SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 25, 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:

• Everyone Fears Google (Again) & Will The Last Googler To Leave Turn The Lights Out?
  Back at the beginning of this year, my 14 "Is Google Evil?" Tipping Points Since 2001 covered the history of how Google has been deemed to be too Big Brotherish or too dominant over the years. Another wave of Google hatred and fear is washing across the great sea…
• Search In Pictures: Google Recruiter, Google Babies, Grady Booch & New Search Construction
  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….
• Google Registers ClimateSaverPC.com: Signs Of New Google PC Coming?
  Gary Price notes, as does Garett Rogers at Googling Google, that Google now owns the domain climatesaverpc.com. Garett speculates that Google may be thinking about building and selling personal computers that are green friendly, i.e. are climate and earth savers. We know Google has been active in environmental issues, though…
• MyBlogLog Brands All Social Media Optimizers As Schmoes
  So MyBlogLog has tagging. Yawn. Then I saw Andy Beal highlighted this part of MyBlogLog’s post about the new feature Spam – If you think someone is spamming you, tag it out loud! Internally, we like to call a user who games the system a SchMOe (Social Media Optimizer). Internally,…
• Yahoo Creates Home Values Meta Search
  Zestimates from Zillow have proven to be a tremendous hit with the public, although they’ve been criticized for being too high or too low in some cases. Now Yahoo has taken Zillow’s home valuation data (they’ve had a partnership for several months) and combined it with similar data from other…
• Google Calendar Goes Mobile
  Google has just launched a mobile version of Google Calendar, which is supposed to load for those visiting the Google Calendar site with a mobile phone. Google describes it more in a blog post today. It appears to work on a range of phones, including Windows Mobile….
• European Union Questions Google’s Data Retention Policy
  Google may be violating EU privacy laws on user search data from Bloomberg reports that the European Union has finally sent Google an expected letter raising concerns over Google’s data retention policies….
• Google AdSense Says Don’t Worry About Accidental Clicks, No One Will Notice
  Accidents happen from the Google Inside AdSense blog today caught my eye. Apparently, lots of publishers accidentally click on their ads and write in to Google to say sorry. Don’t worry, says Google, "chances are we’ve already detected your clicks on your ads and discounted them." Bull. Seriously, bull. Here’s…
• Facebook Opens Up Its ‘Platform’ To Everyone
  "Facebook is the anti-MySpace" and "Facebook is a new type of "Web 2.0" portal" are some of the things that were and are being said yesterday and today about the social network’s new "Facebook Platform" initiative. Basically there’s no direct search angle here but it’s an interesting and potentially important…

Search News Headlines From Elsewhere

Applications & Portal Features

• Calendar for mobile devices, Google Blog
• Bigger attachments in Gmail, Google Blog
• Something to :) about, Google Talk Blog

Conferences

• Take Your Traffic-Driving Strategy to the Next Level, Yahoo Publisher Network Blog

Business Issues

• Diller: Microsoft/Yahoo Would Be Good for Ask.com, MediaPost Publications
• Cringley: What Googlers make, Google owns, Google Watch
• Five takeaways from the E.U. -vs.-Google privacy tussle, MarketWatch

Link Building

• Get Paid in .edu Links to Post Help Wanted Ads, SEO Book
• Will .edu Links Ever Lose Their Luster?, SEOmoz

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Can Yahoo Mobilize Mobile?, ClickZ
• Reply enters deal with Yahoo, San Jose Business Journal
• More home value estimates on Yahoo Real Estate, Square Feet
• Kelsey Research Confirms User Interest in Video, Screenwerk
• Getting Hyper-Active in Local Search, Search Engine Watch
• Mini-Cities: Is It Already in Trouble?, Screenwerk
• Refining Queries Using Category Synonyms for Local and Other Searches, SEO By The Sea

Paid Search & Contextual

• What’s all the noise about….Google Audio Ads?, Google Consumer Packaged Goods Blog
• Accidents happen, Inside AdSense
• adCenter Feature Review: Importing a campaign, adCenter Blog
• The End of “No-Man’s” Land in Online Advertising, MediaPost
• Advertising’s Brave New World, Wall Street Journal

Searching

• You might be digitzing books on the Web without knowing it thanks to this stealthy anti-spam technology, NetworkWorld
• From Microsoft Research: Putting Search into Context
• 300 Search Engines Reviewed, Search Engine Journal
• Find Cheap Gas Prices via Search Engines, Search Engine Journal
• Why Aren’t Credit Card Companies Using A Google Defense Mechanism?, Techdirt
• What Google News and Techmeme Could Learn from Each Other, Read/Write Web
• Yahoo releases their 20 most misspelled search words, SEO Scoop

SEM Industry

• Search Marketing Blogs Update 052507, Online Marketing Blog
• My Public Relations Secrets Revealed, 10e20
• Measuring ROI Can Be Difficult for SEO, Search Engine Watch
• Enquiro Finds Search Plays an Integral Role in B2B Purchases, Search Engine Watch
• Favorite 5 Search Marketing News Sites, MIMA Blog
• Real Estate: SEO Disaster / SEO Opportunity, Small Business SEM

SEO & SEM

• Advanced Search Engine Optimization for College & University Websites, Natural Search Blog
• Google’s Reinclusion Requests – Getting Back Into the Index, Not Rankings, Search Marketing Gurus
• Search Engine Optimisation : A Team game, Dave Naylor
• Got 100 dollars? 7 Experts share budget website marketing tips, SEOish
• 17 Poor Quality Signals Your Site May Be Sending, Eric Enge
• Meta Tags in Search Engine Optimization: Who Needs ‘Em?, Bruce Clay Blog
• Google-Proof PR?, Forbes

Social Media

• There’s a hole in your Twitter, meish dot org

• The Twitter API Respects Your Privacy, Twitter Blog
• MyBlogLog Gets Into Tagging, Techcrunch
• All About Tags, MyBlogLog Blog
• Whiteboard Friday: "Digg-Dugg", SEOmoz
• Google News to Add Videos and Social News Features?, Google Operating System
• Google stands firm behind News search site, ComputerWorld
• CoRank Relaunches: Create Your Own Digg, Read/Write Web

Other Items

• Google vs eBay Netball Championship, Google Australia Blog