blog.

So recently I've started thinking about our first camping trip of the year, maybe we'll be brave and go early Spring time. But before we can go we really need some new sleeping mats, one of ours has an undetectable leak and frankly they are horribly uncomfortable anyway.

We paid a visit to a couple of Outdoors shops after Christmas, and had a look at what was available in their sales. But this wasn't enough choice. So we've gone online and looked at their full range, plus some other high street retailers' websites. And then some other, online-only retailers. We now have a lot of choice, too much in fact.

So we've started reading reviews and feedback and scores-out-of-ten from users of various mats, which has been really interesting and informative, and given us ideas for other sleeping mats that we hadn't yet considered. We're checking Amazon and eBay for their best deals, and pricing comparison sites too. Just when we think we've made a decision, along comes a bad review, or a price discount on another mat that was originally out of our budget, and off we go again on the rollercoaster of indecision.

I love the internet, don't get me wrong. It never ceases to amaze me, it gives me options and solutions and endless knowledge. I'm empowered by facts, figures and statistics at my fingertips… plus the bargains can be incredible. And I know how lucky I am to have all this choice and be in a position to purchase. BUT. And it is a BUT. It's almost spoiled my shopping experience for these flipping sleeping mats. I'm now stuck in an endless cycle of reviews and best prices, and can't go camping until we get it sorted!

I'm sure we'll give ourselves a deadline, and the decision we make will be all the more rounded and satisfactory, knowing we know all we can possibly know about the mats' thickness, durability, weight, inside leg measurement… And then we'll be onto choosing a campsite. Uh-oh. Here we go again…

So everybody who's anybody has been blogging about Google's latest offering: Google Instant.

It's a faster way of finding what you're looking for, reducing search times by between 1 and 5 seconds according to the gatekeepers of the web themselves.

The time saving comes in the fact that your search results are modified as you type, building on the search suggestion function and altering the results you see as you go. 

The reactions of the web using public have been varied; from those thrilled to bits with the speed of it: 'I didn't even have to press enter!' extols a man in Google's own promo video, to those terrified of it: Charlie Brooker claims it's like 'the internet on fast forward' and that it's trying to kill him (!)

It's also got SEO and search marketing companies unsettled due to the impact that it could potentially have on the value of keywords.

For me, I'm a fan. It's going to take a bit of getting used to the constantly changing images and results as you type (one of the key factors behind its development was apparently the fact that Google's users type much more slowly than they read) but I'm just not sure it'll have that much of an impact on me, as I tend to use the browser bar in Chrome as my search field, rather than the box on Google's homepage.

There are rumblings that Instant will be rolled out to work in the Chrome browser bar, but for now, it's not going to change my life. Google Telepathic on the other hand, now that would be something impressive.