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

From Search Engine Land:

• Search Month: May 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 May 2007, then a major story for various search topics along with…
• thinkingVOICE And Clear Channel Take PPCall Outdoors
  Pay per phone call (PPCall) probably qualifies as something of a disappointment to date. While there has been adoption by advertisers and some good results, revenues have not kept pace with early expectations (which, admittedly, I helped create). In mobile it’s a natural business model and that may be the…
• InfoSpace Launches Mobile Services Platform
  InfoSpace released a new mobile platform called “mCore.” Designed to help carriers provide a better user experience, the new platform offers mobile search, storefronts, portals and messaging. It’s also modular to enable carriers to use all or part of the platform. Simultaneously, InfoSpace announced Virgin Mobile in Europe and Verizon…
• Google Maps Adds More Images, Earth Makes 3D Push
  The Google Earth Blog has an overview of a big, high resolution image update for Google Maps (also on Google Earth). The update is global. The two “platforms” are inching closer together with all KML files being indexed and discoverable now in Google Maps. Also, last week Google (on the…
• Easy Way To Turn Off Google Personalized Results
  Aaron Wall reports from the SMX conference on an easy way to turn off personalized Google results. To turn off personalized search quickly, for specific search results, just add “&pws=0″ to the end of the URL string in your browser. Here is an example URL string for a search on…
• Sina Corp, Large Chinese Portal, To Partner With Google
  China’s Sina, Google team up on China services from Reuters reports that one of China’s largest portals is to work with Google on news, ads and search. Sina Corp. and Google China did not reveal the details of this agreement. The president of Google China, Lee Kai-Fu, said “In the…
• YouTube API, Mobile & iGoogle Gadget
  Over the weekend, we had several articles on YouTube come out, including ones talking about YouTube working on a new API, a new mobile platform and even an iGoogle Gadget….
• Shi Tao, Jailed Chinese Reported, Joins U.S. Lawsuit Against Yahoo
  Jailed Chinese reporter sues Yahoo over his imprisonment from the International Herald Tribune reports Shi Tao, the Chinese reported who was sentenced to jail allegedly because Yahoo Hong Kong and Yahoo China sent data to China that led to his arrest, has joined the U.S. lead lawsuit against Yahoo. The…
• Google Heats Up Antitrust Claims Over Microsoft
  Google Intensifies Microsoft Fight from the Wall Street Journal reports that the 50-page white paper sent by Google to the Justice Department says Windows Vista operating-system puts Microsoft at an unfair advantage over the competition. The Wall Street Journal explains that Vista “makes it hard for consumers to use rival…
• Taking Care Of Business By Taking Care Of The Customer: Five Tips For Local Search
  Keep the needs of consumers at the forefront. In my last couple “Locals Only” columns, I’ve mentioned the importance of this in passing, and this month I’m dedicating this space to expanding on this notion and offering specific tips. Much of what is said and written about the emergence…
• Social Link Manipulation
  The term “Social Media” is used ad nauseum to describe an ever growing collection of tools and services by which people share content, links, opinions, experience and perspectives with each other. Keeping up with the latest Social Media services and sites can make you dizzy. Wikipedia now lists 21…
• Google Bad On Privacy? Maybe It’s Privacy International’s Report That Sucks
  It’s a bad privacy day for Google, with Privacy International first accusing the company of having the worst privacy performance of any internet service company in a study it has just released and then accusing Google of conducting a smear campaign against it. But if you actually read the report,…
• Happy 10th Birthday, Search Engine Watch – A History Of The Site
  Ten years ago today, I created Search Engine Watch. Now I’m here at Search Engine Land, but since I ran SEW for 95 percent of its existence, I thought it would be nice to look back and cover how it evolved and changed over the years. So here’s a stroll…
• MacMillian CEO Charkin Steals Google Laptops To “Prove” Book Scanning Point
  Via Techdirt, Book publisher steals Google laptops from The Register covers the jaw-dropping action of Richard Charkin, CEO of Macmillian Publishing, stealing laptops from a Google booth at BookExpo America to try and prove a point about Google "stealing" books for its book search service. Blogged Charkin: Our justification for…
• Good News, Bad News: LookSmart CFO Resigns, Company Ups Guidance
  According to this SEC filing/press release (thanks Gary Price), LookSmart CFO and COO John Simonelli announced his intention to resign. LookSmart has been struggling for several years to regain respect and traction following the loss of the company’s deal with Microsoft/MSN, which sent it into something of a tailspin. Since…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere

Applications & Portal Features

• What you can do about the latest Google Desktop flaw, News.com
• How are you using Talk?, Google Talk
• Notifier for Google Reader, Google Operating System
• Yahoo SiteExplorer web vs. API: answers from Yahoo!, Joost Devalk
• Peek-A-Google, Forbes.com
• Hands-On with Google Gears, PC Magazine
• Google’s Mark Lucovsky Talks about the Ajax Feed API, Stone Temple

Business Issues

• Google overtakes Cisco as Silicon Valley’s most valuable, VentureBeat
• Interview with Dick Costolo, Feedburner/Google, John Battelle
• MP calls on YouTube to remove racist videos, Scotland on Sunday
• How Google, YouTube power their way to center of 2008 campaign, San Jose Mercury News
• Why I disagree with Privacy International, Matt Cutts
• Betting on Google’s next move, News.com
• Kenya: Google Appoints Wananchi’s Mucheru to Head Up its New Operation, allAfrica.com
• Google searches for growth, Atlanta Business Chronicle
• Yahoo’s Zurfer joins Flickr, mobile phones, News.com

Conferences

• The SMX Diaries Special Edition: The SEOmoz Party, SEOmoz
• Summarized SEO Tips from SMX Advanced – Part 1, Search Engine Guide

• Sullivan pulls it off big style, Mike Grehan

• Search Engine Strategies Toronto SearchCrawl 2007 Event Posted, Search Engine Roundtable
• SMX Video – Rand Fishkin Reveals Top 3 Favorite Social Networks, Marketing Pilgrim

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Help Model a City!, Google Lat Long Blog
• Google Maps: How to find latitude and longitude, Lifehacker
• Coverage Area for US 10m Terrain in Google Earth, Google Earth Blog
• Huge Imagery Update Now Available in Google Maps, Google Earth Blog
• London Eye Animation with Shadows for Google Earth, Google Earth Blog
• Developer makes local search easier, Jacksonville Business Journal

Paid Search & Contextual

• Does Your Site Advertising Engage Your Customers?, Search Engine Guide
• Brides, Grads, and Dads, Inside AdWords Blog

• Effective Keyword Research & List Preparation (for PPC) – Case Study 2 – Day 2, Reviewlicious

• Yahoo! Service Engineer Blasts Yahoo! Publisher Network, Search Engine Roundtable
• Ask.com takes on Google AdSense, vnunet.com
• Microsoft adCenter Provides More Information Regarding Rejected Keywords, Search Engine Roundtable
• Yahoo! Distributing Click Fraud Settlement Funds, Search Engine Watch Blog

Searching

• Google Site Links UI Looks Funny, Wolf Howl
• Google’s Handy MultiLingual Search Tool, Smart Keywords

• Image Search Without the Text, SEO By The Sea

• New Research from Yahoo: The Impact of Caching on Search Engines, ResourceShelf
• First Public View Of Powerset Results, Techcrunch

• New Ask.com UI Gives 20%+ More User Satisfaction, Read/Write Web

• Equilink: A Search Engine For Nags, Techcrunch
• Chinese Internet Users Prefer Google Results, Search Engine Journal

• Last weeks in China – Video Search, Rumors and a Changed Interface, Search Engine Journal

• The Growth of a New Search Term in Google, Search Engine Roundtable
• Sputtr: all your search options on one page, E Consultancy

SEM Industry

• New SEOmoz Feature: SEO Q&A, SEOmoz
• I Love Google – Seriously!, EvilGreenMonkey
• My Meeting with Google in Chicago, Karl Ribas
• Jason Calacanis Solicits Assistance for Mahalo.com, Search Engine Roundtable
• Search Engine Watch: What Were They Thinking?, V7N
• Lee Odden on Industry Conferences, Beginning SEO Podcast
• Five Tips for Hiring a Paid Search Agency, Search Engine Watch
• Google Dinged On Privacy, But Should Privacy Group Be Dinged For Bad Report? Stealing Laptops To Teach Google A Lesson & More!, Daily SearchCast
  

SEO & SEM

• Leveraging Social Media and SEO for Public Relations, Online Marketing Blog
• Search Engine Friendly vs Search Engine Optimized, Joost Devalk

• Google Analytics and Search Engine Spiders, Wolf Howl

• Don’t Be Content Ranking #1 in Google, SEO Book
• Google Allows Some Cases of Hiding Text with CSS, Search Engine Roundtable

• How to Handle a Google Penalty – And, an Example from the Field of Real Estate, SEOmoz

• 15 Methods for Paid Link Detection, Stone Temple
• Persuasive Search Engine Marketing, Cre8PC

• Google’s Duplicate Content, Google Blogoscoped

Social Media

• Submit Multiple URLs to del.icio.us Bookmarks as a Batch, Digital Inspiration

• What’s the Long Term Impact of Social Media on a Person?, Search Engine Guide
• Are Sites Preparing Content ‘Exclusives’ for Digg Submission Prior to Posting?, Pronet Advertising

• Roll Your Own Social Network With Crowdvine, Techcrunch

• Sampa Brings Personalized Pages to Facebook, Techcrunch
• Facebook Hammers MySpace on Almost All Key Features, Mashable

• Get Your Blog Linked on BoingBoing – An Alternate Way, Digital Inspiration

Video & Image Search

• Flickr blocked and Flickr blocks?, News.com
• flickr considered harmful, Tiny Nibbles
• Flickr not even flickering in China, SFGate.com
• Yahoo! Releases Zurfer: Mobile Flickr World-Explorer, O’Reilly Radar
• First Full Length Film on YouTube, Techcrunch
• Update on New Embedded Player, YouTube Blog
• Del.icio.us Patent Application Points to Calendars, Mapping, and Ads, SEO By The Sea
• Hollywood’s YouTube frustration grows, News.com

Other Items

• The Three Dimensions of Ask3D, Ask.com Blog
• The Man Behind the Google Doodle, BusinessWeek

• Yahoo Partners with ‘Access Hollywood’, TV Week

• ASK Campaign (no, not that one) bombs, SEO Scoop
• Search Engines Learning from Advanced Searchers?, SEO By The Sea

• Why I Don’t Like .biz Domain Names, SEO Book

• The lure of great Google perks, Seattle Times Newspaper
• Crimeware using YouTube deception, Websense Blog

• Welcome to the Googl Browsing Centre, Googlified

• Search Engine Reputation Management PT II, DaveN
• Online Shoppers Will Pay Extra to Protect Privacy, Carnegie Mellon Study Shows, ResourceShelf

Related Topics: SearchCap

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About The Author: Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio over here. See more articles by Barry Schwartz

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