Hurricane Gustav hits Haiti, takes aim at U.S. Gulf Coast

hurricane gustav tracking, projected path of hurricane gustav, gustav computer models, hurricane gustav, tropical storm gustav, gustav, hurricane gustav path, hurricane gustav projected path, hurricane gustave (Top 100 Google Hot Trends search terms)

Update: Hurricane Gustav hit southern Haiti today, threatening to become an "extremely dangerous" storm as it heads toward Cuba and takes aim at states along the U.S. Gulf Coast. See Hurricane Gustav computer models at Weather Underground.

Hurricane Gustav topped Google Hot Trends today with related results (Hurricane Gustav Tracking, Projected Path of Hurricane Gustav) found throughout the Top 100 most searched terms.

With current maximum sustained winds of 85 mph, Gustav could develop into a Category 2 hurricane later today and a “major” Category 3 or 4 storm by the end of the week, according to AccuWeather forecasters. (View the projected path of Hurricane Gustav from the National Weather Service.)

Forecasters warned Gustav's eye could pass near the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, home to nearly 3 million people.

To avoid the storm, Carnival Cruise Lines diverted one of its ships today to a Mexican port instead of Montego Bay, Jamaica.

Crude oil prices rose today as Hurricane Gustav threatened major oil operations in the Gulf of Mexico, home to more than a fifth of U.S. oil production.

Image: National Weather Service

— Brady MacDonald, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

As of this posting, one measure of national interest in the story of the affair between John Edwards and Rielle Hunter is Google's Hot Trends list. Fifty fifteen of the top 25 most popular Google search terms related to the Edwards affair story, including the top five queries. Several are variations on Rielle Hunter's name: Reille is No. 1, with Riley and Real among the runners-up; and her real name, Lisa Druck, is No. 5. No. 34 is the precise-sounding "42 year old rielle hunter" — probably the result of mass copy-pasting from an online news story.

Googlers are also searching for many of the scandal's major and minor characters, including Edwards' wife, Elizabeth; Edwards' former aide Andrew Young; Hunter's newborn daughter Frances Quinn Hunter; and even Wade Edwards, the son of John and Elizabeth who was killed in a car accident in 1996. 

Notably, even though it's opening day, the 2008 Olympics appear only once in the top 25, aced out by some websiteless entity called Eden Body Works. 

Also worth pointing out is No. 12, "endless yard sale," which refers, apparently, to a 654-mile-long yard sale this weekend from Ohio to Alabama.  But hurry before the sale ends!

JibJab, a distributor of electronic greeting cards, is back in the saddle with its first video co-starring Barack Obama and John McCain. The terms "Jib Jab" and "jibjab.com" held spots at No. 2 and 7 on Google Hot Trends this morning -- so people are hearing about it.

The "Time for Some Campaignin'" eCard opens with President Bush, outfitted in flannel and cowboy boots with a banjo in hand, being carried out of the White House. It goes on to poke fun at McCain's age, Obama's lofty promises and both candidates' high-volume campaign spending. There's even a cameo by a Hillary Clinton (who recently asked donors to contribute to her next presidential bid in 2012). Clinton sings, "I'll be back in four years, heck it ain't all that far! Oh it's time for some campaignin'!"

The spoof of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" might spark a bit of déjà vu. JibJab was in the spotlight during the last election for its "This Land" video, a 2 1/2-minute clip that spread like wildfire four years ago, back when "viral" was just a wee little concept. That cartoon, set to the Woodie Guthrie classic "This Land is Your Land," depicts Bush drawing on a map with crayons, while "liberal wiener" John Kerry dances around in a hot dog costume.

My, we've come a long way since then.

-- Mark Milian

4chan's directions for the Hot Trends prank. This formulation,  where a set of steps end with "???" and then "profit" is itself an oft-used meme.

Last week it was a swastika topping Google's Hot Trends. Now it's the phrase "scientology is a cult," and, even more flattering for the search engine company that's having its feature bombed by ne'er-do-wells: now we see an upside-down and backwards taunt: "ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ****", only the asterisks are, in this case, a four letter word that rhymes with truck.

In the case of the swastika, we couldn't prove that users of the popular image board 4chan were behind it (their discussion threads can pass out of existence within minutes), but this time there can be no doubt. 

As of this writing, several active 4chan threads were devoted to the mass Googling of the "scientology" phrase as well as the upside-down truck insult, all as 4chan users congratulated themselves for having propelled the two phrases to the top of the list (see image at bottom). They were even planning to start with a third: "LOL".  A 4Chan moderator has not yet returned a request for comment.

(Just before this post was published, both entries were removed from the Trends list.)

4chan is enjoying much spotlight after being featured in two major media profiles in the last few days, as well as in the writeup I did on the swastika situation. 4chan is home to a group of Internet trouble makers, or "griefers." (Julian Dibbell detailed the practice in this excellent Wired article from January.)

4chan users revel in causing controversy -- and there's nothing like race or religion to get tempers flaring. Just yesterday the group staged a "raid" on the popular online childrens' game Habbo Hotel, flooding the game's world with avatars made to look like black men wearing Armani suits. Among 4chan's favorite raid flourishes, it turns out, is the 'swastiget' -- where invaders line up in the shape of a swastika. All for the lulz, of course.

A 4chan poster declares the prank a "win"

It seems that with Google Trends, the group has found a new toy to slam on the sidewalk until it breaks, and because this one is owned by the biggest Internet company on the block, no wonder these young fellows are so gleeful.

It remains to be seen how easily the Google Trends team can make their product "grief" proof.

Google has issued a statement about the swastika that was No. 1 on its Hot Trends list this morning but disappeared within hours. 

We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.

Google's apology illustrates how sensitive the issue is. The implication is that someone at Google judged the swastika "inappropriate or offensive." (Pornographic or profane terms rarely appear on the trends list.)

A Hindu swastika symbol adorns stairs in India
Photo by flickr user Meanest Indian 

I've requested additional comment on who decided to remove the symbol and why. It may bear mentioning that Google Trends team members are based in Tel Aviv, Israel (see an unrelated post by team members here), though it's not clear they did the removing.

Obviously the swastika carries hateful connotations. But if a service purports to accurately represent people's searches, who gets to decide what counts as offensive? The swastika isn't a derogatory term or obscene word; it's a symbol with a multifaceted history. 

On a separate note: Google also clarified that "we were just speculating" in an earlier statement about the origin of the search. (That statement said, "In this case, it appears that the html code for this query was posted on a popular internet bulletin board, which led to quite a few people searching to find out more about this symbol.")

Update (10:14 p.m.): Google has refused to comment on whether their position is that a swastika is offensive.  They would also not say if it was an Israel-based employee who made the decision to remove the entry from Hot Trends, though earlier a spokesperson stated that delays in getting a comment on the situation were in part due to the Google Trends team's being based in Tel Aviv.

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

John Edwards-related curiosity reflected in Google Hot Trends

As of this posting, one measure of national interest in the story of the affair between John Edwards and Rielle Hunter is Google's Hot Trends list. Fifty fifteen of the top 25 most popular Google search terms related to the Edwards affair story, including the top five queries. Several are variations on Rielle Hunter's name: Reille is No. 1, with Riley and Real among the runners-up; and her real name, Lisa Druck, is No. 5. No. 34 is the precise-sounding "42 year old rielle hunter" — probably the result of mass copy-pasting from an online news story.

Googlers are also searching for many of the scandal's major and minor characters, including Edwards' wife, Elizabeth; Edwards' former aide Andrew Young; Hunter's newborn daughter Frances Quinn Hunter; and even Wade Edwards, the son of John and Elizabeth who was killed in a car accident in 1996. 

Notably, even though it's opening day, the 2008 Olympics appear only once in the top 25, aced out by some websiteless entity called Eden Body Works. 

Also worth pointing out is No. 12, "endless yard sale," which refers, apparently, to a 654-mile-long yard sale this weekend from Ohio to Alabama.  But hurry before the sale ends!

JibJab, a distributor of electronic greeting cards, is back in the saddle with its first video co-starring Barack Obama and John McCain. The terms "Jib Jab" and "jibjab.com" held spots at No. 2 and 7 on Google Hot Trends this morning -- so people are hearing about it.

The "Time for Some Campaignin'" eCard opens with President Bush, outfitted in flannel and cowboy boots with a banjo in hand, being carried out of the White House. It goes on to poke fun at McCain's age, Obama's lofty promises and both candidates' high-volume campaign spending. There's even a cameo by a Hillary Clinton (who recently asked donors to contribute to her next presidential bid in 2012). Clinton sings, "I'll be back in four years, heck it ain't all that far! Oh it's time for some campaignin'!"

The spoof of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" might spark a bit of déjà vu. JibJab was in the spotlight during the last election for its "This Land" video, a 2 1/2-minute clip that spread like wildfire four years ago, back when "viral" was just a wee little concept. That cartoon, set to the Woodie Guthrie classic "This Land is Your Land," depicts Bush drawing on a map with crayons, while "liberal wiener" John Kerry dances around in a hot dog costume.

My, we've come a long way since then.

-- Mark Milian

4chan's directions for the Hot Trends prank. This formulation,  where a set of steps end with "???" and then "profit" is itself an oft-used meme.

Last week it was a swastika topping Google's Hot Trends. Now it's the phrase "scientology is a cult," and, even more flattering for the search engine company that's having its feature bombed by ne'er-do-wells: now we see an upside-down and backwards taunt: "ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ****", only the asterisks are, in this case, a four letter word that rhymes with truck.

In the case of the swastika, we couldn't prove that users of the popular image board 4chan were behind it (their discussion threads can pass out of existence within minutes), but this time there can be no doubt. 

As of this writing, several active 4chan threads were devoted to the mass Googling of the "scientology" phrase as well as the upside-down truck insult, all as 4chan users congratulated themselves for having propelled the two phrases to the top of the list (see image at bottom). They were even planning to start with a third: "LOL".  A 4Chan moderator has not yet returned a request for comment.

(Just before this post was published, both entries were removed from the Trends list.)

4chan is enjoying much spotlight after being featured in two major media profiles in the last few days, as well as in the writeup I did on the swastika situation. 4chan is home to a group of Internet trouble makers, or "griefers." (Julian Dibbell detailed the practice in this excellent Wired article from January.)

4chan users revel in causing controversy -- and there's nothing like race or religion to get tempers flaring. Just yesterday the group staged a "raid" on the popular online childrens' game Habbo Hotel, flooding the game's world with avatars made to look like black men wearing Armani suits. Among 4chan's favorite raid flourishes, it turns out, is the 'swastiget' -- where invaders line up in the shape of a swastika. All for the lulz, of course.

A 4chan poster declares the prank a "win"

It seems that with Google Trends, the group has found a new toy to slam on the sidewalk until it breaks, and because this one is owned by the biggest Internet company on the block, no wonder these young fellows are so gleeful.

It remains to be seen how easily the Google Trends team can make their product "grief" proof.

Google has issued a statement about the swastika that was No. 1 on its Hot Trends list this morning but disappeared within hours. 

We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.

Google's apology illustrates how sensitive the issue is. The implication is that someone at Google judged the swastika "inappropriate or offensive." (Pornographic or profane terms rarely appear on the trends list.)

A Hindu swastika symbol adorns stairs in India
Photo by flickr user Meanest Indian 

I've requested additional comment on who decided to remove the symbol and why. It may bear mentioning that Google Trends team members are based in Tel Aviv, Israel (see an unrelated post by team members here), though it's not clear they did the removing.

Obviously the swastika carries hateful connotations. But if a service purports to accurately represent people's searches, who gets to decide what counts as offensive? The swastika isn't a derogatory term or obscene word; it's a symbol with a multifaceted history. 

On a separate note: Google also clarified that "we were just speculating" in an earlier statement about the origin of the search. (That statement said, "In this case, it appears that the html code for this query was posted on a popular internet bulletin board, which led to quite a few people searching to find out more about this symbol.")

Update (10:14 p.m.): Google has refused to comment on whether their position is that a swastika is offensive.  They would also not say if it was an Israel-based employee who made the decision to remove the entry from Hot Trends, though earlier a spokesperson stated that delays in getting a comment on the situation were in part due to the Google Trends team's being based in Tel Aviv.

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Hot Trends watch: JibJab's McCain vs. Obama vid

JibJab, a distributor of electronic greeting cards, is back in the saddle with its first video co-starring Barack Obama and John McCain. The terms "Jib Jab" and "jibjab.com" held spots at No. 2 and 7 on Google Hot Trends this morning -- so people are hearing about it.

The "Time for Some Campaignin'" eCard opens with President Bush, outfitted in flannel and cowboy boots with a banjo in hand, being carried out of the White House. It goes on to poke fun at McCain's age, Obama's lofty promises and both candidates' high-volume campaign spending. There's even a cameo by a Hillary Clinton (who recently asked donors to contribute to her next presidential bid in 2012). Clinton sings, "I'll be back in four years, heck it ain't all that far! Oh it's time for some campaignin'!"

The spoof of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" might spark a bit of déjà vu. JibJab was in the spotlight during the last election for its "This Land" video, a 2 1/2-minute clip that spread like wildfire four years ago, back when "viral" was just a wee little concept. That cartoon, set to the Woodie Guthrie classic "This Land is Your Land," depicts Bush drawing on a map with crayons, while "liberal wiener" John Kerry dances around in a hot dog costume.

My, we've come a long way since then.

-- Mark Milian

4chan's directions for the Hot Trends prank. This formulation,  where a set of steps end with "???" and then "profit" is itself an oft-used meme.

Last week it was a swastika topping Google's Hot Trends. Now it's the phrase "scientology is a cult," and, even more flattering for the search engine company that's having its feature bombed by ne'er-do-wells: now we see an upside-down and backwards taunt: "ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ****", only the asterisks are, in this case, a four letter word that rhymes with truck.

In the case of the swastika, we couldn't prove that users of the popular image board 4chan were behind it (their discussion threads can pass out of existence within minutes), but this time there can be no doubt. 

As of this writing, several active 4chan threads were devoted to the mass Googling of the "scientology" phrase as well as the upside-down truck insult, all as 4chan users congratulated themselves for having propelled the two phrases to the top of the list (see image at bottom). They were even planning to start with a third: "LOL".  A 4Chan moderator has not yet returned a request for comment.

(Just before this post was published, both entries were removed from the Trends list.)

4chan is enjoying much spotlight after being featured in two major media profiles in the last few days, as well as in the writeup I did on the swastika situation. 4chan is home to a group of Internet trouble makers, or "griefers." (Julian Dibbell detailed the practice in this excellent Wired article from January.)

4chan users revel in causing controversy -- and there's nothing like race or religion to get tempers flaring. Just yesterday the group staged a "raid" on the popular online childrens' game Habbo Hotel, flooding the game's world with avatars made to look like black men wearing Armani suits. Among 4chan's favorite raid flourishes, it turns out, is the 'swastiget' -- where invaders line up in the shape of a swastika. All for the lulz, of course.

A 4chan poster declares the prank a "win"

It seems that with Google Trends, the group has found a new toy to slam on the sidewalk until it breaks, and because this one is owned by the biggest Internet company on the block, no wonder these young fellows are so gleeful.

It remains to be seen how easily the Google Trends team can make their product "grief" proof.

Google has issued a statement about the swastika that was No. 1 on its Hot Trends list this morning but disappeared within hours. 

We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.

Google's apology illustrates how sensitive the issue is. The implication is that someone at Google judged the swastika "inappropriate or offensive." (Pornographic or profane terms rarely appear on the trends list.)

A Hindu swastika symbol adorns stairs in India
Photo by flickr user Meanest Indian 

I've requested additional comment on who decided to remove the symbol and why. It may bear mentioning that Google Trends team members are based in Tel Aviv, Israel (see an unrelated post by team members here), though it's not clear they did the removing.

Obviously the swastika carries hateful connotations. But if a service purports to accurately represent people's searches, who gets to decide what counts as offensive? The swastika isn't a derogatory term or obscene word; it's a symbol with a multifaceted history. 

On a separate note: Google also clarified that "we were just speculating" in an earlier statement about the origin of the search. (That statement said, "In this case, it appears that the html code for this query was posted on a popular internet bulletin board, which led to quite a few people searching to find out more about this symbol.")

Update (10:14 p.m.): Google has refused to comment on whether their position is that a swastika is offensive.  They would also not say if it was an Israel-based employee who made the decision to remove the entry from Hot Trends, though earlier a spokesperson stated that delays in getting a comment on the situation were in part due to the Google Trends team's being based in Tel Aviv.

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

4chan sprays Google with "scientology" and a nasty insult

4chan's directions for the Hot Trends prank. This formulation,  where a set of steps end with "???" and then "profit" is itself an oft-used meme.

Last week it was a swastika topping Google's Hot Trends. Now it's the phrase "scientology is a cult," and, even more flattering for the search engine company that's having its feature bombed by ne'er-do-wells: now we see an upside-down and backwards taunt: "ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ****", only the asterisks are, in this case, a four letter word that rhymes with truck.

In the case of the swastika, we couldn't prove that users of the popular image board 4chan were behind it (their discussion threads can pass out of existence within minutes), but this time there can be no doubt. 

As of this writing, several active 4chan threads were devoted to the mass Googling of the "scientology" phrase as well as the upside-down truck insult, all as 4chan users congratulated themselves for having propelled the two phrases to the top of the list (see image at bottom). They were even planning to start with a third: "LOL".  A 4Chan moderator has not yet returned a request for comment.

(Just before this post was published, both entries were removed from the Trends list.)

4chan is enjoying much spotlight after being featured in two major media profiles in the last few days, as well as in the writeup I did on the swastika situation. 4chan is home to a group of Internet trouble makers, or "griefers." (Julian Dibbell detailed the practice in this excellent Wired article from January.)

4chan users revel in causing controversy -- and there's nothing like race or religion to get tempers flaring. Just yesterday the group staged a "raid" on the popular online childrens' game Habbo Hotel, flooding the game's world with avatars made to look like black men wearing Armani suits. Among 4chan's favorite raid flourishes, it turns out, is the 'swastiget' -- where invaders line up in the shape of a swastika. All for the lulz, of course.

A 4chan poster declares the prank a "win"

It seems that with Google Trends, the group has found a new toy to slam on the sidewalk until it breaks, and because this one is owned by the biggest Internet company on the block, no wonder these young fellows are so gleeful.

It remains to be seen how easily the Google Trends team can make their product "grief" proof.

Google has issued a statement about the swastika that was No. 1 on its Hot Trends list this morning but disappeared within hours. 

We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.

Google's apology illustrates how sensitive the issue is. The implication is that someone at Google judged the swastika "inappropriate or offensive." (Pornographic or profane terms rarely appear on the trends list.)

A Hindu swastika symbol adorns stairs in India
Photo by flickr user Meanest Indian 

I've requested additional comment on who decided to remove the symbol and why. It may bear mentioning that Google Trends team members are based in Tel Aviv, Israel (see an unrelated post by team members here), though it's not clear they did the removing.

Obviously the swastika carries hateful connotations. But if a service purports to accurately represent people's searches, who gets to decide what counts as offensive? The swastika isn't a derogatory term or obscene word; it's a symbol with a multifaceted history. 

On a separate note: Google also clarified that "we were just speculating" in an earlier statement about the origin of the search. (That statement said, "In this case, it appears that the html code for this query was posted on a popular internet bulletin board, which led to quite a few people searching to find out more about this symbol.")

Update (10:14 p.m.): Google has refused to comment on whether their position is that a swastika is offensive.  They would also not say if it was an Israel-based employee who made the decision to remove the entry from Hot Trends, though earlier a spokesperson stated that delays in getting a comment on the situation were in part due to the Google Trends team's being based in Tel Aviv.

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Google apologizes for swastika situation

Google has issued a statement about the swastika that was No. 1 on its Hot Trends list this morning but disappeared within hours. 

We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.

Google's apology illustrates how sensitive the issue is. The implication is that someone at Google judged the swastika "inappropriate or offensive." (Pornographic or profane terms rarely appear on the trends list.)

A Hindu swastika symbol adorns stairs in India
Photo by flickr user Meanest Indian 

I've requested additional comment on who decided to remove the symbol and why. It may bear mentioning that Google Trends team members are based in Tel Aviv, Israel (see an unrelated post by team members here), though it's not clear they did the removing.

Obviously the swastika carries hateful connotations. But if a service purports to accurately represent people's searches, who gets to decide what counts as offensive? The swastika isn't a derogatory term or obscene word; it's a symbol with a multifaceted history. 

On a separate note: Google also clarified that "we were just speculating" in an earlier statement about the origin of the search. (That statement said, "In this case, it appears that the html code for this query was posted on a popular internet bulletin board, which led to quite a few people searching to find out more about this symbol.")

Update (10:14 p.m.): Google has refused to comment on whether their position is that a swastika is offensive.  They would also not say if it was an Israel-based employee who made the decision to remove the entry from Hot Trends, though earlier a spokesperson stated that delays in getting a comment on the situation were in part due to the Google Trends team's being based in Tel Aviv.

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Hot Trends watch: SpotCrime

Apparently quite a few people were concerned about crime today. Searches for "Spot Crime" hit No. 7 on Google's Hot Trends this morning.

The term led searchers to SpotCrime.com, which lists street crimes committed in many U.S. cities (and even London) and lays them out on a Google map mash-up. Some of the information is pulled from public records; others come from databases like the LA Times' own Homicide Report (which also has a map plotting homicides).

SpotCrime lets you filter violations into nine categories including arrests, arsons, burglary and vandalism. The section for Los Angeles lists 300 offenses since June 29, including four shootings and two stabbings in the last couple of days and almost 50 thefts at the beginning of July.

SpotCrime's blog highlights disturbing periods of crime in certain cities, and Los Angeles garners a post for shootings in a six-month stretch.

That's probably not the proudest recognition the city has received. No worries, though. We're also the most polluted, third most congested and seventh most miserable city.

Hey, at least we're not Detroit.

-- Mark Milian

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Hot trends watch: Textbook Torrents

Textbook Torrents, a Web directory of questionable legality that lets users download digital versions of schoolbooks, got plenty of attention from curious Web surfers Tuesday, hitting No. 21 on Google's hot list after a feature was published on Slashdot.

They probably could have done without one group noticing the service, however: Pearson Education, a major textbook publisher which holds the copyright for many files the site serves.

The file-sharing tracker removed 78 links to digital books at the request of Pearson, according to a posting on Textbook Torrents' home page. The loss is only a drop in the bucket of the site's directory of about 6,000 PDF, text and image files, however.

Site administrator Geekman said he was contacted by e-mail last Thursday with the content removal request, but waited until today to respond so he could verify that it truly came from the copyright holder, he said. The Slashdot story, which doesn't mention the spat with the Upper Saddle River, N.J.-based publisher, was unrelated to the legal confrontation, Geekman assures the site's 64,000 users.

Geekman, who remains anonymous to protect himself from such legal clashes as this, started Textbook Torrents in January 2007 to strike back at the textbook industry's steep pricing, a common complaint among college students. His e-mail response to Pearson reflected this sentiment.

"Sadly, the organization you represent is engaged in monopolistic practices and extortion of those least able to pay. Students have no choice but to purchase the textbooks that their professors assign, and have no choice but to pay the exorbitant prices you set. You print money, not textbooks. I would love to live in a world where the question of unfairly-priced textbooks would be met with uncomprehending looks and Textbook Torrents collected dust. Unfortunately, neither of us live in that world. Until you reach the understanding that we must meet in the middle, where you exhibit reasonable business practices and respect for the students you purport to serve, Textbook Torrents will exist, and more will follow in its wake."

Geekman's residence outside the United States affords him some legal shelter, as the Pirate Bay file-sharing collective has shown, but he yielded to the publisher's request "as a professional courtesy," he said. "I would love to come up swinging if I had the resources for sufficient legal representation," he wrote in an e-mail.

"I know that we have received a great deal of attention as a result of this exchange with Pearson," Geekman said. "Ironically, I think they've shot themselves in the foot by putting the spotlight on a site that has until now been something of an underground movement."

It's an interesting argument that by trying to prevent the piracy of its content, one publisher has singlehandedly planted the seeds for a hefty harvest of textbook downloads. But Textbook Torrents' 64,000 users aren't small potatoes.

-- Mark Milian

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Hot trends watch: EveryScape

As we know, Google Maps lets you view satellite images of just about anywhere in the world, and with its Street View function, you can even virtually cruise down the street and look in store windows. But that's so 2 seconds ago.

Now EveryScape actually walks you inside the building.

The mapping service, which opened its doors last October, experienced a surge in Google searches Monday morning, jumping to No. 4 on the Hot list.

Here is where EveryScape shines: Let's say you're planning to stay at the Mosaic Hotel in Beverly Hills. EveryScape will show you a 360-degree, ground-level perspective of the area, so you can scope out nearby restaurants -- Cool Basil is a popular Thai place within walking distance, and if you're in the mood for Italian, La Dolce Vita is less than a mile away and got great reviews from users. You can even get a peek inside the hotel's own eatery, an elegant looking spot decorated with a tapestry of brown and black -- or step outside to check out the poolside view, adorned with exotic greenery.

The site offers 360-degree street views for 14 major cities, including Beverly Hills and Laguna Beach. While there's still a significant gap between its coverage and Google Street View's more than 40 U.S. cities, EveryScape has ventured beyond our homeland's borders, mapping the streets of grand cities like Beijing and Krakow, Poland.

With a tool for previewing interiors and reading reviews, maybe EveryScape could save me from taking dates to restaurants I can't afford.

-- Mark Milian, intern at latimes.com

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Homing in on Hot Trends

After yesterday's wild guesswork on how many searches it takes to get a term on Google's Hot Trends, I got an e-mail this morning from Master Sgt. Kat Bailey of Air Force public affairs:

Regarding your blog on "Hot Trends watch: Air Force portal," there were 62,547 active-duty airmen eligible for promotion to technical or master sergeant during the 2008 promotion cycle. 12,514 were selected for promotion. In addition, you would probably want to factor in the eligible airman's co-workers and supervisor, who are usually searching for promotees’ names as well.

This is a good clue to help us with our Hot Trends ballparking. I'm going out on a limb to say 50% of promotion-eligible airmen checked in to see if they were promoted. And if you add a few thousand family members, you're looking at roughly 35,000 searches. Once again, this is just a guess. I've asked Master Sgt. Bailey to send along some numbers for traffic to the Air Force site so we can further investigate how many people we're talking about here.

Tune in tomorrow...

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern

Hot trends watch: Rotten Neighbor

Got a troublesome neighbor? You are not alone. RottenNeighbor.com, a site where users can sound-off about local area residents whom they're not too happy with, was a hot Google search this morning, clocking in at No. 7 and 12 on the Hot list.

Rotten Neighbor, launched last summer, lets you search by city or ZIP code for all the noisy, annoying and rude neighbors listed in your area. For any given ZIP code, you can get more specific breakdowns of rude metrics, such as noise, safety and appearance.

Individual neighbor reports list the general vicinity of the culprits, a description of the complaint and the number of other users that agreed. In addition to text grievances, you can post videos and photos of ne'er-do-wells caught in the act. The map also displays such neighborhood party poopers as registered sex offenders and foreclosed homes.

Listings near the Los Angeles Times Building include "barking dog" and "psychopath upstairs." 

The site also lets you log reports for good neighbors, which appear in green on the map. However, there aren't yet many commendations listed in Los Angeles (besides the Cunninghams -- great people).  A utility for praising your neighbors somehow doesn't seem quite as useful.

The sudden increased traffic to Rotten Neighbor seems to be taking its toll on the site's servers, causing slow page loads and sometimes error messages. People checking to see if friends, family members or they themselves made the list may have to wait until the stampede dies down.

-- Mark Milian, guest blogger/intern