SearchCap: The Day In Search, December 11, 2007

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

From Search Engine Land:

• First Networking/Extracurricular Activities Announced For SMX West
  A couple weeks back we announced the Search Marketing Expo – SMX West agenda. Today’s topic is the other really valuable and fun stuff — networking. The networking begins with SMX Bash on February 25. This event is for All Access and Networking Pass attendees (check out what you get…
• Video Search Engine Truveo Expands To More Countries
  As part of its continuing international rollout, AOL-owned video search engine Truveo has launched in Australia, Brazil, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Russia and Turkey. The site has experienced dramatic growth since its relaunch in August as a consumer destination. According to the press release, 70 percent of Truveo traffic now…
• Google Patent on Anchor Tags and Web Crawling
  One of the key elements of how the Google search engine works involves the use of the words, or anchor text, that appear in a link on a source page, to describe a page targeted by the link. We know this from statements about anchor text made in documents like…
• Google’s Matt Cutts On Video About PageRank & Sub Directories
  Michael McDonald of WebProNews conducted a video interview with Matt Cutts of Google and Vanessa Fox, our Features Editor. I highly recommend you watch the 15 minute video, which goes over the recent PageRank reduction for selling links and the sub domains vs. sub folders topic….
• Search Illustrated: The Value Of An Inbound Link
  Most SEOs know how important inbound links are to a successful search marketing campaign. After all, links are widely considered to be the backbone of Google’s ranking algorithm. However, inbound links can carry many different meanings beyond just a top ranking. This week’s infographic explores three different perspectives on…
• Canadian ISP Modifies Google Homepage, Raises Spectre Of Net Neutrality Again
  The net neutrality debate has recently been revived by allegedly fraudulent activity by Comcast in restricting or trying to prevent use of heavy bandwidth sites like BitTorrent. (Here’s a PDF of a lawsuit complaint). Now Canadian ISP Rogers has been accused of hijacking Google’s homepage to send bandwidth-related usage information…
• Google’s Solar Panel Project Helps Power 402 Dishwasher Cycles Per Day
  Garett Rogers reminded me of Google’s Solar Panel Project, where Google installed about 9,000 solar panels at their headquarters to help power the offices. Google offers a status report of home much energy was generated from those panels. The latest reading says, “In the last 24 hours, Google produced 644…
• Google StreeView Continues March, Introduces Embedded Version
  According to Boston.com, Google’s StreetView images are rolling out to more US cities today, including Boston, Providence, Dallas, Fort Worth, Indianapolis, Detroit, Minneapolis, and St. Paul. Google Operating System counts the total number of US cities with StreetView now as 23. StreetView is also actively in development in Canada, Europe…
• Google Launches Navigational Links Worldwide
  Google’s Navigational Bar Goes International reports Google has launched the navigational links interface that was launched in the US in mid-May, worldwide. Each country may have the navigational links in a different order and different options. For example, while one country may have a link for Orkut, another country may…
• In Parallel Universe, Porn Producer Sues YouTube Clone
  The world of pornography often mirrors the world of “respectable” publishing and content. For years the adult film awards in LA both mocked and aspired to be like the Oscars. Porn producers are also often tech pioneers, the most famous example of which is the adoption of the VCR early…
• Google AdSense Makes A Few Small Improvements
  The Google AdSense Blog announced several improvements to the AdSense console. They improvements include: Channel IDs are now visible within the channels section of the console. Last ad modification dates are now shown in your manage ads screen. Manage ads feature is coming to your referral units. And some status…
• MapSpammers Getting More Sophisticated
  After the first relatively unsophisticated Google MapSpam bulk upload attempt became public, I had a long and interesting conversation with a webmaster who had spent many years implementing a “long tail search” campaign on behalf of local business in a major market. He pointed out that with a little bit…
• SEL Mobile User Survey: 47 Percent Access Mobile Internet “More Than Once A Week”
  Several weeks ago I asked readers to take a quick mobile user survey to get a snapshot of mobile search usage among Search Engine Land readers. It was a brief survey that sought only high-level information. We had 75 people respond to the survey, which I’ve presented in its…
• Ask.com Launches AskEraser Giving Searches Ability To Search Anonymously
  Ask.com has launched AskEraser, giving searchers the ability to search anonymously. Ask.com told us about this tool back in July, and six months later, it’s now live for all searchers to use. When a searcher activates AskEraser, Ask will stop recording the searcher’s search queries and cookie information. This information…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Spokeo 2.0: A Feed Reader For Your Friends, TechCrunch
• Are More New Services Coming from Amazon.com? Media Group, Simple Database?, ResourceShelf
• Expert predicts Google will offer 50GB of free web storage, Vnunet.com

Business Issues

• China Can’t Spell G-O-O-G-L-E as Search Engine Falters as Verb, Bloomberg
• Neil Budde Leaving Yahoo; Khemlani Expands Role To Include News, paidContent.org
• Sequoia Invests in Search Marketing Automation Technology – Kenshoo Ltd, Yahoo News

Conferences

• Webmasterworld Pubcon 2007 las vegas recap, ShoeMoney
• Pubcon 2007, SEOWife
• Search Marketing Conferences & Entertainment Options, Search Marketing Gurus
• That’s a Wrap — Looking Back on WebmasterWorld’s Pubcon Las Vegas, Yahoo Search Blog
• What Happens in Vegas…Gets Documented in a Blog Post, SEOmoz

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Telephone Directory Searching and Attempting to Finding Out Someones Age (For Free), ResourceShelf
• Google announces Yann Arthus-Bertrand layer in Google Earth, Google
• Google’s acclaimed, criticized Street View feature debuts in Boston, Boston.com
• SEO for Mobile: Tips and Tricks, Search Engine Roundtable
• World’s Largest Fingerprint and Face Art, Google Earth Blog

Link Building

• When Will New Links Impact the Search Results?, Search Engine Roundtable

Paid Search & Contextual

• Why You SHOULD use AdSense on Your Blog, ProBlogger
• Google Finally Fixes AdWords Diagnostic Tool Bug, After One Month, Search Engine Roundtable
• New Microsoft adCenter Report Center Tutorial, adCenter Blog
• Optimizing Your Yahoo Search Marketing Campaigns After Panama Migration, Search Engine Roundtable
• What Everyone Ought to Know About Geo-Targeting in Google AdWords and Yahoo! Search Marketing, PPC Hero
• Why AdSense Might NOT be Best for Your Blog, ProBlogger

Searching

• Ask Launches AskEraser, Ask.com Blog
• Testing Search Explorer, a clustering Google hack, Pandia
• Why Yahoo! Answers Is a Librarian’s Worst Nightmare, ResourceShelf

SEM Industry

• The Secret "10%" of SEO Knowledge and How Information Spreads in the Search World, SEOmoz

SEO & SEM

• 9 Paths of SEO Enlightenment, Part II, Search Engine Guide
• Google Patent on Anchor Text and Different Crawling Rates, SEO By The Sea
• Hide and Speak: Letting the Spiders Back in to Bento Yum, Search Engine Guide
• SEO 101: What You Should Expect From Your SEO, Cshel
• SEO for Press Releases – Bestpractices, Shimon Sandler
• SEO On A Limited Budget, SiteMost
• The Value of Top Rankings, The Organic SEO
• Top 6 SEO tips for bloggers, SEO.com

Social Media

• Capazoo Wants To Pay You For Your Social Networking Time, TechCrunch
• Yahoo Answers scarier than Wikipedia, education.zdnet.com

Video, Music & Image Search

• Shareapic Pays You To Host Pictures, TechCrunch

Other Items

• Nobel Laureate Says The Internet Makes Us Dumb, We Say: Meh, TechCrunch
• What’s your story?, Official Gmail Blog
• Baidu And Sohu Bank On Chinese NBA Stars, PacificEpoch
• DNS attack could signal Phishing 2.0, Macworld
• Sen. Dodd takes his turn campaigning at Google, Los Angeles Times
• Senate testimony: Our efforts to better connect citizens to government, Google Public Policy Blog
• Yahoo! Mail and Messenger fly sky high, Yodel Anecdotal

Last 20 Hot Items From Sphinn, Our Social News Sharing Site:

• Beware – Your Digital Footprint is Your Resume
• What Gossip Teaches Us About Social Media
• Sphinn Friends & Stalkers: A Dead End?
• Muhammad Saleem Asks: How Would You Improve Digg Alerter?
• Japan’s Bloggers: Humble Giants of the Web
• 3 Must-See Lists for Top WordPress Plugins, Tweaks & Firefox Extensions
• Google Accidently Bans Hundreds of Users from Gmail
• 10 Great Internet Marketing Excuses, and What They Really Mean
• Social Media By the Numbers: Twitter
• 50 Best WordPress Plugins for Power Blogging
• Is AskEraser Really Erasing Anything?
• Funny: Check Out the Meta Keywords at WhopperFreakout.com
• 256 terms that go with SEO, or not.
• Link Value Factors released
• Google Patent on Anchor Text and Different Crawling Rates
• An Online Reputation Management Case Study
• What, Why, When, Where and How of Comments
• What Determines Link Juice
• Share Your Ideas, Write Posts and Do It Now
• What Aristotle Can Teach You About Ethical Blogging
• Links & SEO: The Huge Link Value Factors Survey
• Google Indexing Even Faster?
• Six Steps to a Remarkably Powerful, Personal Network
• Working on the Periphery: How to Make Any Website You’ll Ever Create a Success
• A Visual Tour Through the Basics of Social Media Marketing