Is Google building a car-specific version of Android?

Looks there might be a Google Local PIN scam going on.

Because I’m sure you wanted to know: the hundred most-used emoji on Twitter.

It looks like more political ad contracts might get put online. GOOD. “In a move that could make it easier for the public to identify who’s behind TV advertising aimed at influencing elections and legislation, the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday proposed requiring cable and satellite television providers, as well as radio stations, to begin posting political ad contracts online.”

WordPress 4.1, “Dinah”, is now available.

Google is releasing some more Inbox invites.

Geoscientists are working on more specialized search engines. “…GeoLink and Semantic Scholar attempt to build fine-grained, niche search engines catered to specific subject areas, by tapping into deeper semantic processing that helps computers establish scientifically meaningful connections between publications. When a scientist types in ‘plankton in the Red Sea,’ for example, the search engine would not only understand it as a string of characters that show up on papers, but also know the researchers who investigated the topic, the cruises they took, the instruments they used, and the data sets and papers they published. Google has applied similar techniques to improve its main search engine, but projects like GeoLink benefit from input from scientists with extensive knowledge in the subject area, who identify meaningful links that computer scientists then translate into code.”

FamilySearch has added another round of records. “Notable collection updates include the 269,011 indexed records from the Brazil, São Paulo, Immigration Cards, 1902–1980 collection; the 199,157 images from the China, Collection of Genealogies, 1239–2014 collection; and the 155,719 indexed records from the Canada, Canada Census, 1911 collection.”

From Mashable: The Beginner’s Guide to Starting a Podcast. And I still don’t know of a podcast search engine worth a damn.

The State of Hawai’i has launched a new busines monitoring service. “Through MyBusiness Alerts, business owners can sign up to receive a near-real-time email or text message alert when someone makes a change to a company’s official state business registration filing. The service monitors changes to business name, address, status, type, officers, and annual reports.” The implication is that business owners can monitor their own stuff, but I created an account, looked up a business, and got all the way to paying for it, so it looks like if you’re willing to pony up, you can monitor what you like. (Someone correct me in the comments if I’m wrong.)

Bing is making predictions for 2015. Turtlenecks? I hate turtlenecks…

The Colbert Report is now over, but you can still take a Google Street View tour of the studio. I must admit I’d be a bit more excited if you could take a tour of the office he had when he was on Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.

Now available: an online forest atlas. “Launched this fall, the Global Forest Atlas currently provides a glimpse of the state of forest resources in the Amazon and the Congo basin based on the latest research. Ultimately, its organizers hope it will become a sort of living almanac of forest resources worldwide for journalists and advocates, scientists and general readers.”

Now available: The People’s Archive of Rural India. “Journalist P Sainath created a stir when he quit The Hindu in July to take a break. Now he is back with a new project dedicated to the subject of his journalistic passion: rural India. On Saturday, Sainath will launch the People’s Archive of Rural India, a website that aims to be a “living journal and an archive” documenting the ‘everyday lives of everyday people’ across the under-represented hinterlands of the country.”

Time Inc now has IFTTT channels.

Yikes! Git has a security bug. Good morning, Internet…

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