It does strike me as odd that is private but I need to install a chrome extension to use it and there is a prominent 'Sign up' button on the top right corner.

I am also struggling to understand why the need to install a chrome extension to see search results. Feels like a lot of users will get lost on this first funnel step.

You don't need the extension or sign up to use the search engine, just type into the search bar on the top of the page.

What is raising red flags for me is this part of the FAQ:

> How does You.com make money? > We are currently focused on building the best possible search experience. We will explore monetization ideas in the future and look forward to your feedback in that process.

So they don't have a monetization strategy yet, and they expect you to sign up and install a browser extension? That's a recipe for disaster right there.

This looks promising, but until the monetization situation is figured out, I'm going to avoid giving them any access to my information.

> You don't need the extension or sign up to use the search engine, just type into the search bar on the top of the page.

I'm not sure this is true when you're using Chrome. I use safari and thought the same thing at first.

Your project looks fairly similar to Chalice but using TS. Am I correct? How do you compare yourselves to Chalice?

The big difference is that Chalice (from what I remember) runs a local server where you test your functions and once you are ready, you'll deploy it to AWS.

This deploys it to AWS first, and when a function gets invoked remotely, streams that request to your local machine where it'll execute that function and send the results back to AWS. You basically get to test and develop against your real infrastructure.

I'm not sure it's fair to say that 'Apple is trying to shut down hey' as it sounds like that same situation hasn't affected any other apps before. Apple is choosing to enforce their terms (which you can disagree with - i think charging 30% is way too much) and that is about it. A lot of other apps have faced the same situation before and only certain ones have managed to fall into the specific 'readers' exemption.

I'm also a bit surprised that a team like the one I guess hey has, did not see this coming, as it's pretty clear in the apple store terms and anybody with some iOS and app store publishing experience would have been concerned about that from day 1.

I miss seeing '.cgi' or '.pl' at the end of the http endpoints to give it that authentic 90's look and feel :)

also the user directories. domain.com/~user/

This just remembered me about the MIT system created by Terry Winograd in 1970 called SHRDLU.

I have always considered that you need an environment to create an artifical intelligence. The basics for a real progress are to be able to learn and if you cannot 'feel' the environment that becomes really hard. There are some basic concepts needed for a 'natural talk' you cannot learn if you cannot perceive things (lets say for example dimensions, temperature, contour).

To overcome those problems SHRDLU created kind of a virtual environment and results from my point of view are really awesome (keep in mind this was done in 1970).

Site with information is currently at Stanford server's: http://hci.stanford.edu/~winograd/shrdlu/

I was really impressed with that when I read about it (I think Douglas Hofstader had a section about it in GEB).

Does anyone know if there have been similar projects along the same lines? (i.e. with a constrained virtual environment)

Very 'funny' and usual problems. I really enjoyed the reading. I have found myself many times helping people on points like 1 and 10 (copy&paste ---> keyboard&chair problems).

I have also found a lot of people which is relatively new to internet and who don't see a difference between 'Internet', the browser and google. You speak to them, and they say: my page does not work, it's not active (when you have checked it is working). Then, with further investigation you find that they are typing the domain name on google, and they get no result, which, of course doesn't mean the page is not working. They just mix google, browser and internet.

It's similar to when you hear 'using the internet' exclusively refered to web browsing, as if web was the only thing internet had.

I think the main concern which groups both concepts is 'usability'. I really don't know the reason why, but many sites seem to forget that concept. Whatever the intention behind your site is, you need to think about usability. If your site is not really usable, you will pay for it in the future; it doesn't really matter that you have a really cool design. If your site is not usable you are in big trouble.

So, when making a website or an app, you should ask yourself: is this the most logical and the easier way to do this? If the answer is no you should probably keep thinking and searching for a solution.

At least, from the previews, it seems IE9 is fitting much more to the standards and getting really good results on ACID tests.

Anyway, adapting websites for IE6 was really disturbing... strange margins, propietary parameters and a large etcetera that could really help make your life unpleasant.

Hope IE9 really does as good as it seems from reviews.

Of course one should be 'worried' about privacy with his/her data on facebook, but i don't think one should care less with the information google has about a huge amount of people.

Just as a reminder: they know what you look for on the web (google itself), they know what you talk to your friends (gtalk), they know what you get via email (gmail), they know what videos you watch to (on youtube) and they now even have a browser which is being adopted by a lot of people pretty fast.

Maybe one does not use all those services but many people do, and depending on how you look at it, probably google has a lot of more 'private' information about one's life than facebook.

That, of course, doesn't mean 'FB disconnect' is a bad idea. It's just that i get 'scared' when someone who know a lot about you (google in this case) build something trying to look as they 'protect your privacy'... (i also keep in mind that google is not prone to providing data about users, but they have the ability to)

Do note this was neither sanctioned nor designed by Google. The guy who built it just happens to work there.

Even before Chrome, they know what you read on a very wide cross-section of the web, too, thanks to the AdSense pixel.

Why is it bad if google or facebook know a lot about people? Can you give me some examples?

Pooling all of that information into one place is begging for it to be abused. Would you still be asking the same question if it was s/Facebook/NSA/g or s/Google/FBI/g or even s/Google/KGB/g? Once all of this information is in place how hard do you think it will be for such organizations to get access to it? Just because the 'big bad guberment' isn't the one doing the collecting doesn't mean that the information cannot be abused internally, or externally to the company compiling it.

Usually these discussions sound like some people are worried that the corporations themselves will do something bad with the data (sell you more stuff you like !gasp!).

Government misusing data is the only thing I could think of. But what's the evidence for that fear? If the organisations you mention wanted to go after people, can't they already do so?

With this kind of reasoning, the internet itself should qualify as a huge setback to privacy. The point is that the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages.

Maybe a Facebook engineer will make "Google disconnect" now?

I disabled my FB account back in May, but I'd find it quite difficult to do without all the Google services I use. Google Reader in particular.

I'm sure they will notice much more benefits than just improved trading times.

For example: improved infraestructure management, overall performance increase, fast patches for security bugs, and a long etcetera.

Of course, as JoachimSchipper says, if the applications on top of the OS ar crap, a different OS won't solve the problem, but to have a good underlying OS is a good start.

And, due the the lower latency, they become a more attractive source of liquidity generating more incoming orders and more revenue.

Also complete control over your own future without being beholden to a 3rd party.