Googling Your Name

What happens when you type your name into the Google search???? I do a search every month or so of my real name and my online name, why you ask? First and for most is to see what kind of online image you are presenting. Second, find out just what personal information is available about yourself online. Such as address, phone numbers, and any other personal info you would like to keep private. For the most part when you search your own name, Google will bring up your name associated with websites you have left comments at, or family names similar to yours. With my name I came up with 12,700 documents that refer to me and family members with the same name or similar name.

Da Tombpsyco

Manage Your Online Reputation

Are you happy with the results people get back when they Google your name? If not, there are easy ways to monitor and guide what information is published about you online. Two years ago we covered how to have a say in what Google says about you, and more recently, and how to track down anyone online. But a rash of social media sites have arisen that give you more tools to help you manage your online reputation and become more findable. Let's take a look.

Why Reputation Management's Important

Anyone can create a web page that describes you inaccurately or criticizes your performance at a company. Web sites have emerged to trash bad dates and insult company representatives—and those pages are not what you want potential dates or employers to find when they Google you. If making a good name for yourself online is a priority, it's time to take a proactive approach to getting your name out there the way you want.

How to Monitor Your Online Reputation

One of the easiest tools for tracking what Google knows about a topic is Google Alerts. Subscribe to a Google Alert and receive an email as soon as your search phrase (like your name or company) enters Google's index. Google Alerts cover news stories, video comments, blogs, pages found in web search, and even Google's own mailing lists, Google Groups. Be forewarned: popular search terms will yield a lot of messages! Narrow your results down or opt to receive a daily or weekly digest (versus as-it-happens alerts).

Blog search engine Technorati tracks buzz in the blogosphere, by indexing the body of blog posts as they are published. You can subscribe to Technorati searches for your name or product in your feed reader. If you're looking to monitor blog comments, check out previously mentioned comments which keeps you informed of the ongoing discussion. For all things "web 1.0," Board Tracker watches conversations in discussion forums and keeps you up to speed.

If you don't want to track each location manually, previously mentioned MonitorThis aggregates data from 22 different sources, including many of the aforementioned sites. MonitorThis will give you an OPML file you can import into your feedreader.

Control the Message

Once you start monitoring what people are saying about you or your product, you may find inaccuracies or incomplete statements. There are a few ways you can amend and respond to them.

Your own blog is the most effective method for getting your message seen and heard. Here are some free tools for setting up your own blog. Once your blog is up and running, address the points you found on other blogs and maintain pages that get your name and message up on top of the search results. Tip: Google loves fresh content. The more you update your blog, the better. As long as you keep the search phrases you want Google to find in the forefront, you'll likely find yourself closer to the top of the search results.

Social media sites offer countless ways to participate in online community, and most of these profiles offer the added bonus of search engine visibility. Flickr, YouTube, Digg, Wikipedia, Facebook, and Twitter are six mainstream social media sites that feature results when you perform a web search. They are also high-authority sites that are favored by search engines. Use each one appropriately and make sure to emphasize correct key phrases (such as your name or your company name). If you can interlink these social media profiles with your blog posts with acceptable anchor text, you can help push up other positive pages in the search results.

Here are some tips on how to get the most search juice from these profiles:

• Flickr (photo sharing): Use your name in the title and description of the image. In Flickr, you can also add links to comments and HTML. Also, take advantage of tags!
• YouTube (video sharing): The title of your video can help a lot. Popular videos are often ranked high in search results.
• Digg (social news): Digg and other social news sites allow you to customize your profile with your personal information and affiliated websites. There is also room for a short bio where you can emphasize key words.
• Wikipedia (collaborative encyclopedia): Wikipedia is a bit of a tricky one because you're not allowed to edit your own page or your company's page as per their guidelines. However, you can contribute to Wikipedia and use the Talk: page to engage in a discussion.
• Facebook (community): In order to display your profile in the Google results, you will need to change your privacy settings.
• Twitter (micro-blogging): Claim your username on Twitter (before someone else does) and fill out the short bio.

You can do all of the above as an individual, but the web is about interconnectedness, so the next step is to get involved in the community. Network with others in your field of interest. If you're passionate about science and love to write, contact a science blogger and ask to post a guest post on their blog. Put your social media site membership to good use and participate in the community and in forums. If you don't like what others are saying about your company, be receptive to criticism—and address it.

One of the most important things you can do to control the message is to go to the source and communicate directly with the publisher. However, that option isn't always available. Sometimes you'll just have to deal with Internet meanies and grow that thick skin. When direct methods fail, take the opportunity to be proactive and to create web pages and social media profiles search engines will find and use to push negative inaccuracies further down in the results.

Got your own effective methods to manage your reputation online? We'd love to hear them in the comments.

Tamar Weinberg, Lifehacker's weekend contributor, believes in the power of social media.

Tombpsycos Tales Polaroid is ending its instant film camera line. I know this is subject is not about Google or something high tech. It's about a legend, the Polaroid instant camera. It was the magic of watching a picture develop right before your eyes that hooked wannabe photographers and scrapbook makers. The magic about the Polaroids started when you pressed the button, then out rolled a four inch by four inch silver colored paper, then in about a minute the picture slowly appeared. When I was a kid back in the late 60s through the 70s, this was like rocket science to me. But this era is sadly come to a end. Digital photography has killed the film camera. On 60th Anniversary, Polaroid Discontinues All Instant Film That's one more product that technology has killed off completely: On the eve of the product's 60th anniversary, Polaroid is announcing that its namesake instant film is being discontinued. None of Polaroid's two dozen auto-developing products will be produced after 2008. Depending on the type of film, Polaroid says you can expect to find it on store shelves until the first quarter of 2009, but most of its films will be gone well before then. And don't get too excited about "stocking up" on Polaroid film, either: It will all expire before the end of 2009, after which it will begin to degrade considerably. Polaroid is of course being made obsolete due to the rampant popularity of digital cameras, which make it easy to see what you just shot thanks to their built-in LCDs, without having to wait at all, unlike Polaroids, and without any additional cost. The next target for digital to make irrelevant will naturally be all chemical film. Digital camera revenue overtook film camera revenue way back in 2000 and digicams have all but eliminated film in the market today, even with professional photographers. Of course, Polaroid may be down, but it's not out entirely. Its ZINK "zero ink" technology looks like it's coming to market soon, with a mobile photo printer that lets users print 2" by 3" pictures on special paper, without any ink at all. Production is planned to begin sometime this spring. Stay tuned. POLL: Your thoughts on Polaroid This edition covers: Inline language translations Create a static Google Map Hacker group releases tool to find site exploits via Google Inline language translation While Google Translate is hardly perfect, but when trying to read or respond to a web page written in another language, it can be invaluable. Although the Google Toolbar has translation services built-in, the options for selective translation are pretty limited. Enter gTranslate, a Firefox plugin (note, this plugin is NOT compatible with Firefox 3 beta) that allows for selective translation in any of the language pairs offered by Google Translate. Simply select the text and right click and the translation will appear in a contextual menu. If the passage is too long to fit in the window, clicking on it will open the full translation in a new tab. It also supports translating text boxes on the fly. [via Google Operating System] Create a static Google Map As cool as the interactive Google maps are, there are situations where embedding javascript isn't always ideal. In the past, if you wanted to send a "static" Google map to someone via e-mail, you had to take a screen capture from your browser and then attach the corresponding image. Those days are over. Google has just released launched a new Static Maps API, making it easy to create fast-loading static maps that can then be e-mailed or displayed on a web page, all without the need for JavaScript. The Static Maps API can be combined with the JavaScript API if you want to make the map interactive when someone rolls over or clicks the map on your webpage. [via Google Lat Long Blog] Hacker group releases tool to find site exploits via Google Hacking group Cult of the Dead Cow (cDc) has released the Goolag scanner and Open Source tool designed to search for website vulnerabilities using automated Google search queries. While the concept of "Google hacking" is hardly new, but this kind of automated search is, according to the cDc, "...like Google hacking on steroids." The tool is open-source and available for Windows. Although aimed at IT administrators to help check their own sites for vulnerabilities, there will undoubtedly be users who attempt to use the tool for malicious purposes. While the cDc concedes this, they point out that excessive Google queries may end up getting the user's IP banned from Google. [via ComputerWorld] Tags: google, google hacking, google maps, GoogleHacking, GoogleMaps, goolag scanner, GoolagScanner, gtranslate The Lighter Side of Google Five Google Easter eggs that you can try right now! Go into Google and type in the answer to life the universe and everything. Go to the Google home page and type in xx-klingon, then hit “I’m feeling lucky.” Go to the Google home page and type in Google Easter Egg and hit “I’m feeling lucky.” Go to the Google home page and type in xx-elmer and hit “I’m feeling lucky.” Go to Google home page and type in xx-hacker and hit “I’m feeling lucky.” The Easter Egg Archive Our Easter Egg Hunt - Reviving An Old Tradition Movie Mistakes Egg Vs. Chicken 3D Dancing Easter Egg Screensaver Software secrets revealed World of Warcraft Easter Eggs Amazonian Easter Egg Fujitsu Core Duo Notebook Harbors Hardware Easter Egg The Perfect Hard Boiled Egg