WebProNews » Fremont http://www.webpronews.com Breaking News in Tech, Search, Social, & Business Mon, 13 Feb 2012 04:32:37 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Google Celebrates Anniversary, Opens New Office http://www.webpronews.com/google-celebrates-anniversary-opens-new-office-2007-10 http://www.webpronews.com/google-celebrates-anniversary-opens-new-office-2007-10#comments Tue, 23 Oct 2007 14:20:22 +0000 Doug Caverly http://www.webpronews.com/?p=41314 Some companies don’t celebrate anniversaries.  Some merely put a few grocery-store cupcakes near the water cooler.  But Google knows how to handle an anniversary - the search giant recently made a big cake and opened a new office in Fremont, Washington.

]]> Some companies don’t celebrate anniversaries.  Some merely put a few grocery-store cupcakes near the water cooler.  But Google knows how to handle an anniversary – the search giant recently made a big cake and opened a new office in Fremont, Washington.

The cake, which is pictured on the Official Google Blog, doesn’t look as enormous as the one that commemorated the New York office’s first anniversary; in this respect, the third anniversary of the Seattle/Kirkland office disappoints me.  In other ways, though, Google’s employees in Washington seem to be much better off.

Steve Yegge, a software engineer, writes, “Kirkland is a lovely city nestled on Lake Washington, with views of the water, the Seattle skyline, and of course Mount Rainier, which is by far the area’s most impressive (and hopefully most dormant) volcano.”

Also, “we have no state tax,” and “[w]e have three lovely ski resorts within an hour’s drive, including Snoqualmie Pass, the nation’s largest night-skiing facility.  And the world-famous Whistler/Blackcomb resort is just a few hours’ drive across the Canadian border.”

Most of us can appreciate these things from a distance.  Those of you who live nearby might have a shot at appreciating them and getting in on next year’s celebration, though – Yegge also states, “[W]e’re always looking for great people to help us out.”

]]> http://www.webpronews.com/google-celebrates-anniversary-opens-new-office-2007-10/feed 0 Microsoft Fremont Becomes An Expo http://www.webpronews.com/microsoft-fremont-becomes-an-expo-2006-01 http://www.webpronews.com/microsoft-fremont-becomes-an-expo-2006-01#comments Mon, 16 Jan 2006 22:23:43 +0000 WebProNews Staff http://www.webpronews.com/?p=25980 Fans of classifieds sites can breathe easier, as Microsoft plans to unveil its Windows Live Expo to beta testers in the coming months.

Microsoft’s “Fremont” project recently picked up a name change, to Windows Live Expo, which once again shows that the marketing folks in Redmond have yet to meet a product name they couldn’t elongate.

Users interested in participating in Microsoft’s challenge to Google Base/Craigslist/eBay/Oodle can visit the signup page for Expo and get a heads-up email when it becomes available. How long will they have to wait? It could be a while.

Garry Wiseman, Fremont’s product unit manager, wrote at the Team Expo blog during CES 2006 that the date isn’t set “in stone”:

Anyway, one of the primary reasons I didn’t want us to set a date in stone for launching is because I felt that we should have the flexibility to decide when the product was of decent enough quality to launch (which could be earlier or later than any date we’d plucked out of the air).


Microsoft’s hand got forced a bit when someone in their China operations made an internal email about Fremont, sorry, Windows Live Expo, available by posting it to a blog on Spaces. That email announced the opening of Fremont to internal testing.

Michael Arrington at TechCrunch posted a screenshot of the Expo beta, showing categories including Autos, Events, Housing, Jobs, and Merchandise. Microsoft bills Windows Live Expo as an “online marketplace and social networking site;” the original Fremont name comes from an open Sunday market favored by Microsofties in that section of Seattle.

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David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business.

]]> http://www.webpronews.com/microsoft-fremont-becomes-an-expo-2006-01/feed 0 Microsoft Fremont Appears Based on Google Base http://www.webpronews.com/microsoft-fremont-appears-based-on-google-base-2005-12 http://www.webpronews.com/microsoft-fremont-appears-based-on-google-base-2005-12#comments Thu, 01 Dec 2005 20:01:27 +0000 Jim Hedger http://www.webpronews.com/?p=24948 Microsoft coders have been working quietly and steadily over the past few months to create a classified advertising system.

Announced Tuesday and launched in beta Wednesday, Fremont (named after a beautiful Seattle neighborhood ), seems to be a lot like Google Base . Fremont is currently in beta test and an MSN email address is required to access it.

Fremont is going to be a free service where anyone with information can place a listing. Items or services ranging from bowling balls or offering legal services, a listing on Fremont might find its way into one of MSN’s growing list of search services. For example, someone in Seattle wants to sell his or her bowling ball. If another person with a 98XYZ zip code types “Bowling supplies” into the MSN search engine, the Fremont bowling ball listing, along with a handy map, might be mentioned search results.

As with Google Base and sudden competitors Craigslists and eBay, one of the most interesting components of Fremont is that people placing listings don’t need to have an pre-established web presence. Fremont (and Base) will establish a listings page (or document) as soon as the information is entered. That document can link to an established web presence but a listing in the general, local, or other types of search indexes is not dependent on one.

Another interesting front in the ongoing search engine wars has opened. Any bets on when Yahoo is going to jump in?

Jim Hedger is the SEO Manager of StepForth Search Engine Placement Inc. Based in Victoria, BC, Canada, StepForth is the result of the consolidation of BraveArt Website Management, Promotion Experts, and Phoenix Creative Works, and has provided professional search engine placement and management services since 1997. http://www.stepforth.com/ Tel – 250-385-1190 Toll Free – 877-385-5526 Fax – 250-385-1198

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