John Battelle asked why Google was/is returning no results for a search on [amazon.com] at 9am (PST, I think) yesterday. At the time, I felt it wasn't a huge deal, these things happen on occasion at Google, normally not for such a large brand, but it happens, nevertheless. What is a bit surprising is that Google is obviously aware of the issue, based on John telling us Google contacted him with a confirmation of the issue, but Google has yet to fix the issue, almost a day later.
LeeAnn Prescott at the HitWise blog provides some value statistical insight into the importance of such a search. She explains that the search phrase [amazon.com] "was the 42nd highest volume search term, with a share of 0.20% of Google searches." That is pretty significant to Google, Google users and Amazon. Since Amazon.com is searched on so frequently, why hasn't Google fixed the issue already?
Postscript From Danny: I'm with Barry, in that my feeling was also no big deal, in the sense that over the past few weeks, we've had these types of errors reported for other sites, as well.
It IS a big deal to get the errors, of course -- and Google should straighten them out. But the Amazon query is the latest in a string of problems. Dave Naylor, for example, posted an example earlier this month of Digg not showing up just as Amazon isn't now.
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