SearchCap: The Day In Search, January 17, 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:

• Google’s Video Sites Gain Market Share
  Americans are increasingly turning to the web for video, averaging 3.25 hours of video per person during the month of November, according to new data released by comScore today. Americans viewed nearly 9.5 billion online videos during the month and Google was the leading destination, with 3 billion videos viewed…
• Twitter: What Are You Thinking?
  “Brevity is the soul of wit.” Polonius from William Shakespeare´s Hamlet Twitter is a simple web application that asks the following question: What are you doing? You get 140 characters to answer. In Twitter: More Than Messaging, It Can Generate Traffic and Twitter Useless For Driving Traffic? Think Again, Neil…
• Truveo Creates New Election Videos Site
  AOL’s video search engine Truveo has created a new election videos site/area that collects candidate videos as well as commentary and news footage. Truveo claims the site is more comprehensive in terms of its sources and range of content than others. YouTube offers YouChoose, featuring candidate and user-generated videos, and…
• Google.org To Announce Five Strategic Initiatives Today
  Today, Thursday, January 17, 2008 at 9:00am PST (12:00pm EST), Google.org will be holding a conference call to discuss the launch of five strategic initiatives for the organization. The conference call participants include Sheryl Sandberg, Vice President, Global Online Sales and Operations, Google Inc. and Board Member, Google.org and Larry…
• The Library of Congress Teams Up With Flickr
  The Library of Congress has teamed up with Flickr to create The Commons. The Library of Congress has added a sample of their over one million photos to Flickr, so that the Flickr community can help describe the photos through tagging. My Friend Flickr: A Match Made in Photo Heaven…
• Four Reasons To Avoid Using Dates In URLs
  Everything you do has a chance to provide a clean or dirty signal of relevancy to search engines and searchers. While a date in the URL may provide a signal of relevancy to some searchers looking for archived information, many people who are explicitly looking for old information will…
• OpenID Gaining Critical Mass, Yahoo Announces Support
  OpenID is a single sign-in infrastructure that potentially alleviates the need to create new passwords and user names for every new site one joins or visits. There’s been lots of discussion about OpenID and who’s in, who’s almost in and so on. Today, Yahoo formally joined (and fully legitimized) the…
• Why The SEO Industry Needs Small Business
  Here’s the primary thing on my mind as we begin 2008: If we, the search/online marketing industry, don’t do a better job of helping the small business owner understand and adopt the best practices of search marketing, we are doomed to irrelevance. “Oh, but there’s no money in small…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• New SDK, Gadget Designer, and sample gadgets, Google Desktop APIs

Business Issues

• AOL Rumored To Be In Talks To Buy UK Social Travel Site WAYN For $200 Million, TechCrunch
• Google feeling lucky in D.C., Los Angeles Times
• Baidu The Next Domain Registrar?, Pacific Epoch
• Industry Moves: AOL Appoints Acquisitions Integration Head, paidContent.org
• Rumor: Alibaba, China Yahoo VP Resigns, Restructure In Works, Pacific Epoch

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Google Local (Maps) Listings… and Listings… and More Listings, Search Engine Guide
• Yahoo, T-Mobile say sign mobile Internet ad deal, Reuters

Link Building

• 83% of SEO’s don’t yet report paid links, BlogStorm
• SEO Trend: Buying links to hosted pages, SEOptimise

Paid Search & Contextual

• Google Adwords – They Are Not Practicing What They Preach, SEM Geek
• Google may lose ad spend to Facebook, Daily Telegraph
• Painless Parameters: dynamic text in adCenter, adCenter Blog
• Yahoo! Turns Conversion Tracking Off If No Conversions in a 45 Day Time Period, PPC Hero
• Ad Revenue Tied To Streams Rises, Wall Street Journal
• Microsoft adCenter Launches adExcellence Accreditation in UK, Search Engine Roundtable

Searching

• New Patents for Google and Microsoft, ResourceShelf
• Where Are They Now? Hakia’s Social Network, Marketing Pilgrim
• I can get an appointment with Dr. Google any time, TheStar.com

SEM Industry

• Go 1 Day Without Any Search Related News, I Dare Ya, The SEO Scoop
• Thoughts on SEO Ethics, Stone Temple
• 75 Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter, Marketing Pilgrim
• Why I do not like 95% of SEO Experts, ShoeMoney

SEO & SEM

• Robots Exclusion Protocol 101, SEOmoz
• Debunking Five SEO Myths Once and For All!, Marketmou
• Microsoft’s Live Search Still Can’t Work Out 301 Permanent Redirects, Search Engine Roundtable
• Getting a Search Engine Optimization Education -SEO by the SEA, SEO By The Sea
• 4 Thing To Check Before You Register A Domain Name, www.seosmarty.com

Social Media

• iPhone Home, Twitter Blog
• Twitter in Japan, Twitter Blog
• Justice Reigns: Stumble Troll BANNED by SU, Collective Thoughts
• What is trackur?, www.trackur.com
• Perspective: Myspace Still Kicking Facebook’s Ass in Traffic, Read/Write Web
• Your Privacy Is An Illusion: Facebook bullies writers, not its engineers, to keep data private, Valleywag
• After 350 attempts Mahalo finally gets on Digg, BlogStorm
• Baidu Rumored to Launch Social Networking Product, RedlineChina

Web Analytics

• 20 Analytics Tools For Blogs, Online Marketing Blog
• No Google Analytics API? No Problem!, Google Blogoscoped

Other Items

• Search Names Used Elsewhere: Google and Yahoo, ResourceShelf
• Team Aquaduct wins Innovate or Die competition, Official Google Blog
• Podcast: Apologies To Wired & SEM Community; Cool Google Maps Images And More!, Daily SearchCast

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

• Search Related News-Free Day – Will You Accept the Dare?
• S.E.O.A.D.D.
• You Just Saved Your Online Reputation In Google, Yahoo & MSN
• 75+ Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter
• 5 More Free Tools To Improve Search Engine Optimization
• SEO 2.0 Resource List: 40+ Sites For Writers
• I confess…. I use to be an Uptight Control Freak!!
• 20 Analytics Tools For Blogs
• How to Get 1,100 Subscribers in Five Days
• 7 Simple Ways to Use Universal Search to Appear on Top of Google
• Marketing Trends: 21+ Websites for Finding What’s Hot
• Robots Exclusion Protocol 101 | SEOmoz
• How To Make the No-Follow A Blessing and Not a Curse
• Google Cleared to bid on Wireless Auctions
• Shoemoney, That Really Sucks
• Why PageRank is broken and how it’s being fixed
• Justice Reigns: Stumble Troll BANNED by SU
• 6 Reasons Why I Won’t Stumble Your Page
• Do search engines index references to password protected smut?
• Why You Should Reveal SEO Secrets To Clients
• Writing for People (and Search Engines): How to improve click-through rates for organic listings
• The Semmys – Highly Controversial Just As It Should Be
• The Unbearable Idiocy of Brands: Ford Runs Over Its Fansumers
• Fresh Content: Myth or Magic?