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Cue the “Google+ is dead” jokes, and the following “was Google+ ever alive?” remarks.

Google has today removed the link to users’ Google+ profile from the top its many web properties, most notably its front search page and Gmail web app. Previously, names appeared with a plus in front like “+Stephen” and would link to your Google+ profile. From today, it looks like Google is making the name label no longer a link, and moving the “+Stephen” Google+ link to the app drop-down menu…
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As part of its Google I/O developer conference today, Google is offering some updates on its Google Places API for iOS as well as future updates arriving for its Maps app.
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<a href="http://recode.net/2015/05/27/google-confirms-buy-button-is-coming/">Image via Re/code</a> 

Speaking at the Code Conference in California, Google’s chief business officer Omid Kordestani confirmed that the company is in fact planning on adding a “buy” button to search results. This feature has been rumored for several months and is a way for Google to compete more seriously with the likes of Amazon and eBay.

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Following the recent rebrand of Google’s Webmaster Tools to “Search Console,” the Mountain View company has now announced that it is introducing new reports to help app developers get better insight into how their indexed Android app is performing in search…
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Earlier this week, users discovered an issue with Google Maps that centered around typing in a racial slur and being directed to The White House. This evening, Google has issued an apology on its official Maps blog. The company says that it is “deeply upset” by the issue and is currently in the process of fixing it.

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Google announced today in a blog post that it is renaming its popular Google Webmaster Tools service to Google Search Console after nearly 10 years of existence. Aside from the different name, no other changes are being made to Google Search Console. Google, of course, updates the service with new features on a regular basis, though.

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Following up on Google’s agreement with Twitter to instantly add tweets to web search results, the duo announced today that users on mobile devices will start seeing real-time Twitter results as well. The feature is available in the Google app on Android or Google’s mobile website, and is expected to make its way to the desktop soon.

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Old on the left, new on the right

It appears that Google is testing a new design for the header of its mobile search website, featuring a much more spread-out interface including a larger text entry box, navigation tabs, and Google logo. The size and placement of the actual search results seem to be identical, however…

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The Wall Street Journal today reported that Google plans to launch a new “buy now” button this week. The button will be incorporated directly into its shopping search results. The report echoes a similar report from The Wall Street Journal earlier this year, in which it was reported that Google wanted to enter the online commerce and more seriously battle Amazon and eBay.

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In a post on Google+ this evening, Google has announced that it is adding a new feature to its search engine that will make it incredibly easy to quickly order food on the go. Google says that starting today, if you search for a restaurant that is integrated with Seamless, Eat24, GrubHub, Delivery.com, MyPizza.com, or BeyondMenu, you will be able to order a meal directly from the search results.

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As you probably could have expected would happen eventually, Google this evening has revealed that more searches are now performed on mobile devices than on desktops. In a post on the Inside AdWords blog, Google wrote, “more Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan.”

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The Knowledge Graph is a controversial—but now fundamental—part of using Google, and for most casual browsers of the web, it’s nothing but an added convenience. It already does a great job of figuring out which pieces of information are most important and accurate, and gives them to you directly within the Google search page—there’s no need to go digging through countless results to find what you want. I myself even find it useful very often, usually when I’m searching for specific facts. Something like “When was George Washington born?” is a great example.

But I’m also wary of how intelligent it has gotten in recent years, and how much more integral to the Google experience it is becoming. Not only is Google pulling content from crowd-sourced Wikipedia articles, it is now getting smart enough to pull some of the content I’ve written on this website. Knowledge Graph has been known to bring death to many pages hosting all kinds of content, with lyrics websites being the perfect example. But what happens when Knowledge Graph and its Quick Answer box are so smart that you don’t need to browse the web at all?

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Google is set to debut a reworked version of its search result ranking system tomorrow, Fortune reported today. The new rankings will place websites with mobile-friendly designs ahead of those that work best on desktop machines in search results.

The decision to make this change was prompted by the fact that over 60% of Google’s search traffic now comes from mobile devices, the company said. The modification was first announced in a post on Google’s Webmaster Central blog earlier this year.

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Microsoft’s Bing isn’t the most popular search engine around, but—at least according to the latest from comScore—it’s gaining ground slowly but surely. For the first time, Microsoft sites have surpassed the 20% milestone, meaning more than one fifth of overall search traffic is now owned by the Redmond, Washington company…
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The Wall Street Journal reports that Google is currently in talks to allow advertisers to target ads towards existing customers in search results. According to the report, Google has approached advertisers with the idea of them sharing customer information that Google would then use to target the ads.

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Half of a 2012 FTC report on Google’s business practices has been “inadvertently disclosed” in an open records request by the WSJ. Bizarrely, what was leaked was every other page of the report. MarketingLand’s Danny Sullivan has been busy reading the report and tweeting some of the things revealed by it.

The FTC eventually concluded that Google had not violated antitrust laws by favoring its own services over that of rivals, but found it was “a close call.”

[tweet https://twitter.com/dannysullivan/status/580634396618698752/]

Google did, for example, promote its own services in search results … 
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The Wall Street Journal today published a report highlighting an investigation done by the Federal Trade Commission that began in early 2013. The investigation centered around how Google skewed search results in an effort to promote its own services over competitors. Google, according to the FTC report, was accused of boosting its services for shopping, travel, and local businesses.

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