Using Google for good (not evil).

I used Google between 30 and 60 times yesterday. That’s a rough approximation, but it’s a task so seamlessly integrated into my 10 hour-a-day computer habit that I hardly notice when I’m going to the site or the toolbar I have installed. Without thinking, each time I’m spending a few seconds searching, refining my search with Boolean terms, grabbing what I need and closing the browser tab to move on to another task. That means I could use Google upwards of 21,600 times (60 x 360ish days) a year (give or take).

I’m also an avid Gmail fan, although for the first year or so after I switched I was really uncomfortable with the lack of folder structure and frustrated because I couldn’t organize my messages the exact way I wanted to. What I’ve learned as I’ve acclimatized to this new paradigm is how to unclench a bit (thanks Google!). I’m adjusting to not having everything exactly the way I want it, and I’m okay with it because I realized that Google has actually re-trained me how to be more effective at what I do. I’m saving time by not organizing each of the 500 or so messages I receive each week into folders that I have to create, group together into subfolders, and sort regularly. More time freed up for Google searches!

The next step in the Google love-in came about a year or so ago, when my company’s intranet became a cliché, a vapid hole of unorganized, un-findable and out-of-date documentation (for example, I had been promoted twice in the time I was there, managing a team of 10 people, but the company’s phone list still insisted I was a junior coordinator. I digress.) My solution was Google Desktop. Now, I could abandon any semblance of organization in my documents folder as well, because I could instead search my local files, applications, web history and email files at once. Again, it took some time to get used to but instead of mousing over my C:/ drive and exploring its folder contents, I moved in the other direction on my screen and immediately typed in a keyword or two in the system tray search field and scrolled among the (quickly) populated results.

I could go on about any number of tools and applications that have revolutionized the way I do basic daily stuff – search for directions (Google Maps! Google Earth!); scan the morning papers for client news (Google Alerts! Google News!); baking a pie (Google Calculator! Google Conversions!). In using all of these really simple tools, they seem to get better with time. Most are in some sort of perpetual beta testing, which means that any one can comment, complain, refine, suggest improvements.

I wonder how they all came to be. Under what circumstance, around what boardroom table in what kind of brainstorm session did these tools get formulated as a viable idea? I’m not sure of the answer yet, but in the meantime Google Labs is giving me a view into what I can expect next to get me ready for the inveitable change.

Over the coming weeks my posts will be diving more deeply into what people are calling Web 2.0 technologies, their impact and the effect on social networks, businesses, and the ‘interweb’ as a whole.