May 9, 2012 at 1:38pm ET by Danny Sullivan

Last November, Google tested a new "Sources" section in its search results, in the third column where ads normally appear. It seems the testing is underway again, showing extended information about actors, films, musicians, people and more. It also seems likely everyone may see this extended information soon, and that it's the "search refresh" the Wall Street Journal wrote about in March finally arriving. Experiment Confirmed I noticed these appearing yesterday in my own search results, and Google has confirmed that there's an experiment happening: We're always experimenting with ways to im [...]

WSJ Says Big Google Search Changes Coming? Reality Check Time!

Mar 15, 2012 at 4:26am ET by Danny Sullivan

The Wall Street Journal is out with a story saying that Google is about to make one of the biggest changes in its history of offering web search, providing more direct answers and gaining "semantic" smarts to understand more about what words mean. I'm scratching my head, since Google already does this. Methinks Google's PR has exploded in ways it didn't expect. Beyond Blue Links! From the story, we learn things such as: Over the next few months, Google's search engine will begin spitting out more than a list of blue Web links. It will also present more facts and direct answers to queries at [...]

Google Expands Use & Display Of Related Searches

Jun 16, 2011 at 5:06pm ET by Matt McGee

Google has announced an interesting expansion of its related search capabilities. The updates to Google's search results will show up in a number of different ways: Search References/Lists When the search query suggests results that may involve a list, Google will show what it calls the "top references" for the query. This may show up for searches such as "greek philosophers," "american authors" and -- as shown below -- "seattle neighborhoods." That display may appear anywhere on the first page of search results. But, if the user clicks on "Ballard" or one of the other names on th [...]

Related Topics: Google: Squared | Google: Web Search

“Anti-Search Engine” FindTheBest Adds Buying Guides, Top 10 Slideshows

Mar 24, 2011 at 11:43am ET by Greg Sterling

There are a number of ways to describe FindTheBest, the site launched last year by DoubleClick founder Kevin O’Connor. One is "decision engine" another might be "comparison engine," a third could be "anti-search engine." It might be called an "anti-search engine" because, like Blekko's Rich Skrenta, FindTheBest's O'Conner believes that search results have become cluttered and filled with spam. O'Conner wanted to provide structured, "apples-to-apples comparisons" of places, institutions and products with total transparency. The site aggregates and then provides structured comparison dat [...]

DoubleClick Founder Launches Structured “Decision Engine” FindTheBest.com

Aug 2, 2010 at 8:45am ET by Greg Sterling

At first blush it wasn't impressive to me. I assumed from a quick look that FindTheBest was just a collection of links and "best of" lists. It thus seemed strange that DoubleClick founder Kevin O'Connor would come out of quasi-retirement to launch a basic directory site. But as we got into it a bit more it was clear there was a larger and more interesting project going on. FindTheBest is a kind of comparison engine for structured data of all sorts. It's not an alternative to search per se. In fact it will rely heavily on search and SEO for user discovery. The idea is to provide consumer [...]

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