During their annual Searchology event, Google announced a number of new updates to their core search product as well as a couple of new side projects.

Filtering

Users will now be able to filter results by content time, date, type, media, forum discussions, reviews and more. Whilst much of this has been available to users via Google’s advanced search page, the new features will be built into the core product offering.

Google will also offer the ability to view search results visually in a “wonder wheel” which illustrates the popularity of certain search terms and their related items.

Marissa Mayer has specified real time search to be Google’s most pressing and difficult challenge. Interestingly, startups OneRiot and Tweetmeme have made it their focus to search and index the real time web beginning with Twitter (neither of which are really real time search).

Google Squared

Google has also announced the launch of a Google Labs product called ‘Google Squared’ which lets users search for a particular topic and reveals a list of all information related to the topic – a vertical search engine of sorts. Results to Google Squares are presented so users can easily filter and remove certain results, leaving only the content you were looking for. Google Squared will launch in the next few weeks.

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It will come as no surprise but in the evening, Web users perk up.

According to a study by Lightspeed Research and the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB UK), the largest percentage of UK Internet users in all age groups said they were most likely to pay attention to an online advertisement after 6 in the evening.

The likelihood of users to pay attention to advertising at other times varied slightly depending on age.

The later the day became, the more young adults were interested in online ads.

More older users said they were most likely to pay attention to ads from 9am to 12pm and from 2pm to 6pm, while the fewest indicated the lunch period.

Attention to ads also varied based on the activities users were engaged in. The greatest proportion of UK Internet users said they were very likely to process an ad while “researching the best deals,” followed by shopping, gambling and searching online.

The most people said they were not at all likely to notice online ads while e-mailing or instant messaging, followed by watching online video and playing online games.

Twitter acquisition drama continues, first it was Google and now, according to TechCrunch and Valleywag sources, Apple (?!). The plan is apparently to announce the acquisition at this years WWDC in San Jose.

The reason behind most peoples doubts is that its difficult to see how and where Twitter fits into the overall Apple setup and culture. Valleywag pinpoint the success of iPhone twitter applications as the main and ‘obvious’ driver for the deal,  but I still don’t quite understand it.

Google, and Microsoft have been linked to possibly buying Twitter, Google just towards the end of last month. The Twitter founders apparently turned down Google’s cash and stock offer, and not to forget Facebook’s $500 million offer back in November.

As absurd a proposition as this may be however, there may be some truth and potential motive. In Apple’s eyes this could be there big moment, their grand opportunity to grab a stake in what is unquestionably the hottest internet product at this moment in time. Whilst Google slowly but surely builds their own social network, a move like this could catapult Apple ahead of both Yahoo and Microsoft in in terms of internet footholds.

Also, and although extremely speculative, it is quite interesting how Apple decided to profile the site just last week. Finally, and I might simply be looking too deep into this, but @EV’s tweet yesterday immediately got me thinking, and that’s before even hearing about this rumour.

Arrington (Michael that is) is convinced the story is bull, despite making a meal of it on Techcrunch over the last few hours. But hey, that’s tech blogging for ya!

Following up on techcunch’s story about the hilariously absurd use of goats to mow the lawns around Google’s headquarters instead of lawnmowers, we were able to get a comment from PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. PETA is okay with letting the goats be goats (eating grass and looking cute), but they have some major concerns about how they’ll be treated in doing these tasks.

Says Amy Cook, an Assistant Manager of Marketing for PETA:

PETA has no problem with letting goats do what goats want to do (e.g., look cute and eat weeds), but we do have concerns about how the goats may be transported, whether they are provided with access to shelter during storms and shade as well as water during hot weather, where they are housed when they aren’t “working,” what kind of veterinary care they receive, and what becomes of old and/or excess goats. PETA has found over and over that whenever animals are used by a business to make money, corners are cut and animals often suffer as a result. And that really gets our goat, if you’ll pardon the pun.

You think Google, with its “do no evil” mantra, would be kind to the goats. But then again, they have been cutting food supplies to employees during tough times, so you have to wonder if the goats would be left without an ample supply of water as well. Also, veterinary care seems like one of those goat perks that might be on Google’s cost-cutting checklist.

But you never know. I’m going to reach out to Google for comment.

Online news scores surprisingly high.

People around the world do trust the media, but to varying degrees.

According to TNS, the good news, for Internet content producers, is that people now trust the information they get from online news—roughly to the same degree as news from television and information from friends.

Globally, the most trusted information source was friends, with 42% of those surveyed saying that they trusted word-of-mouth recommendations. About an equal number trusted TV news (41%), online news (40%) and newspapers (39%).

Naturally, there were variations in media trust from country to country, but several patterns emerged.

Internet users in the US and Canada held similar attitudes toward the media, with the largest differences in the US’s comparative lack of trust in newspapers and TV news.

Most Trusted* Media According to Internet Users in Select Countries in Canada and the US, 2008 (% of respondents)

Looking at Western Europe, UK Internet users were the least trusting of newspapers, while those in France, Italy and Spain put the least trust in TV news. Web users in France also held online news in the lowest esteem.

Most Trusted* Media According to Internet Users in Select Countries in Western Europe, 2008 (% of respondents)

Internet users in Nordic countries were relatively trusting of online media, with around one-half the respondents from each country expressing their trust. Users in Denmark trusted it even more than word-of-mouth.

Most Trusted* Media According to Internet Users in Finland, Norway and Sweden, 2008 (% of respondents)

Throughout the Asia-Pacific region, online news ran close to TV news and newspapers in trustworthiness.

Most Trusted* Media According to Internet Users in Select Countries in Asia-Pacific, 2008 (% of respondents)

Wikipedia, despite being among the most highly visited Websites worldwide, was less trusted among the countries surveyed than industry magazines, industry Websites and product comparison sites.

Finally, private blogs were the least trusted source in almost every country. In China, however, where bloggers are sometimes jailed for what they write, 24% of Internet users said they trust them more than free papers and company brochures, though little else.

Around the world everyone trusts some of the media…some of the time.