Blogger and Picasa Web Could Be Rebranded

Mashable reports that Blogger and Picasa Web Albums could change their names and become Google Blogs and Google Photos. "Google intends to leave several non-Google name brands and rename them as Google products. The move is part of a better effort to unify its brand for the public launch of Google+."

While Google Photos makes a lot sense, replacing Blogger with Google Blogs is not a great idea. When people say "Google Blogs", they refer to the long list of Google's business blogs. "Google Blogs" is previously used for Google Blog Search, but only on the homepage.

On the other hand, Blogger could be redesigned and use boundary elements from Google+, Blogger's profiles could be replaced by Google Profiles, the commenting system could be revamped and included with Google+.

One of the reasons why Picasa Web Albums didn't get improved too much is that it has always been perceived as Picasa's online extension. It wasn't a separate photo sharing service and many of its features required Picasa. You couldn't upload more than 5 photos, download albums or edit photos without installing Picasa. Google measured changing Picasa Web's name back in 2008.

Google Business Profiles?

The source code of the Google Profiles page includes a broken link that has a enlightening anchor text: "business profiles". The link sends you to a page that doesn't exist: http://www.google.com/_/managepages, but this characteristic could add Google Profiles to Google Apps and allow users to create multiple profile pages.

Another interesting thing is that Google has a new subdomain: https://plusone.google.com, which redirects to Google Profiles. There's already a Web page about the +1 button, so it's not clear why Google has a new address for Google +1. Maybe profiles will be a characteristic of Google +1.

Add Multiple Google Profile Photos

The new Google Profiles border lets you upload multiple profile photos and button between them with a simple click. Visitors can see all the photos you've uploaded, so you must be cautious when you replace a profile photo. It's not enough to click "change photo" and upload the latest image: you should also click on the image and delete the preceding profile photo.

Profile photos are stored in a Picasa Web album, just like the photos from the Scrapbook section. The main dissimilarity is that profile photos can be cropped or shortened in Picnik.

If you previously have a Google Profile, it's a superior idea to upload a new profile photo. The new border uses bigger photos, so your old avatar looks pixelated.

Google Profiles Has a New Interface

Google Profiles has a new user interface that emphasizes the profile photo, includes a lot of new sections and uses encrypted relations. You can now click on a part of your profile to edit it, add "10 words that explain you best", bragging rights, association information, structured in sequence about your education and employment, a scrapbook with your favorite photos. Another modify is that you can now hide the Google Buzz tab from your profile.

The new Google Profiles is closer to a social networking feature, but it's just one part of the puzzle.

New Google Profile Search

Google has a new particular search engine for probing Google Profiles. It has a better boundary than the regular Google Profiles search feature, it's included with Google Search and it shows extra links from people's profiles.

This attribute is not yet enabled in the interface, but you can look for Google Profiles by adding up &tbs=prfl:1 to a Google Search URL. Here's an pattern.

Google could use the data from user profiles to offer advanced search features like restricting profiles to people who lived in Chicago, attended Long Island University and are involved in sports.