Google's new voice-recognition search tool for the iPhone has problems understanding Australian accents, leading to some bizarre answers to spoken queries. Similar problems have been reported in the U.K. with regional accents.

Users down under have noticed searches for the word "iPhone" can return pages of results for "priceline", "mustang" or simply a message saying "try again."

The number eight becomes a search for "ike", seven turns into "Clinton", and don't even try searching for the number six.

Google recommends the tool, which is available as a free download for the iPhone and iPod Touch in Apple's Application Store, works best with a North American accent.

It seems again a case that for anything outside of America, there be dragons. It is surprising that large "international" companies take this attitude. I recently complained of Goolge ignoring my browser language preferences.

Another great example is LinkedIn.com. Obviously if you want to do international business networking, you have to speak and write English. It seems all too hard for the Americans to comprehend that there is a world beyond their shores. Xing.com while developed by Germans, are very conscious of the need to speak multiple languages, hence the greater uptake and multi-lingual networking taking place there.

We may now live in the global village, but we do need to make an effort to reach out to each other and communicate in ways best understood by the people we engage with.

Social networking sites are enticing more people to them than porn sites. A recent study by Bill Tancer, a self-described "data geek" and General Manger of the Internet tracking company Hitwise, has concluded that porn searches have gone flaccid while people seem to be more interested in social intercourse. He said surfing for porn had dropped to about 10 percent of searches from 20 percent a decade ago, and the hottest Internet searches now are for social networking sites.

“As social networking traffic has increased, visits to porn sites have decreased, young users spend so much time on social networks that they don't have time to look at adult sites.” Tancer said.

Tancer, in his new book, "Click: What Millions of People are Doing Online and Why It Matters", said analyzing web searches did not just reflect what was happening online but gave a wider picture of society and people's behavior. 

Tancer said the change in communication patterns was one of the most noticeable shifts in society in the past five years — a key point for marketers seeking to learn about their audiences.

In terms of behaviour, Tancer says his study also shows searches for anti-depression drugs spike around Thanksgiving, people are more interested in tropical storms since Katrina.

Tancer said the current obsession with celebrities was also reflected through web data, with celebrity websites garnering more attention than sites devoted to religion, politics, well-being and diets combined – and there is no sign that this is waning.

This celebrity mentality had also overlapped into the November presidential election in the United States with surfers looking for images of Republican vice presidential candidate Sara Palin rather than looking for her policies.

"A lot of the focus around the candidates in general is image based. People want to know how tall Barack Obama is and also to search for their families," he said.