Google takes on Facebook
TOBY SHAPSHAK: Google to lose that blank look
After failing to successfully launch a social media service, the search giant will present its own news feed
The most uncluttered page on the Internet is about to lose its minimalist status. Google has announced that its home page, launched in 1996, is going to give up its white space.
Instead, it will get a Facebook-like news feed, much like the mobile version which suggests stories based on your search history. This function has been available for a while and tends to be pretty good. The key difference between Twitter or Facebook’s curated waterfall of news is that Google will use an algorithm, instead of following people. It is surprisingly big news, perhaps because Google’s minimalist page is such a throwback to a simpler time. Initially, it had just a small search box and two buttons: "Google search" and "I’m feeling lucky". It was a revelation.Before that, the Internet was quaint enough — perhaps small enough — to have manually constructed lists of the coolest places. That’s what Yahoo did. Its alphabetical and thematical lists were a great example of the early, manual curation of the day. Google’s home page set it apart. The idea of search, the concept that the Internet was navigable enough to search, was in its infancy. Sites like Ask Jeeves, Alta Vista an...
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