SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 18, 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:

• Microsoft To Acquire Online Marketing Firm aQuantive For $6 Billion
  A day after 24/7 Real Media was acquired by WPP, Microsoft announced plans buy digital ad firm aQuantive, which owns Atlas and Avenue A | Razorfish, for $6 billion in cash. It is apparently the biggest acquisition in Microsoft’s history….
• Rumor: Google To Buy Feed Analytics Company FeedBurner For $100 Million
  Rumour: Google to buy Feedburner from Seth Sethi earlier today reports that Google is rumored to buy FeedBurner, a feed management, analytics and advertising company. Valleywag has said they confirmed the rumors and add that the purchase price is about $100 million. Google already does RSS ads with AdSense for…
• Video Hits Google Universal Search & Google Video Now Live With Meta Search?
  Since the announcement of Google Universal Search, I have been waiting eagerly to see videos show up within Google’s search results. Last night, it finally started. For me, it was for a search on star wasr kid (here’s more about him). You can see the embedded video showing up in…
• Google Book Search Expands
  Although Google currently has a wealth of books in their Google Book Search database, this isn’t enough either for them or us, so they’ve taken steps to improve the situation. If you now do a search, you’ll find references to millions of books that they haven’t yet digitized. You can…
• Billable Click Fraud Is 10% to 15%, Says Fair Isaac
  Fair Isaac Claims Pay-Per-Click Fraud Is 10% to 15% from InformationWeek says Fair Isaac is going to report today that it has found the click fraud rate of billed paid search and contextual advertising to be 10 to 15 percent, though the figures are based on what the Associated Press…
• Search In Pictures: Taylor Swift, Nooglers, & Deepak Chopra
  In this week’s Search In Pictures, here are the latest images culled from the web, showing what people eat at the search engine companies, how they play, who they meet, where they speak, what toys they have and more….
• Ask.com’s Usability Architect: Exclusive Interview With Michael Ferguson
  I love an underdog, especially a smart underdog. So I’m definitely rooting for Ask.com, because I think they’ve been an undervalued player in the search game. All the headlines have been focused on the big three and in the meantime, the team back at Ask.com has been quietly building…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere

Applications & Portal Features

• v2.80: Making Image Overlays Easy with GGroundOverlay & GGeoXML, Google API Blog
• Integrating visual tools with spreadsheet data, Google Docs & Spreadsheet Blog
• Oh, the places you’ll go…., Official Google Blog
• Picasa Web Albums introduces embeddable Flash slideshows, Download Squad
• AOL To Launch Silverlight-Based Gadget, TechCrunch
• Google Apps Partner Edition, Google Blog

Business Issues

• Cringe: Google brings light unto Michigan, Valleywag
• Google shows off new office building in Ann Arbor, Associated Press
• Australia’s Fairfax, Google Sign Deal For Ads And Content, PaidContent.org
• Even Yahoo! Gets The Blues, BusinessWeek

Conferences

• UK Blogging & Search Engine Optimization News, Bruce Clay
• What Had Us Buzzing At The Search Insider Summit?, MediaPost

Link Building

• SEO Basics: "Click Here" is Evil, Search Engine Guide
• Strategies For Inducing Editorial Links, Search Engine Journal

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Local businesses in Universal search, Google Lat Long Blog
• Top secret, in plain view / Google Earth may blur the image, but others don’t, San Francisco Chronicle
• Localized Search: A Threat to SEM?, MediaPost

Paid Search & Contextual

• adCenter Feature Review: multiple account performance reports and misspelled keywords management, adCenter Blog
• The Other Paid Search: Paid Direct Links, ClickZ
• Google AdSense Speaks Up on Proxy Sites, Search Engine Roundtable
• Ask’s Related Search Ads, Marketing Pilgrim

Searching

• Yahoo says ‘Been there, done that’ to Google redesign, News.com
• How Does Google Universal Search Compare to Yahoo! Alpha, Ask X, Microsoft Imagine Live & Google’s Own Searchmash?, Read/Write Web
• We find better results for “needle” when we start with one big haystack, Good Morning Silicon Valley
• No JavaScript, No Google Navigation, Google Operating System
• Swimwear and Diets – The Search Correlation, Hitwise Intelligence
• Google and Yahoo beware; month of search engine bugs coming, SC Magazine Australia

SEM Industry

• The Misguided Hype Of Transparency, MediaPost
• Google Adds Bergy, Wysz & Pat To Google Webmaster Help Forums, Search Engine Roundtable
• Why I Love the Sordid Underbelly of the Search World, SEOmoz
• Google Evangelizes Its Ecosystem — Google Online Marketing, InformationWeek

SEO & SEM

• Taking advantage of universal search, Google Webmaster Central Blog
• Branding, SEO Implications for Google Universal Search, ClickZ
• Ranking in the Search Engines: Why It Takes So Long, Performancing
• Tips for Your First Day In-House, Search Engine Watch
• Query Stats Working Again at Google Webmaster Central, Search Engine Roundtable

Social Media

• Twitter vs Jaiku, Chris Pirillo
• Google Reader Tip: Show Only New Items, Online Marketing Blog
• The Devil’s in the Details, Twitter Blog
• Facebook Spamming Your Identity To Drive Their Traffic, David Dalka

Video & Image Search

• Chasing the YouTube Scammers, ClickZ News
• Interview with YouTube on Partner Program, Search Engine Watch
• YouTube Founders Unfazed by Challenges, Forbes.com
• Yahoo ‘censored’ Flickr comments, BBC NEWS

Other Items

• Happy Birthday Alan, YOUmoz
• Experiencing the Great Firewall of China, Jeremy Zawodny
• Google’s Mayer: Why I gotta take a vacation, USATODAY.com
• IPS student data exposed, Indianapolis Star
• Frustration follows exposure of IPS data, IndyStar.com