Google released two small, but significant updates this week that I believe a lot of people could have easily missed. One is the Google Sidewiki, which is a new widget for the Google Toolbar that allows users to post and share comments publically on any website. This is great for users, and might be a little scary for webmasters and marketers that are sensitive to UGC. However, I think we can embrace the Sidewiki: think of it as a free 24-hour focus group for your website. I dig that.
Another noteworthy update to the Google search engine is the “Jump to” search snippet, thought to be a direct response to Bing’s Instant Answers feature. It’s a relatively small tweak that may make anchor tagging popular again in website development. “Jump to” now appears underneath the title of the websites that return in a search result, followed by direct links to important sections of that page.
In other news, Twitter gained a rumored $100 million in funding from a group of five investors. Speculators now say that the micro-blogging site is worth close to $1 billion.
I’ve been seeing more reports that teens are ditching Facebook, or at least carefully monitoring their privacy settings, to avoid their parents. Check out the Ad Age article which is the first one that I’ve seen reporting numbers on this phenomenon.
