SearchCap: The Day In Search, February 1, 2008

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

From Search Engine Land:

• Microsoft Makes $45 Billion Bid To Buy Yahoo
  Microsoft is to bid $31 per share to Yahoo’s board of directors to purchase the company, a deal potentially worth $45 billion. Below, more details, some history and analysis. We’ll also keep updating this story, and we’ll have a separate post linked from this when the conference call starts….
• Q&A With Microsoft On Proposed Yahoo Purchase: 2+2 = #1
  Greg Sterling and I have just finished a short Q&A with Microsoft’s Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of strategic partnerships, about his company’s bid to acquire Yahoo. How does Microsoft plan to integrate Yahoo, if its proposal wins? The plan right now is one more about how the two…
• MSFT + YHOO: What Would Microsoft Yahoo Look Like?
  So the conference call has happened, and despite saying it has a plan to digest Yahoo, Microsoft didn’t share that with the world. Indeed, at one point it was said any plan depended on what Yahoo’s leadership would suggest. That means it’s time for What If. Some thoughts below…
• Live Blogging Microsoft’s Bid For Yahoo Call
  Microsoft conference call on the Yahoo bid is happening now. I’ll live blog rough notes. Greg Sterling will do a formal write-up later….
• Microsoft Call: "We Love The Yahoo Brand" [But Can The Deal Happen?]
  Danny and I just got off the Microsoft conference call. He’s already posted live notes from the call. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said at the outset, "This is a decision I’ve thought long and hard about. This is the right path for Microsoft and it’s the right path for…
• Microsoft + Yahoo: Recapping Reactions
  Now that we’ve posted our own five different stories on the Microsoft bid for Yahoo, I wanted to take a spin across what others are writing up. Below, a recap of things I found interesting below. In particular, I’ve tried to focus on stuff that’s got original observations or…
• Two Approaches to Determining Intent: The Wisdom of Crowds and Personal Values
  I’ve said a number of times that the holy grail of search is to disambiguate intent. A two or three word query, given the complexity of the English language, is just not enough to confidently provide results that will always be relevant and useful. But up to now, it’s…
• "Open Network" A Reality, C Block Of 700MHz Spectrum Hits $4.6 Billion "Reserve Price"
  Yesterday the coveted "C Block" of the 700MHz spectrum, which will serve the entire US market, hit the FCC required minimum "reserve bid" of $4.6 billion. Google had promised to bid this amount to trigger the "openness provisions" imposed by the FCC. Effectively the rules now require that "any legal…
• Google Revenues Up 51 Percent, Social Networking Monetization "Disappointing"
  Google posted Q4, 2007 revenues that represented 51 percent growth vs. 2006. Quarterly revenues were $4.83 billion, compared with $3.21 billion a year ago. However, earnings and revenue per share fell short of analyst consensus estimates. The headline that everyone is repeating is that social network monetization is not performing…
• Mine The Web’s Socially-Tagged Links: Google Social Graph API Launched
  Did you know there’s a way to tag links on pages to indicate social connections? I’d heard about this vaguely, but you can bet there’s going to be much more public awareness and potential use, thanks to Google launching its new Google Social Graph API. Now available, the API…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Gmail Has a Daily Limit on Sending Email, Digital Inspiration

Business Issues

• The Apologetic Jerry Yang, New York Times
• At Google, fewer ‘Nooglers, News.com
• Chatty Zuckerberg Tells All About Facebook Finances, AllThingsD

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Sergey Brin’s iPhone Adventure in Davos, New York Times
• Will SEO for Pizza and a Salad, Purposeinc

Paid Search & Contextual

• Google still waiting for social ad payoff, News.com
• Get Keyword Fit: Keyword Expansion Tips to Get the Best Out of Your adCenter Keyword List, adCenter Blog
• V10 Sunset Extended to March 18, AdWords API Blog
• Inside AdSense: Login message clarification, Inside AdSense

Searching

• Behavior-Based Internet Advertising: Who Is Watching You?, Search Engine Guide
• Does Google let third parties edit search results?, BlogStorm
• More on Search, Transactive Memory and the Plastic Mind, Out Of My Gord
• The Mother of All Googlebombs, piloSEO

SEM Industry

• Bridging the Gap: Old and New SEO @ SMX West, Online Marketing Blog
• SphinnCon Israel coming up…and not a woman to be seen (on a panel), Illuminea
• Search Engine Strategies London Calling, Search Engine Watch Blog
• SEOs Fight Fat - A Different Kind of SEO Contest, Search Engine Guide
• The Super Bowl Ad That Almost Was…, SEOmoz

SEO & SEM

• Duplicate Content Question, Matt Cutts
• January 08: Best Search/Marketing Posts, Small Business SEM
• How to Deal with Negative Search Engine Results, ViperChill
• Marketing Questions From SEO Blog Readers, Stepforth
• Page by Page redirects in IIS, JLH Design
• Search Spikes Lower Search Quality, SEO Book

Social Media

• Has Digg Jumped the Shark?, Techipedia
• Part One: From Twits to Tweeple, Why I Embraced Twitter and You Should Too, Search Engine Guide
• Maximizing the Likelihood of Getting Dugg, SEOmoz
• Social Media Founders on Undisclosed Mass Promotion, Waxy.org

Video, Music & Image Search

• Yahoo To Announce Large Video Acquisitionâ - Maven Networks For $150 Million, TechCrunch

Web Analytics

• Counter for a Site’s Google Subscribers, Google Operating System
• Urchin Software from Google In Beta, Google

Other Items

• Google Brain Wash, Googlified

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

• StumbleUpon Category Selection & Supporting Case Study
• Has Digg Jumped the Shark?
• Twitter Down….Finally I Can Get Some Work Done!!
• Is it a sin to Sphinn… yourself?
• Great Way To Help Clean Up Stumbleupon
• Sorry Aaron Wall - I f’ed up
• GoDaddy Abandons One of Our Bretheren … When He Needs Them the Most
• Why Cutting Clichés From Your Copy is as Easy as Pie
• The Rise of Twitter as a Platform for Serious Discourse
• Microsoft Makes $45 Billion Bid To Buy Yahoo
• New SEO Couple: Bill Slawski & SpostareDuro
• CrazyEgg: New Free SEM/SEO Analytics Tool Blows My Mind
• Ian (g1smd) First to Break 1000+ Sphinn Comments!
• 8 Ways to Turn Negative Feedback into an Opportunity
• Rev Up "About Us" Pages
• Google ranks for duplicated Duplicate Content
• Taking Advantage of Universal Search
• David Ogilvy on SEO
• 5 Reasons Why Rankings Are A Poor Measure Of Success