Google Doodle on Home Page June 9

[Rustward]

"Today, Google's home page has one of the most interactive Google Doodles to date. In celebration of Les Paul's 96th birthday, Google's home page sports an interactive guitar version of its logo."

You can play by strumming the strings with the mouse pointer or use the keyboard.

Here's the article. Of course you'll have to go to Google's home page to get to the guitar.

How to Play The Beatles on the Les Paul Google Doodle | News & Opinion | PCMag.com

This is way cool.

 

[Midpack]

I agree, someone pointed it out to me this AM at work. I played with it for several minutes today, and you can "record" yourself too.

 

[Dreamer]

That was fun! I saw it when I used Google earlier today, but did not know you could play it.

 

[Bestwifeever]

Thanks for letting us know. I also saw it but never have my sound turned on. I made a recording too.

 

[clifp]

I am in the process of reading in the Plex, about Google damn those guys are smart and creative. They have displaced Pixar as my favorite company.

 

[Rustward]

I am in the process of reading in the Plex, about Google damn those guys are smart and creative. They have displaced Pixar as my favorite company.

Early in this century, I did a contract for a financial services company in Minneapolis (Centurion logo, based in NY, I think) and had the pleasure to work with a gentleman who was from 3M, based in the Minneapolis metro area (ticker MMM). I asked him how 3M was able to develop so many creative products. He told me that every 3M corporate employee was required or requested (don't remember which) to spend 4 work hours per week trying to think of current product innovations or innovative new products, as the company needed a steady stream of new products because most of the profit was from new products before they got cloned. Maybe the Googles and the Pixars of the world work on the same basis. I dunno. I have never worked for such a company, but I would love to.

Edit to add: Yes, the people at Google are pretty clever, to say the least.

 

[ERD50]

I was confused until I stumbled on the note that you need to have your Google search set to 'classic' view. Even after I signed out so it didn't default to my 'iGoogle' search, it didn't work, had to go to 'classic' to get sound.

I was under-whelmed. Les Paul was a creative and technical genius, and the Google Doodle thing was toy-ish. For a taste of his amazing journey through life, check out "Chasing Sound", I think it is still on Netflix instant, a fantastic little documentary.

Reader's Digest version, based on my faulty memory:

Small town in Wisconsin, kid grows up in family tavern, plays in family band at the bar, drafted in WW2, plays in the band and DJ's to entertain troupes, comes back to US and creates new recording techniques (like multi-track) and develops solid body electric guitar ('invents' is a stretch, IMO - he 'developed' the thing - in important ways). Never retired, because he loved what he did. Heck, if Jeff Beck would come around and idolize me at my 'job', I wouldn't retire either! Google youtube beck les paul.

Oh, and an interesting note, his arm was broken in a car accident. Doctors said his elbow would never regain motion, so he had the doctors fix his elbow in a position that allowed him to play guitar.

RIP, Lester William Polsfuss


-ERD50

 

[clifp]

Your a tough customer ERD. In the last day they've got about 4,000 YouTube uploads for this little gem.

Some pretty impressive Can't take my eyes off of you, and this one, and the Star Spangled Banner

Google allows/encourages employees to spend 20% of their time working on their own projects. Many of the most popular Google Apps, Google Earth, and even Gmail came from this. However, it is actually a full time job for several folks to come up with this doodle and PacMan

 

[nphx]

Neat - but not so noble. Google and their Chromium OS benefits from less Adobe Flash on the market. "Neat" capabilities like google maps or Books API have strong and enforced restrictions if you leverage these in you own commercial endeavors. (maps entry level price point starts at "just $10000" per year.

 

[ERD50]

Your a tough customer ERD.

This is true. But I'll stand by my 'toy-ish' statement. To a musician (I barely qualify), any 'instrument' without dynamics, pitch-bend, and/or some other expressive forms is just a toy. Any single note on a Les Paul guitar can be made to sound in infinite variations. Not just 'plunk'!

That second clip in particular did a great job considering the limitations. But it is still 'toy-ish' without the dynamics and variation in a musical instrument. It's a little odd to me to 'honor' Les Paul, who was a very expressive player, in this way.

But people had fun with it, and that's cool.

-ERD50

 

[ERD50]

Neat - but not so noble. ... (maps entry level price point starts at "just $10000" per year.

Some of us consider making a profit by providing services and hiring people in the process to be quite 'noble'!

-ERD50

 

[Rustward]

I was under-whelmed. Les Paul was a creative and technical genius, and the Google Doodle thing was toy-ish. For a taste of his amazing journey through life, check out "Chasing Sound", I think it is still on Netflix instant, a fantastic little documentary.

Maybe you could lighten up a little? I think the purpose might have been more to draw attention to Les Paul from some who might never have heard of him.

Do parades, hot dogs, and fireworks do justice to the 4th of July?

Chocolate rabbits and colored eggs to Easter?

...

 

[Bestwifeever]

Sometimes a toy should be allowed to be just a toy.

 

[powerplay]

It's a pretty cool tool and is still on Google today.

 

[ERD50]

Maybe you could lighten up a little? I think the purpose might have been more to draw attention to Les Paul from some who might never have heard of him.

...

The attention aspect is good, I agree. I guess it is all a matter of perspective, I think Les Paul is soooooo cool, this just pales.

Musical toys like this have been around since the earliest days of personal computers, so yes, I'm underwhelmed, or jaded or whatever.

No big deal, just my personal view.-ERD50