SearchCap: The Day In Search, Dec. 29, 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:

• Of Disappearing
  Sex Blogs & Google Updates
  Last week, Barry Schwartz reported there seemed to be a Google update going,
  based on forum activity he was seeing. Google’s Matt Cutts quickly followed up
  with a short refresher on the difference between algorithm updates, data
  refreshes and index updates. The purpose was to explain that any changes some
  people were seeing were likely small and seemingly restricted to individual
  sites as new data flowed in, rather than a massive algorithm change similar to
  the great Florida update of November and December 2003. All fine and good and
  reassuring until the great sex blog disappearance happened this week. Folks…
• Google Pushes
  Forward With Newspaper Ads
  Google Set To Expand Newspaper Ad Program at the Washington Post reports that
  Google’s newspaper tests were a success according to the company. They want to
  expand the tests in the coming months. The pilot results were triple in volume
  of ads sold, compared to what they expected. FYI, the first ad test was deemed
  unsuccessful….
• Google Jet
  Spotted At Christchurch Airport, New Zealand
  Stuff.co.nz reports that the Google Jet was reportedly spotted at Christchurch
  airport in New Zealand yesterday afternoon, complete with a nice picture of
  the plane. They do not know who was on the plane owned by Google’s founders.
  Reportedly, the plane’s tail number was blocked out so that it cannot be
  tracked by the public via internet tracking sites. No official statement from
  Google has been made to confirm this news….
• Google
  Accidentally Deletes Email Of 60 Gmail Users
  GigaOM and TechCrunch report that some Gmail users have noticed some or all of
  their mail has been deleted. Google has responded with an official statement,
  explaining there was a bug that affected about 60 Gmail users. Here’s the
  statement via GigaOM:…
• Yahoo Removes
  Message Boards: What Is To Come?
  This morning, I was searching for a specific Yahoo message board and came up
  with nothing, so I assumed it was not there. Then I see that Slashdot reported
  the message boards have been removed. Yahoo informs us that they are "working
  on new ways for readers to comment on the news and participate in a discussion
  around it."…
• Defending SEO,
  Yet Again!
  SEM and SEO, Rocket Science, or Just Plain Science? (Part 1) from Kevin Lee at
  ClickZ has Kevin jumping formally into the "SEO is easy versus SEO is rocket
  science debate" and digging a hole even deeper for himself, as far as I’m
  concerned. Sorry, Kevin. Kevin writes: To recap the roots of the controversy,
  my business partner of over 10 years, David Pasternack, touched a nerve
  recently when he wrote an article for his DMNews column, Troubled Times for
  SEO Firms, in which he stated, "SEO isn’t rocket science." Apparently, a
  segment of the SEO blogosphere hopes to continue…
• The People
  Behind Google Maps, Yahoo Maps, MapQuest & Other Mapping Software
  Cartographers hit the road to bring updated online maps by the St. Louis
  Post-Dispatch tells the story behind the individuals who draw the maps we use
  in our GPS devices or via our favorite online mapping software. NAVTEQ is the
  company that MapQuest, Google, Yahoo and others use for their mapping
  database. They travel the globe, document new roads, old roads, construction
  issues and more. One thing I found particularly interesting is what
  construction effort warrants a map change at MapQuest; MapQuest manager
  Christian Dwyer said his company typically adjusts its maps any time a
  construction project exceeds three months;…
• Google’s Not So
  Top Terms & Top US Gainers For 2006
  Last week, I wrote The Lies Of Top Search Terms Of The Year covering how the
  top terms of 2006 from Google turned out not to be the top terms at all in raw
  popularity. I caught up with Google at the end of that week to talk about this
  more but didn’t have a chance to post a follow-up before Christmas hit. Now
  Google’s done a blog post — How we came up with year-end Zeitgeist data —
  explaining that the top searches list really should have been called the "top
  gaining searches" list. More on that below, plus…
• PhraseRank, Not
  PageRank, To Fight Search Spam
  Can indexing phrases from pages be an effective approach in identifying and
  filtering keyword stuffed pages, and honeypot pages aimed at attracting
  visitors solely to have them click upon ads? A new patent application
  published yesterday and assigned to Google, Detecting spam documents in a
  phrase based information retrieval system, presents a reasonable argument in
  favor of the method. Ok, so "Phraserank" doesn’t appear in the document. But
  it’s a term that might be worth thinking about. It may do much more than just
  help fight spam….
• YellowPages.com
  Adds ‘Send to Mobile’
  Joining Yahoo Local, Windows Live Local, Google Maps, and IAC-owned Citysearch
  and AskCity, YellowPages.com announced a new "send to mobile" feature. The
  listing and contact details are sent via text to the user’s mobile phone.
  Here’s a result for the search "Plumbers, New York." (Send to mobile is on the
  upper right of each ad.)…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere:

• 
  2006: The Year in Search Reviewed, Avenue A / Razorfish
• 
  A tale of two social newsfilter sites: Digg and Newstrust, Boing Boing
• Trust is Hard
  to Gain, Easy to Lose, Blake Ross
• 
  Google Self-Promotion Over the Top?, Search Engine Showdown
• Get
  Disorganized with Google Desktop?, Google Blogoscoped
• Google’s
  Orkut Down For 13+ Hours, TechCrunch
• 
  N.C. pursues Google division expansion, The Charlotte Observer
• 
  Interview with Google about duplicate content, Natural Search Blog
• 
  Is desktop search over?, Geeking With Greg
• 
  Overlap Showdown: Only at 1 of 6, Search Engine Showdown
• 
  Best of 2006, Google AdSense Blog
• 
  Need Content Removed From Google Quickly? Expedited Google Content Removal,
  Search Engine Roundtable
• 
  Google Drops Ads Automator for New AdWords Campaigns, Search Engine
  Roundtable
• 
  When Google sneezes, the internet gets flu, The Register
• 
  Yahoo to offer full auction refunds in Japan case, Webwereld