SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 23, 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:

• Google & Dell’s Revenue-Generating URL Error Pages Drawing Fire
  Last year, Google signed a landmark deal to become the default search engine on new Dell computers, plus to bundle Google software. Now, people are noting anew that a consequence of the deal seems to be pushing Dell users to search results dominated by Google ads, rather than editorial…
• Direct Navigation And Domain Empires
  Business 2.0 has a fairly comprehensive (cover) story about domain portfolios and "direct navigation." It starts off with a profile of Vancouver entrepreneur Kevin Ham ("The Man Who Owns the Internet"), who operates a $300 million domain "empire" but goes on to discuss others who have become wealthy from domain…
• Google’s Biotech Investment In Brin’s Wife’s Company, 23andMe
  Raising some eyebrows this morning is Google’s investment in a biotech firm called 23andMe, which states as its mission to: "help you make sense of your own genetic information . . . [and] put your genome into the larger context of human commonality and diversity." Anne Wojcicki, Google cofounder Sergey…
• TechCrunch: Google Is Buying FeedBurner
  $100 Million Payday For Feedburner – This Deal Is Confirmed from TechCrunch has Michael Arrington saying last week’s rumors of a Google purchase of FeedBurner are true: Feedburner is in the closing stages of being acquired by Google for around $100 million. The deal is all cash and mostly…
• Yahoo Closing Webjay
  Odd. Just a year and a half after buying music playlist sharing site Webjay, John Udell notes that Yahoo is closing the service. From the closure notice: We are sorry to announce that Webjay will be closing its doors at the end of June, 2007. Please take this time to…
• Google’s New AdSense For Video Pilot
  Today Google introduced a "closed beta" that allows for the in-stream insertion of ads in video content on its AdSense network. Here’s the Inside AdSense explanation: "[W]e’re extending AdSense to online video content. Publishers in this test will be able to define at what point in their videos that streaming…
• Technorati Blog Search Relaunches
  Technorati has relaunched today, and I’m on a short day, so I can’t dive in to play with it in depth. Below, I’ll recap what some others are saying. add a few off-the-cuff remarks on blog search in general, plus comment on how Technorati continues to be masterful in working…
• Q&A With Seth Godin, Founder & CEO Of Social Search Service Squidoo
  Seth Godin is widely known as one of the foremost advocates of "permission marketing," promotional campaigns that don’t rely on interrupting the attention of your customers, but rather engage them and even turn them into enthusiastic advocates that volunteer time and effort to help you promote your products or…
• Driving Online Registrations: Think Beyond the White Paper
  Successful B2B marketing efforts—particularly search advertising campaigns—often utilize landing pages designed to collect registrations. Website visitors must complete a (hopefully short and simple) registration form to receive something of value. Typically this registration data is then cultivated and, if warranted, entered in the company’s lead management and sales system….
• Search Illustrated: Blocking Search Engines With Robots.txt
  While most of the time we want search engine crawlers to grab and index as much content from our web sites as possible, there are situations where we want to prevent crawlers from accessing certain pages or parts of a web site. For example, you don’t want crawlers poking…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere

Applications & Portal Features

• Getting it done with Google Apps, Google Blog

Business Issues

• HotJobs Exec Departure from Yahoo Won’t Affect Newspaper Group, ClickZ
• Microsoft’s Berkowitz: Consider aQuantive Deal a Merger, Search Engine Watch

• Microsoft pours more cold water on Yahoo-merger speculation, All About Microsoft

• What Should Ask.com Do?, Search Engine Watch
• Google is failing the Microsoft litmus test, All About Microsoft
• Google Can’t Google?, Jeff Barr
• Google Urged to Share Code, PC World
• Newspapers want Google News’ quarter, News.com

• IAB: Ad Spend up 35% in 2006, John Battelle

Local, Maps & Mobile

• 1-800-GOOG-411: Freedom With Speech, Google Lat Long Blog
• Cingular BlackBerry 8800 has Google Maps and GPS, Google Blog
• Majority Would Purchase Google or Yahoo Mobile Phone, Cellular-News.com
• GeoCommons, Share Your GeoData, O’Reilly Radar

Paid Search & Contextual

• Google AdSense Preview Sandbox 1.0, Download Squad

Podcasts

• The Marketing Pilgrim Podcast – Episode 7, Marketing Pilgrim
• Universal Search, Microsoft Buys Chris, AdSense MFAs, Google Hot Trends, SEO, Link Bait, & More, Search Pulse
• AdSense Arbitrage Media Coverage, Shoemoney
• Dell’s Google-Powered Bad URL Money Machine; Technorati Mark II & More!, Daily SearchCast

Searching

• Google Base Learning, ComparisonEngines.com
• Download US Patents in PDF, Google Operating System

SEO & SEM

• What Does Universal Search Mean for SEM?, Search Engine Watch
• WebmasterCentral it’s just crap, Dave Naylor
• Digging Deeper Into the Latest Release of Google Analytics, Search Engine Watch

Social Media

• Google and FeedBurner – Strong Growth in the Blogosphere, Hitwise
• Digg Bans Users Who Digg Too Often, Search Engine Journal
• Report: Microsoft building apps to personally identify anyone online, Boing Boing
• WebJay closing in June

Video & Image Search

• Is the Google Video PlusBox Fair?, Google Blogoscoped
• MeeVee Adds Feeds from Several Major Networks, Mashable
• Pageflakes Users Create 100,000 Pagecasts, Mashable
• Briefs: Image Recognition Software Used to Find Stolen/Looted Art and Valuables; Exalead Launches Video Search Beta, ResourceShelf

Other Items

• Next Open Hack Day!, Bradley Horowitz