Search Engine News

IT managers pressured for more Web 2.0 access

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 13:18 GMT

Interesting article from Asia: IT managers pressured for more Web 2.0 access. About half of Asia’s information technology (IT) managers admitted that their users tried to bypass their company’s security policies to access Web 2.0 applications (Hong Kong, 54 per cent; China, 53 per cent; and India, 43 per cent), according to the latest Web 2.0 survey. More details behind the link.

Yamli the Smart Arabic search engine

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 12:58 GMT

Google, Yahoo, Bing & Others Do 4th Of July Logos

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 11:13 GMT

It's the 4th Of July! Happy 4th to those celebrating today, and here's a look at how search engines are recognizing the holiday in logos: Google went with a cookout theme for its logo: Yahoo had a small eagle next to its logo, which produced fireworks-stars if you hovered over it: Bing went with fireworks exploding behind the [...]

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Electronic Frontier Foundation Praises Ixquick on Privacy

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 07:44 GMT

Ixquick, the private search engine, received praise for its outstanding security and data handling practices last week from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)*.

EFF praised Ixquick for its “truly excellent privacy policy,” which experts regularly cite as the best in the industry. Ixquick is the only major search engine that does not record users' IP addresses or make a record of their searches, as verified by a third-party auditing firm. EFF also praised Ixquick for supporting HTPPS, a security feature that prevents data from being eavesdropped upon as it moves across the internet.

The HTTPS protocol encrypts users' search queries to protect against eavesdropping by a users' local Internet service provider, as well as eavesdropping by any third parties. For example, a user in China could search for “Tiananmen Square” without Chinese authorities being able to intercept the query. Of the major search engines, only Ixquick offers the feature.

“We hope that some day, the major search engines can catch up with Ixquick,” said EFF technical analyst Peter Eckersley, noting that Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft do not offer the HTTPS service.

Computer users concerned about privacy should also be aware that Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft record every search query made through their websites and link them to the user's IP address and cookies–a practice that has come under fire from both privacy and government groups. In contrast, Ixquick allows for fully anonymous, private searches, since it does not record any personal data on its users.

People wishing to use the Ixquick search engine can go to http://www.ixquick.com.

They may also utilize the HTTPS encryption feature by going to https://www.ixquick.com

(Note the addition of the letter “s” after “http” in the HTTPS encrypted site.)

*The Electronic Frontier Foundation (http://www.eff.org) is a leading privacy watchdog group that employs an expert staff of lawyers, policy analysts, activists, and technologists. Through legal action, education, media, and legislative efforts, EFF has championed the public interest in critical battles affecting digital rights since 1990. EFF's analysis and comments about HTTPS, including statements about Ixquick, can be found online at: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/06/several-facts-about-

Source: Ixquick

Happy 4th of July!

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 01:00 GMT

It's a Saturday, so I know you're not going to work hard today anyway.

For those in the US, I hope you enjoy your hot dogs and fireworks!

Search for Web Shows with Qwiji

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 23:54 GMT

Qwiji is the world’s first Web-Shows publishing platform, it’s free, and no download is required.
A web show is an exciting alternative to casual browsing, allowing you to lay back and watch the web as it was meant to be.

Same as a TV program, the show host will guide you through the most interesting and relevant web sites & videos within our interactive show-board interface. Our motivation is to provide you with a smart, simple & fun on-line experience. We encourage you to PLAY shows, create your own shows and share with your friends. Qwiji is in Beta, so your participation and feedback is vital to our success, go a’head and join us. Qwiji is on the move, we’ll keep uploading new features, Web-Show genres and much more, so stay tuned.

Web Shows are the only way to watch the web. Yes, just like you watch a TV program on your TV set, the Web Show allows you to lay back and watch content, videos, images that were gathered by your host, edited and annotated by the host. Besides the smart concept, it also looks great ! Web Shows are displayed in Qwiji Board (or Qboard as we call it) which give you the ultimate experience and control.

We’ve been active in the web arena before someone called it 1.0 and we’ll probably keep using no matter what name it gets. We’re passionate about the web, the creation, the communities, the wisdom and creativity. However, one thing in particular disturbs us most: the browsing experience. Have you noticed that the major change in the browsers in the last 15 years was the tabs functionality? We believe that the browser should provide a much more intuitive, rich & entertaining experience. We will strive to re-invent your web browsing.

Erez Shemesh
Co-Founder, CEO
Yaniv Hakim
Co-founder, CTO

Making a John Q Public account on Google

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:43 GMT

One of the advantages of working at Google is that you get to see neat products and features before the rest of the world does. But that can also be a disadvantage. Sometimes I'd like to talk about a fun Gmail Lab or a new Calendar feature but I'm honestly not sure whether the outside world can see the new feature. I don't want to leak something that the outside world can't see, so I usually I play it safe and end up not talking about any Gmail Labs, for example. I'd enjoy giving more Gmail tips but I also don't want to show my actual email that might contain secret stuff.

I think I've figured out a way to solve this issue. I've created a new Gmail account, siliconvalleyuser (at) gmail.com. Let's say it belongs to John Q Public, a power user living in Silicon Valley. Feel free to send John non-Google-related emails about fictional events: “Hey John, want to come to the party on Saturday?” or “John, here are those pictures from the fireworks this past weekend.” or “Hey John, I saw in the newpaper that you won the California lottery--congratulations!” Then when I want to do a screencast or demo some power feature of a Google account, I'll have some realistic email to show.

Just one note: please don't email anything to John about Google. I get way too much email about Google already, and the purpose of this account is to show different features of Gmail or Calendar. To keep this email address completely separate, I created a filter that deletes any emails that mention Google or me:

Again, please don't email about Google-related stuff, but feel free to email John about interesting fictional things at siliconvalleyuser (at) gmail.com! I'm hoping that I can do some blog posts or videos with good tips.

How to View Images in Gmail

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:37 GMT

When you sign up for a newsletter, or an RSS feed, using your email, you may not always be able to see the images in a post or message when receiving it in Gmail.

Why Gmail ‘hides' images

To protect you from spam and other malicious emails. Apparently, spammers and scammers use images in emails to see whether your address is real or not. By not showing the images, Gmail is actually protecting you to some degree from these threats. However, when you know a message is from a reputable sending, like for example if you signed up to the Google Tutor RSS feed, you can set up your Gmail to display images from the same sender each time.

Displaying images in Gmail

There are some easy steps to assure you can see the images you want to.

If you want to display images only once: At the top of your email message, you will see a blue bar with two links. The first one says “Display images below”. By clicking on this, images for this one email message only will be displayed, and not for any other emails you will receive from the same sender in the future.
If you always want to display images from a particular sender, simply click on the second link that says “always display images from sender@senderyoutrust.com”.

Here are two screen shots showing before and after clicking either of the links:

In the first screenshot, the images in my Gmail email are still disabled.

After clicking either link at the top of the Gmail message, the following happened:

You can also stop Gmail from displaying images after you initially allowed them. You can do this by clicking on show details at the top of the message, and selecting “don't display from now on”.

Google has a step by step guide to displaying images here as well. Now, you will never need to miss a Google Tutor image again!

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Video Recap of Weekly Search Buzz :: July 3, 2009

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:05 GMT

In this week's video recap, we discuss the July Google webmaster report, a lot has happened over the past 30 days. Google may have had a PageRank quirk. Google penalized the porn industry and then reversed it. Google is messing...

Daily Search Forum Recap: July 3, 2009

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:00 GMT

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web....

Search for Amusement Parks with Parkr!

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:20 GMT

Search Parks with Parkr!

After many months of incubation here we are!

My little child is born: Parkr!

The Amusement Park Reviewer.

So let’s test and review!

Google Added 25% to Chinese Ad Revenue

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 12:33 GMT

After their recent skirmish with the Chinese government over Internet porn, Google China is back online. And they're already optimistic: apparently they're poised to announce a Q2 revenue increase in China of 25% over the previous quarter. (And in this economy, that's not just great; that's phenomenal!)

Brand Republic reports that Google China will also see operating revenue increases of 45% to 50% over the second quarter of last year. For owning only 30% of the Chinese search market, that seems pretty impressive. And the revenue boost from April, May and June of this year probably wasn't because of a jump in market share—they've only added eight percentage points to their marketshare over the last two years.

Meanwhile, Baidu continues to dominate the Chinese search market with 64%, according to Brand Republic. And it's not losing ground to Google, either—Baidu is up six percentage points from two years ago. So it would seem that smaller players in the market are losing market share to the two leaders. Brand Republic doesn't mention on a similar revenue boost in Q2 for Baidu, but the Chinese search giant did have a strong first quarter this year.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt notes that the company continues to work with the Chinese government over its pornography concerns.

What do you think? Is Google betting better at monetizing in China, or are people just suddenly more willing to click on search ads? Do you think Baidu is seeing similar gains?

Search Ads Less Helpful than TV, Newspaper

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:33 GMT

The results of a new poll from Harris Interactive indicate that Internet advertising isn't as effective as search engine marketers would like to think. When asked what medium's ads were most helpful in making purchase decisions, the 2500+ American respondents indicated that first television, then newspapers, then search engine ads. Internet banner ads fared even worse:

37% said television ads were most helpful in purchase decisions
18% said newspaper ads
14% said search engine ads
3% said radio ads
1% said Internet banner ads

Perhaps most revealing, however, is the math. Those numbers don't add up to 100% because another 28% (rounding effects) said that none of those ad media were helpful in purchase decisions.

The Harris poll also asked about what kinds of ads people ignore. Again, the banner ads didn't do so well:

46% tended to ignore Internet banner ads
But only 17% of people said they ignored search engine ads
13% ignored TV ads
9% ignored radio ads
9% don't ignore any of those ad media

The full results (PDF) break out the data by demographic and geography:

I'm kind of torn about these results. I've long said that as an Internet marketer, I'm proud to have people so subtly influenced by search engine ads that they don't recognize that influence later. On the other hand, it'd be nice to be considered “helpful.” On yet another hand, since when is the point of advertising to be found “helpful”? Should that even be our goal?

What do you think? Is this something to get worried about, or should we go along our merry way, advertising or persuading but not “helping” people?

via

Google Shrunk its Search Results Page

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:09 GMT

Honestly I didn't notice the difference until I read from Mashable that Google have changed the way it displays search results. As usual, I couldn't find any announcement about it at the Official Google Blog. So, I take it to mean that Google may still be ironing out some kinks related to this “enhancement.”

So, what are the changes? There are three “unnoticeable” things actually. First, which should have been quite obvious I were closely paying attention was the shrunk Google logo at the top of the page. Then there is also now a big space in between the search box and the first row of the search results page.

As to the search results itself, these are now indented but the most significant change was the removal of the page size indicator. This indicator gives you an idea of how long it will take for the page to load. Google also removed the word “pages” from the previous ”similar pages” link.

Was there any improvement in the loading speed? We have no way of telling now. But ii could be faster or slower. Perhaps if you're a keen observer whenever you use Google search, maybe you can easily tell whether there was any change in the speed of loading the search results or none at all.

So, any idea on why Google did these changes? Is it for aesthetic purposes? Revenue generation or what? Do you like the new look of Google search results page? Personally, I prefer the old one or maybe perhaps I could learn to like this new look once I get used to it.

Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.

Google Shrunk its Search Results Page

Search and Community Track at SES San Jose: NACA's Save The Dream Tour

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 09:54 GMT

At SES San Jose 2009, I've been asked to make a solo presentation to kick of the Search and Community Track. The title of the session is "How to Optimize for Search & Engage the Community."

I've been working on my presentation, but it lacked a compelling case study that illustrated how a community organization had used search engine optimization and YouTube video to generate measurable results. I had planned to show examples of videos created by Barack Obama's presidential campaign, Monty Python, and Blendtec, but plans have a way of changing.

Then, I got involved with the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA), a national non-profit community advocacy and homeownership organization headquartered in Boston.

NACA is organizing a series of Save the Dream events to help homeowners avoid foreclosure, restructure home loans, and reduce mortgage rates. They have already held events in Columbia, SC, Stamford, CT, and Washington, DC. And NACA plans to hold more Save the Dream events in Cleveland, OH, July 17 - 20 at the Wolstein Center; Chicago, IL, July 24 - 27 at McCormick Place; and St. Louis, MO, July 31 - August 3 at Chaifetz Arena.

Although I don't have my case study wrapped up just yet, I do see one in the making. And it offers lots of lessons to search engine marketers, YouTube directors and entrepreneurs about how to create unique, relevant content that can quickly gain popularity in the Internet community.

For example, we issued an optimized press release yesterday announcing that NACA CEO Bruce Marks and Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge (OH-11) will hold a joint press conference on Monday, July 6, at the Wolstein Center at 11:30 am to discuss the upcoming Save the Dream event in Cleveland. You can get the gist of the news at NACA and Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge (Oh-11) Announce Same Day Solution for Homeowners with Unaffordable Mortgage.

But we also embedded a documentary video created by DigiNovations of Concord, MA, in the optimized press release. It provides background on NACA's Save the Dream program, which has helped homeowners across America restructure and renegotiate home mortgages and home loans they can no longer afford.

Documentary: NACA's "Save the Dream" - Mortgage Restructuring and Renegotiation Rescues Homeowners

Now, the press conference hasn't even been held yet -- and the Save the Dream event in Cleveland is still two weeks away. But I was stunned yesterday when one Twitter user near Memphis, TN, said "this is fantastic news" but she couldn't afford to wait, had called NACA and was "on hold" waiting to talk with someone.

I initially tweeted back that NACA will have over 500 staff and volunteers at the Wolstein Center in Cleveland, including over 250 counselors providing counseling from 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. from Friday July 17 through Monday July 20. Then, I realized that this information wasn't helpful today, this minute, now. So, I sent her a direct tweet with the cell phone number of the person I was working with at NACA -- in case she needed it.

I got a direct tweet back saying, "Thanks for the info... my process is well underway - so I'm all set (I hope!)"

So, something extraordinary is happening. And as I prepare for my presentation at SES San Jose 2009, I hope you won't mind if I share the story as it unfolds. That's one of the lessons I've already learned: You can't plan a search campaign and expect the community to wait to respond when you are ready -- especially if you are offering an answer to the huge subprime and predatory lending industry.

This is bigger than a case study. This is people's homes.