probably know that some Gmail theme designs can change based on certain things, like time of day. Something you might not know (I didn’t) is that the theme options screen actually tells you this. In those tiny theme preview icons. The fact that someone had to explain this to me, then we […]

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Apple continues to expand the customer base

by Ian Rosenwach 10.22.2013

Today Apple announced that they are giving away new software for free, selling their computers at a slightly lower price point, and launching the new iPad Air. Tim Cook’s vision for Apple becomes more clear with every product launch: Keep product quality high and deliver incremental new technologies (so far) Experiment with lower prices and […]

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App discovery – when will app search evolve?

by Ian Rosenwach 8.16.2013

Ben Evans has a good post on the history of content discovery on the web and the implications for app discovery.  I want to talk specifically about discovery through search, and why search isn’t as effective as it could be for app discovery. Inputting a keyword requires the user to have at a sense of […]

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Book Review: The Master Switch

by Ian Rosenwach 3.20.2011

I’ll confess – the middle 150 pages or so of “The Master Switch”, by Tim Wu, went by slowly. But the final 100 pages more than make up for it. Wu covers the emergence of communications empires from telegraph to telephone, radio to broadcast TV, and cable TV to the Internet. He provides context on […]

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The Content Subscription Wars

by Ian Rosenwach 2.16.2011

This week both Apple and Google announced new Content Subscription Platforms for Publishers.  Google calls their One Pass while Apple’s runs within the App Store.   Google Checkout powers the payment component of One Pass. This will be an uphill fight for Google, for at least two big reasons: I don’t know exact numbers, but expect […]

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Google Latitude, the iPhone, and Apple’s values

by Ian Rosenwach 9.10.2009

I’ve just started using Google Latitude for iPhone more.  But there’s a problem I knew about but hadn’t experienced. My friends who have Blackberries have their location constantly updated on the phone.  I have to actually navigate to the Latitude website in Safari for my location to be updated! This is because Apple does not […]

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Google, China, and brand nationalism

by Ian Rosenwach 9.5.2009

On Thursday news broke that Google’s China chief, Kai Fun-Lee, was resigning. This was positioned in the media as a blow to Google’s China efforts. This story, translated from Chinese, provides some excellent perspective. The article in the WSJ had an interesting tidbit: “Mr. Lee’s departure is the end to a tenure in which some […]

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