Ash K. Gilpin

At Google, they are all about making all kinds of information accessible to everyone. The more up-to-date the information, the more valuable it is. This is particularly true in the world of finance; information, and timing of that information, is money. Today, real-time quotes are not freely and easily available on the web. Some websites offer one real-time quote at a time, but typically only after you have enrolled in a service and/or signed a complicated legal agreement. Other sites approach the problem differently and show you streaming delayed data, but that doesn’t solve the problem either — it masks it. What’s really important is getting free, easy and fast access to real-time quotes so you know how the market or your company is doing now, not as of twenty minutes ago.

As a result, Google has been working with the SEC, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and the D.C. trade association, NetCoalition, to find a way to bring stock data to Google users in a way that benefits users and is practical for all parties. They have encouraged the SEC to ensure that this data can be made available to their users at fair and reasonable rates. Since then, the NYSE has moved the issue a great step forward with a proposal to the SEC which if approved, would allow you to see real-time, last-sale prices across all Google properties including Google Finance, Personalized Google, Google Mobile, and of course, Google.com. It won’t matter if you’re on Wall Street or Main Street — you’ll have free, easy and fast access to real-time prices from NYSE on Google.

So stay tuned…

Valentine’s Day is just over a month away but according to new research from Yahoo! Personals, the most visited online dating service, Cupid is charting a tricky course for the next few weeks.The study shows we are now in National Break-Up Season, the period between the December holidays and Valentine’s Day when people are more than twice as likely to think about breaking up than at any other time of the year.

January, with all its focus on resolutions to be healthier, richer, and happier, naturally leads couples to take stock of their relationships and think about whether they are with the right person.

“‘Find a new love’ is up there with ‘lose weight’ and ’save more money’ as a New Year’s resolution,” said Anna Zornosa, vice president and general manager, Yahoo! Personals. “People tend to ‘put up’ with current relationships in order to have a partner for holiday gatherings, but once the festivities are over it’s time to decide whether to fish or cut bait.”

Are you currently in the market for meeting a new special someone?  HRDating.com is a small and growing online dating service.  Another site you might have heard about is PlentyOfFish.com.  Love could be just a click away.  Enjoy and good luck!

Apple CEO Steve Jobs, in his keynote at MacWorld in San Francisco, announced the new iPhone cell phone.  The iPhone is an impressive, and expensive, device. It comes in 4 GB and 8 GB models and costs $499 and $599, respectively. It includes a 3.5 inch touchscreen with a virtual keyboard, a 2 megapixel camera, is Wi-Fi enabled and runs OSX. Cingular is the carrier. The desktop-like interface and user experience looks to be a killer. This might actually take the mobile email revolution another full step forward from what Blackberry has done. Standard web sites can be viewed via the Safari browser (and soon, I’m sure, Firefox). And there are a number of nice touches as well, including a motion sensor that rotates photos when you turn the phone, and voicemails displayed visually that you can click on and listen to. As we all expect from Apple, this is a seriously buttoned up device.

This is an update to my posting about AGLOCO.  In a few more weeks, AGLOCO viewbar should be up and ready for download.  Once you download, you will be able to start making money for just surfing the web, as you normally do, and from your friends doing the same that I have signed up under you in your network.

The hardest part about AGLOCO is getting people to sign up for it.  Most people are reluctant because they think there is some catch to it.  It really couldn’t be more harmless.  If you want to make money for simply surfing the web give AGLOCO a try, you can sign up here - it’s completely FREE.

Yahoo has officially bought MyBlogLog.  The size of deal has not yet been confirmed, but is rumored to be around $10 - $12 million.  MyBlogLog will be part of the Yahoo Developer Network and because of such - will probably allow users to log in via their Yahoo IDs which should help expand its user base, significantly.

Yahoo! Inc. recently launched Yahoo! oneSearch, an entirely new search service designed to give consumers exactly what they want on their mobile device — instant answers. oneSearch leverages Yahoo!’s deep experience, investment and expertise in search on the desktop as well as relationships with leading content providers to deliver an unmatched mobile search experience for consumers.

With this launch Yahoo! expands its mobile Internet leadership.Yahoo! oneSearch is available to consumers through the Yahoo! Go for Mobile 2.0 beta. By the end of January 2007, Yahoo! plans to make oneSearch available across the company’s Mobile Web and SMS services. Yahoo! oneSearch will roll out in additional country and language versions in the coming months.

Amazon.com has launched their own independent shoe and handbag niche website, Endless.com. Shoes and handbags will still be available on Amazon.

Endless provides an enhanced browsing experience for shoe buying, compared to what Amazon.com does. For example, the visual search is real nice — you can keep refining your search by price, style, color, size, or brand. Endless.com’s focus is on free overnight shipping — they have a countdown clock on every page letting you know the next delivery date.

Yahoo! Inc. announced a new contest entitled “The Intern” in conjunction with the 6th season premiere of “The Apprentice” on Sunday, January 7th. “The Intern” contest is a free weekly game that will allow fans to show off their “Apprentice” knowledge by predicting what will happen next on the show. “The Intern” winner will be awarded the opportunity to shadow the winner of “The Apprentice” for two weeks at the Trump Organization.Yahoo!’s “Apprentice” site is the premiere destination for fans, and serves as a prime example of how Yahoo! creates essential experiences for users with partner content, original content and user-generated content. The site offers one place to find out everything there is to know about the show, including exclusive weekly “webisodes” of unaired footage as well as information on the contestants, juicy gossip, cool photos, and videos.

In addition to the exclusive behind-the-scenes action, the new Yahoo! “Apprentice” site also features compelling content with the incorporation of several Yahoo! services including Games, News, Flickr, Del.icio.us/My Web, blogs and videos. Each of these programs engages users with the show with contributions, including “The Intern” game, photos of the contestants and much more. It also gives fans the chance to get to know the younger generation of Trumps, with exclusive access to Ivanka and Donald Jr.’s blogs, which highlight their personal experiences throughout the show.

AOL Co-founder Steve Case, who left Time Warner (AOL’s parent company) in 2005, has recently launched his next startup, Revolution Health.

Revolution Health is like a health-related portal site and social network, combined. Users are urged to ask questions and answer other users’ questions, rate their doctors, participate in online discussions and otherwise contribute content. The site also has a number of tools to help people become more healthy, such as a calculatSor that shows how long you need to do a given activity to lose a pound of weight, and a tool for showing you how much money you’ll save if you quit smoking.

Every user has a profile page where they can link up to other users, set personal goals and aggregate content they’ve contributed to the site.

More information can be found on TechCrunch

Amazon.com said that it sold 1,000 Xbox 360 game consoles in 29 seconds as part of a promotion that slashed two-thirds off the regular retail price.  It also broke last year’s single-day record of more than 4 million orders placed on December 11th.

It has also been reported that the demand for the Microsoft Corp. machines were so high that Amazon.com’s site bogged down briefly on Thanksgiving Day, generating bitter complaints from shoppers and forcing the retailer to change procedures for subsequent promotions.

Amazon.com also sold the most expensive digital music player to date, for $19,999.