I posted previously about how I saw the web unfolding in 2010. One of my pointers was about on-site search and how bad it is in general. I recommended that the big players team up with the search engines to get it right.

Well, Google beat me to the deadline and launched its Google Commerce search offering toward the end of 2009, not 2010. I’ll be really interested to see who takes this on and how the technology (and partnership) affects their sites.

At $50,000+, it costs more than most SMEs would have in their site development budgets and I’m not sure the M&Ss or Nexts of the world would ever really incorporate it, but what a great plug in.

A lot has been made of Eric Schmidt resigning from Apple’s board. The short version: he’s also CEO of Google and these two tech giants are really starting to cross swords.

While Google are undoubtedly an increasing ‘problem’ for Apple, I think most reports are in danger of missing the elephant in the room: Nokia. They have a 40% market share of the world’s mobile handset market. They produce a phone every 13 seconds, with around 1.1 billion customers today, and they are well and truly on a charge.

Nokia are unquestionably number one – larger than their top three rivals combined – yet they were accused of being asleep at the wheel when it came to the iPhone. Enter the Nokia N900 Smartbook, launched this week with, “Computer-grade performance in a handset” and Flash support (not yet available on the iPhone).

Microsoft’s mobile version of the Office suite, currently only available on Windows mobile devices, is soon to be available on Nokia handsets. And Microsoft and Nokia plan on developing several mobile apps together.

Apple fans have consumed rumours about Mr Jobs producing a tablet computer for several years but it’s yet to materialise. Enter Nokia’s booklet. Add to this momentum the fact they appear to be teaming up with music rather than dictate to the industry. Dave Stewart (50% of the Eurythmics group) is a change agent and big fettler in the Nokia world of the future.

Nokia are a capable chameleon. They’ve reinvented themselves from a paper and rubber manufacturer to an electronic giant turning over $70 billion. So when they say, “we will quickly be the world’s biggest entertainment media network.” we should really pay attention.

Their aptitude, coupled with some audacious strategic alliances may yet see CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo pull off a Finnish coup d’état.

We’ve all got a good design idea in us. You know, the one that’s been at the back of your mind for years. You’ve told your friends about it but the task of developing it, sits at the bottom of your to do list (along with that parachute jump and learning French).

Watch this simple and brilliant invention for 40 seconds and tell me you’re not thinking about finally hiring a patent lawyer.

Dustin Curtis was so appalled by his experience at American Airlines’ website that he drew up a redesign and sent them an open letter.

I did exactly the same thing recently. My aunt’s ouiji board is more in touch with web design and best practice than what a company had created for a young, energetic start-up I know. So I redesigned it and set them my creation. My chosen patient wasn’t anywhere near the scale of AA, but its foe pars put it on the critical list and, like Dustin, I simply couldn’t resist.

But unlike AA, if I had published my critique (instead of sending privately), the site’s owners wouldn’t have noticed. AA did notice and their response is here. How about you, are you awake at the wheel?

If and when your company is mentioned online are you listening?

Richard Branson recently launched PitchTV to help entrepreneurs find investors – a mini Dragons’ Den if you like.

The hopeful amongst you can upload a two minute video which gets voted online and the favourites will be broadcast on Virgin planes. Getting your ideas seen by business travellers would be a huge coo (for exposure if nothing else!).

The barrier to this is simply time. Don’t be thinking about spending your seed money on pucka cameras and an editing team. You can do the lot with a Flip and stopwatch for under £100 (honestly). Here’s the third example to be put online. You could’ve created something of equal quality last weekend if you’d wanted to.

For the audience, there’s the added benefit of not having to watch the Simon Cowell wannabies lash into the dreams of everyday passionate people in ‘the Den’. Oh yeah, there’s also an annual special prize from Sir B himself, and my bet is that’ll be some first-rate business support not recycled Christmas socks!

The Old (Barrichello), the Pretender (Button) and the Skint (the Brackley team) have pulled off a spectacular one-two in Melbourne to kick off the Formula One season.

Continuing the B fest, they’ve shown:
Belief – evidently they kept working hard when a full closure was more than likely.
Brains – the clean sheet of ‘09 regulations allowed them to show innovation beyond McLaren’s and Ferrari’s dreams.
Bravery – in the management buyout (and subsequent cut backs).

Brawn GP, now a euphemism for ‘Giant Killer,’ really have shown us it all this weekend.

Commentators said the grid was turned on its head. That’s untrue as the back of the pack looked all too familiar. But the midfield have undoubtedly caused the former front runners a major headache. To the victor go the spoils. Well, perhaps a Virgin.

Side quote: The guy who invented the first wheel was an idiot. The guy who invented the other three, he was the genius (Sid Caesar).

Photo credit: cbc888

The New York Times blinked first and opened its 2.8 million articles allowing users to build things with its content via API.

But the Guardian has suddenly become the pie-piper of the newspaper business by opening up its data more fully. The Guardian trumps NYT by allowing for-profit use of the data (opposed to NYT’s non-profit stance) and it allows full data from articles and pieces, as opposed to excerpts.

With the newspaper industry crumbling by the month, this really is a stake in the sand by the Guardian. They’re clearly enthusiasts of the freemium business model and I applaud their bravery. Will it be follow us or die; or is it a case of a freemium too far?

As usual, Mathew Ingram and Greg Stirling have great takes on it but I really want to know what the industry is planning next. This is a modern day equivalent to the steam liners fighting back against the passenger airliners of Howard Hughes et al. We’ve all heard enough whining about Google their ilk eating newspapers’ lunch – what are they cooking for dinner?
Photo credit: Terje S. Skjerdal

My local Greggs’ bakery is a massively busy shop. So much so its small car park is log jammed from 11am to 3pm EVERY day. From day one I said they could have designed a drive-through system and probably made themselves even more successful (and certainly more efficient).

Well, it seems fast food won’t have the technique to themselves for long as Sears is the latest retailer in the States to test drive-through shopping. It’s a natural evolution from the reserve online, collect in store system pioneered so well in this country by the likes of Argos.

It appears to make perfect sense but others who’ve tested aren’t reporting positively. Personally, I can see out-of-town Argos extras and Tesco extras testing a drive-through system that would really help them at peak Christmas trading.

Crossing machine and cinema gives you machinima. It’s a geek’s bedroom hobby that’s breaking into Hollywood. Companies like Rooster Teeth show game content and skew it to a story rather than playing the game itself. Halo and World of Warcraft are classic petri dishes for this art.

Well, things look to be going all Sky One for this genre. These creations have attracted A-list attention as “a collaboration with fifteen leading episodic television writers from popular series–such as The Simpsons, Saturday Night Live and Seinfeld–to develop 15 original episodic comedy pilots…”

There’s plenty of talk lately about what the blending of online TV will mean with the BBC, ITV and BT soon to become bedfellows on a common platform for IPTV (known as Project Canvas). We shouldn’t be closed to the fact it’ll be as much about content as it is accessibility. New ground is soon to be broken, I hope it’s original and entrepreneurial and not all crass reality show spin offs.

Plenty of bloggers are spouting New Year’s resolutions. Most are quaint rehashes of being less avaricious, and showing greater care to one’s fellow man and the weighing scales simultaneously.

Forget resolutions, try predictions. J.K. Galbraith said ‘there are two types of forecasters: those who don’t know and those who don’t know they don’t know’, but there’s always Tom Asacker. He hits it right between the eyes with his article, “Nine Predictions for 2009.” As ever, he is articulate, succinct and on the money (at least that’s my prediction).