The Lost Google Tapes

Somehow I missed this way back in 2006 when it came out, The Lost Google Tapes. These are tapes recorded early in google's history, well, 2000-ish, by a reporter doing a story on google. He got the founders, etc. etc on tape. The tapes got released on the net as podcasts in 2006. The recording quality is TERRIBLE, but if you denoise it and EQ using Amadeus Pro or similar software on windows or linux (Audacity?) you can hear what's going on pretty well. I'd post modified version but I'm not sure if that would be legal, let me know what you think...

Well, it's fascinating to hear these voices from the past. It's a bit like being a fly on the wall.

Tools that Google Uses Internally

Google did a webcast earlier this year about their internal tools. It was posted for a while and then unfortunately removed. But, you can still see summaries: The Tools Google Uses Internally (includes screenshots), Innovation@Google 2008 Event Notes, and A glimpse inside Google's secret sauce (also has screenshots).

Generally speaking it looks like a pretty well thought out set of collaboration tools, helping to reinforce a company wide policy of distributed intelligence and innovation.