SearchCap: The Day In Search, December 31, 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:

• December 2007: Search Engine Land’s Most Popular Stories
  Below are Search Engine Land’s 10 most popular stories from December 2007:…
• Search Month: December 2007 Search News, In Review
  Search Month is a monthly newsletter that recaps stories covered on Search Engine Land over the past month. It’s also available by feed here. Below, news about Search Engine Land itself, then our 10 most popular stories from December 2007, then a major story for various search topics along with…
• My Love/Hate Relationship With Facebook Ads
  Last month I began running a campaign on Facebook’s new ad network. After hearing the hype, I couldn’t resist playing around with it as soon as I had a reason to. At first I was somewhat frustrated because I wasn’t getting any page views or clicks. It took some time…
• The 2007 Paid Links War, In Review
  The paid links debate is back, this time about whether Google wants all links in a paid post to have a nofollow attribute. Below, a look at the latest round, plus a recap of this year’s "War On Paid Links" by Google and where the other search engines stand on…
• Baidu’s CFO Dies In Holiday Accident
  Baidu.com says CFO killed in China accident from the AFP reports Shawn Wang, Baidu’s CFO died on December 27. Wang was in a fatal accident during a holiday vacation in China. He joined Baidu in 2004 and helped Baidu with their extremely successful IPO and NASDAQ listing….
• Google Trademarks Knol, Android, OpenSocial & More In 2007
  Gary Price reports Google has applied to trademark several terms this year, including Knol, Android, OpenSocial, Open Handset Alliance, Panoramio, Dalvik and more. These trademark applications are common for companies wanting to protect their new product releases….
• Yahoo’s Chief Performance Expert, Souders, Joining Google
  Steve Souders, Yahoo’s Chief Performance expert and writer of the Firefox add-on YSlow announced on his site he is joining Google on January 7, 2008. It is not clear exactly what Souders will be doing at Google. It appears that he will be working with Dion Almaer, who is working…
• Pew/Internet Study Finds Most Americans Get Their Answers From the Internet
  A PEW/Internet and American Life study out today finds that the place Americans turn to most for answers is the internet. The study, which surveyed 2,796 Americans, found that 76% have internet access and that 58% turn to the internet when they have questions about things like health, school, careers,…
• Google The Stealth Social Network?
  Google’s plan to socialize its various applications continues. Google Operating System has spotted code in Gmail that may lead to a Facebook-style news feed of status updates from your Gmail contacts. More about this and Google’s continued "stealth social network" moves below….
• Deconstructing Google: Chapter 4, After The Google Breakup
  Previous chapters have covered how the growth of Google and fears of how it was reshaping the communication landscape led to the application of existing anti-trust laws along with new ones to force a Google breakup in 2010. This chapter looks at the immediate aftermath: the "Baby Googles" or "Googlets"…
• Comparing Search Popularity Ratings Services: June To Nov. 2007
  I’ve now compiled the latest search popularity stats from Nielsen, comScore, Hitwise and Compete. That means it’s time to put them all together, to see what a "panel" of ratings services agree on — and don’t agree on — in terms of search engine popularity….
• Compete Nov. 2007 Search Stats: Google Hits High; Microsoft Steady & Yahoo Declining
  Nearly done with today’s search popularity stats review. Previously, I’ve covered the latest stats from Nielsen, comScore and Hitwise. Now its time for Compete. Like the others, it puts Google tops. Unlike the others, it’s far more positive about Microsoft’s share and negative about Yahoo….
• Hitwise Nov. 2007 Search Stats: Google Near All-Time High; Microsoft Hits All-Time Low
  With the latest stats from Nielsen and comScore posted earlier today, I continue on with my compilation of the latest search popularity stats, now moving to Hitwise. As with the others, Google is way in the lead for November 2007. But unlike the others, Hitwise has a full year of…
• comScore Nov. 2007: Google Tops Search Share; Yahoo Holds Steady In Number Of Searches
  Continuing on from my earlier post about Nielsen Online’s latest search popularity stats, I’m now moving to those from comScore. For November 2007 — as with Nielsen — it’s the same-old, same-old. Google’s on top, followed by Yahoo and Microsoft. But in terms of raw searches, while Google still shows…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• New Gmail for Google Apps, Googlified
• Google Services Bugs and Usability Issues That Spoil My Holiday Spirit, Search Engine Journal
• Leaked Microsoft Documents Highlight Google/DoubleClick Fight, www.windowsitpro.com

Business Issues

• InfoSpace Completes $135M Sale of Mobile Business to Motricity, ClickZ
• "SmartSearch" = Dumb Trademark–Applied Information Sciences v. eBay, Eric Goldman
• Faces of Business 2007: Peter Fleischer, Google privacy counsel, San Francisco Chronicle
• Google is God, BuzzMachine
• Should Web Giants Let Startups Use the Information They Have About You?, Wired

Local, Maps & Mobile

• WhatsOpen: First Googlephone app launched by Sergey Brin’s favorite startup, Valleywag

Link Building

• 9 tricks to get the most SEO benefit from your social media linkbaiting campaign, The SEO Scoop
• Is Linkvana Link Building Nirvana?, www.pdxtc.com
• Can This Hurt Your Competitors New Website? (Blackhat Linkbombing), www.semspot.com
• Does Google Order Link Reports by Importance Factors?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Creating Linkbait Graphics: Dissecting the Creative Process, 10e20

Paid Search & Contextual

• AdSense Apply Wrong Exchange Rate to November Earnings, ProBlogger
• Google Product Results Monopolizing Prime Pay-Per-Click Real Estate?, The CLM Blog
• Google in search to sell its advertising to (UK) newspapers, Times Online
• Writing Effective PPC Ads Is All About Seeing The Big Picture, SEM Geek

Searching

• Become a Knowledge Management Ninja with Google Reader, Micro Persuasion
• Easter Egg: Once in a Blue Moon, Googlified
• Google in 2000, Google Operating System
• Australia Joins China In Censoring The Internet, TechCrunch
• Google pushes google experimental to the UK, SEO Home
• Introducing SearchSalad: A Healthy Way to Search, Search Engine Journal
• Search Engine Identification and Filtering of Malicious Web Sites, SEO By The Sea

SEM Industry

• 2007 SBS Search Quiz: Winner , Small Business SEM
• How to Show the Sphinn Button Only AFTER the First Sphinn, All Things SEM
• My 10 SEO-related New Year’s Resolutions, www.jasonbartholme.com

SEO & SEM

• Democrat Chris Dodd: 2008 Presidential Candidates & Online Marketing Strategies, Search Marketing Gurus
• How to Prepare Yourself for the New Year: Eight Year End Optimization Tips, www.doshdosh.com
• Ask.com Crawler Inserting Url-Encoded Spaces in URLs Causing 404 Errors?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Knol & Personalized Page Rank: Incursions or Future Google SEM Essentials?, AIM Clear Blog
• Republican Fred Thompson: 2008 Presidential Candidates & Online Marketing Strategies, Search Marketing Gurus
• The Next US President is a Bad Marketer, SEO Book
• 301 Redirects Using .htaccess File, The Organic SEO
• Rewriting the Beginner’s Guide – Part IV Continued: Titles, Meta Data , SEOmoz
• 12 Ideas to Drive Traffic (w/o Google), Shimon Sandler
• Does One Incur Google Penalties for Blocking Entire Countries?, Search Engine Roundtable

Social Media

• Everything You Wanted to Know About Twitter. Now In Podcast Form, Vanessa Fox
• Things I Hate About MySpace, SEOmoz

Video, Music & Image Search

• Briefs: Metasearching for Video, ResourceShelf

Web Analytics

• Latest Interview: Jonathan Mendez, Stone Temple

Other Items

• Google: the chainmail version, Official Google Blog

2007 In Review

• Top Google Apps in 2007, Google Operating System
• 2007 Blog Statistics, ShoeMoney
• 2007 Metrics, Google Operating System
• Our Stats for 2007, ViperChill
• adCenter Blog Nostalgia – A Look Back At 2007, adCenter Blog
• The Year in Launches (2007 Edition), TechCrunch
• Top 10 New Google Earth Features 2007, Google Earth Blog

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

• Creating Linkbait Graphics: Dissecting the Creative Process
• Deconstructing Google: After The Google Breakup
• Link Building this Year
• Top 15 SEM blogs that influenced me!
• Finding Do-Follow Blogs the Easy Way
• Matt Cutts Says Financial Arrangements Should Affect All Links Within a Post
• 9 tricks to get the most SEO benefit from your social media linkbaiting campaign
• Resurrecting Sites from the Internet Graveyard
• I’m a brand not a product!
• A 10 Minute Trick to Reduce your Blog Spam
• How to Create Desire in Social Media
• Paid posts are the devil incarnate according to search engines
• 2007 Awards for Support and Inspiration
• Matt Cutts Repsonds, Confirms Double Standards
• Comparing Local Business Page Options
• Sphinn’s Wisdom: 60% success
• How to Prepare Yourself for the New Year: Eight Year End Optimization Tips
• Techcrunch Now Nofollow Sponsor Links
• 115 Social News and Bookmark Sites Ranked and Rated
• Digg Traffic Has Questionable Value For Most Niche Publishers
• 5 New Year’s Resolutions for Copywriters
• Archives Suck (and 3 Ways to Save Them)
• The Best of Copyblogger in 2007
• Is It Too Late To Nominate The Worst Search Marketing Article Of The Year?
• Big List of 2007 Recap Posts