SearchCap: The Day In Search, Dec. 19, 2006

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:

From Search Engine Land:

• Up Close With Digg Podcasts (& Vote For The Daily SearchCast!)
  Neil Patel covered the new podcast feature at Digg in yesterday’s story, The New Digg Features Plus, A Submitter’s Perspective, but I wanted to take a deeper look at how it works plus maybe entice a few votes for my own podcast, The Daily SearchCast, along the way….
• Ask.com Tests New Search Interface With Ask X
  The Read Write Web blog first spotted Ask.com testing a new interface they named Ask X. The new interface sports a steel background for the home page with more goodies inside. A search on Ask X for barry schwartz shows a three column pane interface. On the left hand side is the search box, where you can type and as you type you see search suggestions appear below the search box [Note From Danny: Pity this doesn't happen on the home page as well]. In the middle column is a smart answer, followed by two paid listings and then…
• Survey: General Search Fails Professionals
  Convera, an enterprise search company, commissioned an online survey of 1,000 U.S. "professionals" in publishing, advertising, marketing, healthcare, finance and government. The survey sought to determine work-related search behavior and corresponding satisfaction levels. While sponsored research must always be regarded with a critical eye, the results are worth noting:…
• Yahoo Pushing Vertical Search Through More Yahoo Shortcuts
  Yahoo! Shortcuts must be working for searchers and for Yahoo! Starting last week, I noticed Yahoo prompting me a lot more to search for retailer coupons, flights from city to city and movie showtimes – all which trigger a Yahoo Shortcut. While shortcuts have been around for a while, this is the first time I remember Yahoo prompting me over and over use them before I’ve completed a search….
• Google Drops SOAP Search API
  Google has dropped support for the Google SOAP Search API as of December 5, encouraging people to make use of the AJAX Search API in its place….
• Quintura For Kids Launched
  I discussed Quintura in November – if you recall it’s a search engine that provides searchers with a tag cloud, which if they mouse over the tags it will display results. Well, today they launched Quintura for kids as a beta release. It works along the same lines as the adult version, with a search box, tag cloud and mouse over to see results, drawn from Yahoo Kids. It’s looking very seasonal at the moment with a backdrop of snow, lights, trees and so on. There are also five icons for various search subjects such as animals, games and music,…
• Enquisite Search Marketing Shares: Google Sends Most Traffic
  Enquisite is a search ranking tool that works in part by gathering in your traffic details. That means they take in data from a variety of web sites and so can see general traffic patterns. They’ve just posted search referral data for November and part of December, putting Google far above anyone else in terms of sending search related traffic (about 78 percent). Yahoo follows in the 6-7 percent range, then MSN in the 3-4 percent range. Data is based on 10 million referrals in the period. Number of sites involved isn’t said….
• Reminder: How To Find The Right Search Marketing Partner Webinar Today
  Reminder! Our sister site Search Marketing Now is holding its first free webinar today. How to Find the Right Search Marketing Partner is led by Chris Sherman and starts at 1pm Eastern time. The webcast is free to attend. You’ll find more information and registration info here….
• Google Maps Adds Multiple Destinations To Driving Directions
  Philipp Lenssen reports that Google Maps has added a very useful feature to Google Maps. You can now plot multiple destinations for your trip. For example, I plotted a trip from my office, to a 100 Broadway, NY, NY and then to 14 Avenue R, Brooklyn, NY. Small feature, but very useful feature, that almost all mapping products have already. To work this yourself, after you set a destination from point A to point B, click on the "add destination" link to add more points to the map….

• Google Tests Related Searches At Bottom Of Page
  I reported at the Search Engine Roundtable that Google is now showing related searches at the bottom of the search results page. An example query that is working now, is for michael jordan, scroll down to the bottom of the page and you should see the "Searches related to: michael jordan" area. If not, I have a screen shot in the link above. I believe this is new, if it is not, then Google is now showing them more often since yesterday, then they have in the past….
• Australian Court Rules Against Linking; Search Engines Don’t Need To Panic
  Australian court rules against MP3 link site from News.com covers how an Australian court has decided that linking to some content can be illegal, in the right circumstances. In the right circumstances! That part is important. It’s easy to read the headline and come away thinking that search engines (or anyone, potentially) are going to find life much harder in Australia if they are deemed to be illegally linking to content such as music or articles posted online without a content owners permission. However, I think the case looks pretty specific to this particular MP3 search site, which the…
• Polar Rose Promising Face Recognition Image Search
  I got a press release today from Polar Rose, a new company promising to bring facial recognition technology to those seeking images from across the web. In other words, want to find all the pictures of Bill Clinton? Polar Rose says it will make it happen through a browser plug-in that works with existing photo services, as well as through partnerships. If this sounds familiar, I’ll revisit Riya’s recent foray and back away from facial recognition….
• YouTube’s Growth Worries Media Giants
  YouTube brings out media giants’ competitive claws from the International Herald Tribune takes a look at how YouTube is threatening the large media companies, such as NBC, News Corp., Viacom and CBS. As YouTube continues to grow, especially with the $1.65 billion acquisition by Google, these media companies are now having second thoughts about distributing the shows they produce in web format. The International Herald Tribune says that the media companies "are close to announcing a new Web site that will feature some of their best-known television programming and other clips in an attempt to build a business for distributing…
• Google Ran Out Of Radio Ad Inventory Already
  MarketWatch reports that Google does not have enough airtime inventory to run the test audio ad campaigns they want to run in 2007. Reportedly, Google is currently in negotiations with CBS, to buy some of their ad time. Jordan Rohan of RBC Capital Markets said that without enough ad inventory, Google won’t be able to show any "significant impact until mid-2007." There is no official response from Google on this matter, as of yet….
• Google Says No To Images Next To AdSense
  Ad and image placement: a policy clarification from the official Google Inside AdSense blog covers issues about placing images next to AdSense units, something that seems to have grown in popularity as a means of encouraging clicks. In short — don’t. Google doesn’t want images to appear related to AdSense links: We ask that publishers not line up images and ads in a way that suggests a relationship between the images and the ads. If your visitors believe that the images and the ads are directly associated, or that the advertiser is offering the exact item found in the…
• Why Do People Google Google? Understanding User Data to Measure Searcher Intent
  What are people looking for when they type "Google" into Google? What do they want to see when they use "eBay" as a query? How does a Google or Yahoo learn from their log files, and other user information? What does it tell them about user intent? In an interview posted earlier today with Luke Wroblewski, Yahoo’s Principal Designer for Social Media, we’re told that the amount of user data that Yahoo has to work with while designing may be almost overwhelming. A point we haven’t seen made much by the search engines, it’s the second time today I’ve heard…
• Stop The Freak Out Over Linking
  On Friday, Google Webmaster Central had a post about linking that I’m watching generate all types of new worries of what’s allowed or not allowed. I’ll do the freak out, then a summary of it, then try to push the reset button by revisiting my golden rules on linking….
• Google’s Tips On Duplicate Content Worries
  Over the past year, I’ve heard more and more worries about duplicate content issues. It’s a serious concern site owners have, though sometimes I fear the worry is out-of-proportion to the reality of people actually getting hit by duplicate content penalties. Others may disagree. If you are worried, Deftly dealing with duplicate content from the Official Google Webmaster Central Blog provides some excellent tips and advice on how to avoid issues with Google. I especially like the last tip: Don’t worry be happy: Don’t fret too much about sites that scrape (misappropriate and republish) your content. Though annoying, it’s highly…
• Yahoo’s Anti-Spam Guy Tim Converse Leaving
  Yahoo’s lost a number of executives over the past year to small start-ups. Now count another one, especially close to home for search marketers. Tim Converse, the engineering manager who leads anti-spam efforts at Yahoo, is moving on to a start-up himself. Tim writes on his personal blog:…
• The New Digg Features Plus, A Submitter’s Perspective
  Today, Kevin Rose announced the release of new Digg features. What most people covered in the release were all the cool additions, but no one really talked about the small changes that have drastically affected submitters. Before I dig into these small changes that affected submitters, here is a quick recap of the new features that everyone is talking about:…
• Tracking Santa Through NORAD & Google Earth
  I love to track Santa courtesy of NORAD, the North American Air Defense Command. I did a post on my personal blog last year, Tracking Santa Through The NORAD Web Site, talking about how I moved from listening to Santa’s location on the radio to monitoring him with my kids on the web. Gary Price tipped me to the news that the NORAD Tracks Santa 2006 site is now up. Can’t wait for him in flight? Nathan over at InsideGoogle highlighted an official Google blog post about how you can find presents he’s left behind in Google Earth and then…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere:

• Unmashable Web?, Ongoing
• The last blog post on the Google API, Dave Winer
• Podcast: Don’t Freak Over Links! Digg New Features — Digg The Daily SearchCast! How People Search, Tracking Santa & More, Daily SearchCast
• Yahoo! Talent Show Crowns Winner, WebProNews
• Tracking Santa in 3D with SkylineGlobe, ResourceShelf
• Image search race: Polar Rose, Pixsy, Snap, Ookles, Riya — list is getting long, VentureBeat
• Aerial Coverage for all of Italy, Windows Live Local Blog
• Time for a new hit, Yahoo Corporate Blog
• Pimp my links: JeepReviews.com, Pronet Advertising
• Does this MSN Behavioral Search Matter?, Search Engine Watch Blog
• Snap Image Search, VentureBeat
• Google Reviews, Google Blogoscoped
• Yahoo! 2006 Holiday Schwag, Cartoon Barry Blog
• Accessible Search: Answers to common questions, Official Google Blog
• Google Releases Russian Translation, News, Google Blogoscoped
• 9 Ways To Get Banned by Search Engines, Search Engine Journal
• Exalead Patent Granted for Unified Search Using Categories and Keywords, SEO By The Sea
• SimplyHeadlines.com emerges from "stealth mode", Search Engine Watch Blog
• Google Movie Mentions We’d Like to See, Google Blogoscoped
• West Point: Googling Considered Harmful, Google Watch
• Google Jokes, Sometimes…, Google Blogoscoped
• Blogger Beta Integrates with Picasa Web Albums, Google Blogoscoped
• DMOZ is Back Online, SEO Book
• Book: Google and the Myth of Universal Knowledge, Google Blogoscoped
• Top news searches differ from top web searches, Search Engine Watch Blog
• Track Google Bugs, Google Blogoscoped
• Opera Introduces Fraud Protection, Opera
• Does It Pay to Use Google Checkout? (Pun Intended), Search Marketing Standard Blog
• First Big Partner for Zudeo- BBC, TechCrunch
• Digg continues to battle phony stories, News.com
• EBay Is Expected to Close Its Auction Site in China, New York Times
• AOL Chief Has a View, a Long One, New York Times
• AOL Re-Org Unveiled: Six Business Units Will Report To COO Ron Grant, PaidContent.org
• Everything in the Digg, Reddit & Netscape Algorithms, SEOmoz
• Indulge in some holiday giving, Official Google Checkout Blog
• Yahoo! Helps Children’s Charity Search Engine For Christmas, Search Engine Watch Blog
• Searches Up, Dude! Ask.com Sponsors Surf Contest, Search Engine Watch Blog