Cuil is Cool. A batch of ex-Googlers started their own search engine predicated on things I like – finding relevant results instead of endless amounts of crap, helping me find things by not assuming I have any idea of what I'm looking for, and suggesting ways to move ahead. Best of all they are being transparent about what they know about me and what they do with that knowledge. Specifically, here's Cuil's privacy policy:
"Effective Date: July 27, 2008
Privacy is a hot topic these days, and we want you to feel totally comfortable using our service, so our privacy policy is very simple: when you search with Cuil, we do not collect any personally identifiable information, period. We have no idea who sends queries: not by name, not by IP address, and not by cookies (more on this later). Your search history is your business, not ours.
More precisely:
Logs
We do not keep logs of our users' search activity.
Cookies
Cookies are small files on your computer that websites create to store user preferences, such as language settings. Each time you visit a Cuil page, your computer's cookies automatically provide Cuil with your preferences. You can change or delete your cookies anytime via your Web browser options.
We do not record the information in your cookies on our servers; your browser sends your preferences to us with each search request. This way, we do not store any personal information about you on our servers.
Other Sites
Cuil's role is to direct you to other websites that you are searching for. We do not control those sites even if you are directed to them via Cuil. We are not responsible for any of their actions.
Uses of Communications
We value and encourage open communications. Therefore if you decide to email us personally identifiable information (such as your name, email address, information about you or any other content that you may send to us) via our site, we may retain your communication and share its content with third parties (such as our contractors). We won't spam you or sell this information, but do not send us communications via our site that you want to keep strictly confidential. Such communications are outside of the search service we provide our users.
Changes to This Privacy Policy
Cuil is completely committed to protecting your privacy and we'll keep looking for new ways to do that. To help protect you, we might make changes to this policy. We'll let you know about any changes by putting a notice on our home page, where you'll see it clearly, 30 days before they become effective. If you find such revisions acceptable, you will indicate your agreement through your continued use of our search service or communications with us."
This is how it should be. Transparency of motive is the way of the future of digital business, and the horrid job that the iconic businesses of the last hundred years have done destroying the trust of my generation when it comes to not having my private information sold to anyone with lips has left a rightful bad taste and high level of paranoia on the people with the most money to spend – thus stunting the growth of many. Why wouldn't I opt-in and tell cable company to stop showing me diaper commercials (I've had chemo, radiation, and a vasectomy – the next diaper I'm going to need will be for myself)? I don't mind advertisements – I mind a waste of my time. I'd happily opt-in to things that might make my life better or give me back time instead of wasting it. The reason I don't, is A: because they don't even bother to ask and B: because even if they did I know that 10 minutes after I gave them any information I'd have 47 catalogs in my mailbox and be getting phone calls from the "Republican Transvestite Crusader's For Mollusk Rights to Marry"at dinner time. (Note: I mean no offense to transvestites or mollusks, and I am a Republican, albeit an embarrassed one, and therefore feel I can say that - since no matter how many times I attempt to enforce the "do not call" law, the Republican machine feels they can ignore my request and bother me with absurd "the President/Newt Gingrich/Tom Daschle/Ronald Reagan wants to have dinner with you" line in one of the most ridiculously silly attempts to get at my rapidly plummeting portfolio.)
I have no idea if the engine works, and almost don't care. This is cuil.
RedHat's new CEO Jim Whitehurst thinks he can make a run at the dough by stuffing Linux into the cloud. I think it's a great bet. No one is going to care "how" things work in the cloud, as long as they do. They will, however, eventually want to know that things in the cloud are as they appear – from privacy, security, performance, and all other perspectives. Consumers? No, they won't care, but businesses will. There should be a lot of noise around the "trust" factor of the cloud over the next few years. So far only really EMC and a bunch of academics seem to be paying attention. Amazon should be leading this initiative but I haven't heard boo from them on the subject. Free is fine, but once the cloud becomes a real business running other peoples real businesses, the rules will change. Praise be the Internet. Liars need not apply.
Speaking of Scrabble, Facebook users can't access the game "Scrabulous" anymore – the flagrant rip off of Hasbro's Scrabble game. Duh. I think FaceBook should be responsible for violating the Hasbro copyright as much as the folks who created the game – or at least having knowledge that the game was an obvious rip-off and still enabling the masses to screw the owner. Sites like this make me crazy – they are all about the eyeballs (which is a fundamentally flawed thing to be about, but don't get me started), so anything that gets more is ok. It's why MySpace went to court every time someone tried to get them to stop letting sex offenders lie and lurk on their site – they couldn't care less about the perverts themselves, they just wanted everyone to know that MySpace is the land of the free – so please bring your dirty, lying, perverted, sick eyeballs to our club so we can jack our advertising valuation. Of course if they were transparent in their intentions, people might actually de-value them, so don't expect to see that any time soon. Having said that, I bet a transparent community site dedicated to total psycho perverts would actually do well, and thus garner excellent advertising revenues. Larry Flint didn't hide – you absolutely knew his motives. You didn't have to like him, and you didn't have to buy his trashy magazine, but at least you knew. It's sort of a weird time when Larry Flint is the better, more honest guy in the conversation.
Which gets me to Howard Stern, or more precisely, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). It took 15 months to approve the merger of satellite radio competitors XM and Sirius. That's about 12 months longer than any other deal - ever. AT&T, Compaq/DEC, Compaq/HP, Giant Bank and Giant Bank, and so on. Two struggling companies that clearly would die fighting each other, who's only hope was to merge, and the FCC took that long to act. Why? Because they were lobbied by the NAB and others, (people I love by the way), to do the wrong thing. The ridiculous argument that competition would be eliminated if these two merge is as dumb as it comes. Remember when TV was free? Oh yeah, it still is. Remember when it was questioned (after 90 days) whether Brocade buying McData would end in death and famine? It didn't' – and you know why? Because both companies were in a position to die if they didn't merge to fight Cisco. If I'm willing to pay for digital content – so why should any government be able to stand in the way? I love digital content. I can buy satellite, cable, even IP content. I can buy iTunes or pictures of a dog riding a pony. I pay with my own money, which is taxed, to some legal company, who is taxed, so why should anybody be able to stand in the way of commerce like that? If the content is illegal then there are other means of dealing with that – but if it is legal, what could the government possibly have as a motivation or legal reason to get in the way? They don't and that is irritating. Fortunately the deciding vote – finally – was cast in favor (by a Republican, mind you) and the merger completed. However, it remains to be seen that after such a delay the combined company will ever get out of the debt hole it is in and survive – so while totally lying about the reasons for taking so long – under the guise of doing the right thing for the public and the business community, the US Government might have actually destroyed satellite radio, and the fantastic digital content that I just happen to enjoy immensely.
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