If we were to state one reason why Google has taken over the search engine world, it would be “innovation.” Their original approach to search engines was entirely unique and revolutionized the way we think about search engine ranking. Since that time, they have entered a large number of fields, creating an array of beautiful products; Gmail became a front-runner in web mail, Google Docs changed our approach to productivity, and YouTube has wasted literally billions of hours that should have been devoted to work. And Google is always on its way to its next innovation, with a full “Google Lab” devoted to upcoming features. One of the more anticipated lab items is Google’s Fast Flip, which creates an automatic magazine in your browser.
As described at CS Monitor, the service will pull in links and stories to a variety of online news stories that are directly related to user interests. It organizes all this data — including the content, images, and so forth — into an easy to navigate, “flip through the pages,” online magazine. To make this project successful, Google has partnered up with several publication resources, including The Monitor.
For those of you who hear this and think “Hey, that sounds like Flipboard!,” you’re right. The features of this Google Lab makes it a close cousin to the incredibly popular iPad application. However, the Google service will be doing a few things that Flipboard doesn’t do (yet). Most prominently, Google will use its existing technologies to help the service learn about the interests and habits of the reader, presenting an evolving magazine that becomes more fine-tuned to the reader’s preferences as they continue to use the service. Additionally, Google will be providing several methods of customizing your own organization, allowing users to sort their magazine by source, subject, or popularity.
