SearchCap: The Day In Search, August 27, 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:

• 
  FindLaw Hit By Long Arm Of The Google Law Over Paid Links
  Toolbar PageRank penalties are nothing new to the SEO world, we see them all the time. But when Todd Friesen broke the news that FindLaw.com is marketing a new advertising service to sell links that will “help you increase your company’s visibility, rank and penetration within natural search results on…
• 
  Google Offers New Content Hub For US Presidential Elections Home Stretch
  Many millions of people saw Hillary Clinton speak last night at the Democratic National Convention. If you didn’t (and are interested) you can see the speech on YouTube. Indeed, Google has been doing various things in various places — on Maps, YouTube, iGoogle and elsewhere — to offer news, content,…
• 
  Google Checkout Steps Up Promotion Through AdWords
  Steve LaLonde spotted Google sporting new checkout badges for some Google Checkout merchants within the AdWords listings. I was able to reproduce it for a search on petco, a Google Checkout merchant. Here is a side by side look at the checkout badges on AdWords. The $5 off version is…
• 
  AdAge: Microsoft Likely To Sell Avenue A To WPP
  AdAge reported that Microsoft and mega-agency WPP have restarted talks that may result in the sale of Interactive agency Avenue A to the latter. Avenue A was part of the $6 billion deal for aQuantive that also included Atlas and the DrivePM ad network….

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Me.dium Follows Microsoft into IE8 Beta 2 Push, mashable.com
• Selling Google Apps no cinch for Google, CNN Money

Business Issues

• Yahoo mixes old and new in Internet-age news service, AFP
• Did Microsoft try to blitz Google with ads?, SeattlePi
• Google is neither buying nor running many online display ads, but Microsoft and MySpace are, VentureBeat
• Yahoo! kicks off major ad offensive across Europe, NMA
• Microsoft Vs. Google, Again, Forbes
• Yahoo eyeing Nebraska town for operations, KCAU TV

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Google Cuts Features Out of ‘Android’ OS, PC Magazine
• Nations Respond To Google Earth Threat, InformationWeek
• Upstart JumpTap takes on Google, News.com

Paid Search & Contextual

• adCenter Feedback – adCenter Blog for Advertisers, adcentercommunity.com
• Google AdSense Stops Displaying on Google Cache Results?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Google AdWords Marking "Great" Quality Scores as "OK"?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Top 5 Tips for Winning in Retail Over and Beyond the Festive Period – adCenter Blog for Advertisers, adcentercommunity.com

Searching

• Ask.com Launches All-New Ask Kids Search Engine, MarketWatch
• The Google Alphabet, 2008 edition, O’Reilly Radar
• Linguistic Agents Unveils RoboCrunch : Beyond Search, arnoldit.com

SEM Industry

• Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank, The Invesp Blog
• Google Solicits Webmaster Help for Popular Picks Thread, Search Engine Roundtable
• Rehabilitating SEO, Search Engine Watch
• Google Guidelines Guru Patrick Sexton Joins We Build Pages, We Build Pages
• How Well Do Search Marketers Brand Themselves?, Part II, Search Engine Guide
• Interview with Lee Odden of Top Rank, Your SEO Mentor

SEO & SEM

• The Branding Value of a Search Impression?, Official Google CPG Blog
• The Impact of User Feedback, Part 2 (and more Popular Picks!), Official Google Webmaster Central Blog
• 5 Tools to Visualize Page Outlinking Tactics, Search Engine Journal
• Digital PR – Online Public Relations, Social Media and SEO, Online Marketing Blog
• How Does Google Use Click-Thru Data?, Small Business SEM
• Is Google Changing Their Search Results HTML To Mess with Scrapers?, Search Engine Roundtable
• SEO 101: User Content Generation, Web Optimist
• SEO content: Seriously Effective Online, SEOptimise
• What Search Marketing Analysts Could Learn From Sports Analysts, SEM Geek
• Local Search, SEO, and Rants, Stephen Espinosa

Social Media

• Facebook Gets Friended By Malware, New York Times
• The Great Social Media Traffic Debate, Techipedia
• Why I Hate Social Bookmarklets & Proof They Don’t Work, Site Visibility

Video, Music & Image Search

• YouTube Toolbar for Playlists, Google Operating System
• Making money on YouTube with Content ID, Official Google Blog

Web Analytics

• FeedBurner Subscriber Stats Having Major Issues, Search Engine Roundtable

Other Items

• Dispatch from Korea, Yodel Anecdotal
• Google UK botch security certificate, Andrew R H Girdwood
• Strengthening the study of computer science, Official Google Blog

Recent Hot Items From Sphinn, Our Social News Sharing Site:

• AJAX and Non-JavaScript Experiences for SEO friendly websites
• Proof that Savvy Social Media Users are the Most Contagious Viral Seeds
• 13 Free and Cheap Website Monitoring Services
• You Might Be A Digg Spammer If…
• Get Alerted Once Any Page Is Changed
• John Andrews Is Going to Work for Google
• Link Building and the 6 Principles of Persuasion
• 6 Unique Ways to Get Instant Links to Your Site
• Should a SEO Company Declare Its "SEO Code of Ethics"?