IndustryHighlights from the SEW Blog: Nov. 2, 2006

Highlights from the SEW Blog: Nov. 2, 2006

Featured posts from the Search Engine Watch blog, as well as our customary headlines from around the web.

Featured posts from the Search Engine Watch blog, as well as our customary headlines from around the web. If you’re not familiar with our blog, click on any of the links below, or visit the blog’s home page at http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/.

  • Smarter Launches Visual SearchSeems that just last week I mentioned a shopping comparison engine launching a color search feature. Well, this week it’s Smarter’s turn to take the colorful spotlight. Smarter.com today launched visual search. Visual search can be found by clicking on the Clothing & Accessories tab or by searching for any product within that section. Right now it’s is a bit hidden as the consumer has to click on a small link under the header. Differentiator here is that Smarter’s visual search is all about clothing. Users select gender, then a top (shirt, sweater, etc.), then a bottom (pants, shorts, etc.),…
  • SnapShot: A Better Version Of AlexaCompete, Inc. is a B2B firm that conducts consumer-oriented research for large clients. Now the company has released SnapShot, a free tool that anyone can use. It operates like Alexa or Google Trends to display relative traffic, as well as several other metrics such as page views and time on site. Here’s an example….
  • SideStep Buys TravelPostSideStep acquired TravelPost for a combination of cash and stock. TravelPost will become a wholly owned subsidiary of SideStep. According to the press release, “TravelPost.com has grown into a leading source for unbiased user-generated hotel reviews and ratings, travel news, information resources and travel blogs. The company has excelled at organizing travel information to improve the way people research and shop for travel.” TravelPost, with over 500,000 hotel reviews on its site, might be the smartest little travel site you’ve never heard of. The coolest feature is the ability to filter hotel reviews by Age, Gender, Budget, and Trip Purpose….
  • More Details On YouTube & Google AcquisitionBlog Maverick has some intimate details on the Google YouTube Deal from a “trusted anonymous author” in a message board. Here are some of the excerpts:…
  • Buying Keywords As Trademark Use?The London Free Press is reporting on a case in a New York Federal District Court, Rescuecom v. Google, in which the Judge granted a motion to dismiss on Google’s behalf. The case involved the use of trademarked terms as keywords, finding that keyword advertising isn’t a use in commerce. But, don’t go looking to this ruling for any insights when it comes to the use of trademarked keywords in adwords. There are at least three reasons not to……
  • Yahoo To Buy AOL? Sell To Microsoft? Merge With eBay? Or Keep Status Quo?Fortune reports that rumors are spreading that Yahoo is in talks with Time Warner about buying AOL. The article says, “FORTUNE has learned from multiple sources that Yahoo recently approached Time Warner about buying America Online.” That rumor was shot down by Time Warner explaining “that there are no active conversations between the two companies.” So the article then goes into what-if scenarios. What if Yahoo did buy AOL? What if Yahoo sold out to Microsoft? What if eBay and Yahoo merged? And what if Yahoo kept with the status quo?…
  • Competitive Intelligence & Link SearchesRand over at SEOMoz has a great write up on Long List of Link Searches where he goes through a sample client and how he would approach the competitive intelligence aspect of the SEO research. This is a must read for any SEO because he goes through “the obvious,” some “advanced operators,” “alternative search sources,” “directory search terms,” “blog & forum searches,” and “submit type searches.” The best part is that this is a practical example that gives you actionable items to run through in your own SEO practices. Gotta love Rand for doing this, most would not….
  • Google Enhanced Google Alerts & Adds Blog Search AlertsThe Google Blog announced that they have added Google Blog Search email alerts to the Google Alerts system. So like you were able to add alerts for Google News and other Google properties, you are now able to add alerts for Blog Search results. Google has also enhanced Alerts to “show results from multiple sources (including Google News, the web, and blogs).”…
  • Yahoo Search Marketing Blog Now LiveAs I expected, Yahoo has announced the launch of a new blog named Yahoo Search Marketing Blog….
  • Customized Search From Optevi And MicrosoftIn writing about the launch of Google Custom Search Engine, I neglected to mention a couple of other companies doing similar things. The first one omitted from my post was consumer-focused customized search engine Optevi. Optevi allows users to choose from or create “bundles” of sites that influence search results….
  • Yahoo Adds NOODP Support & Weather Report UpdateThe Yahoo Search Blog announced that Yahoo has finally added support for the NOODP META tag. You can deploy this two ways; META NAME=”ROBOTS” CONTENT=”NOODP” (stops MSN, Google and Yahoo from using ODP directory) or META NAME=”Slurp” CONTENT=”NOODP (stops just Yahoo from using ODP directory) I reported back on October 11th that this was coming and Danny explains why NOODP tag support is not enough, we need it to support a method to tell Yahoo not to use the Yahoo Directory title and description as well….
  • November Elections MashupsMaps have long been important in politics, as anyone who works in politics or watches the TV coverage on election night knows. And then there’s the familiar saying, “All politics is local.” Now, as reported on the Google Earth Blog, Google Earth has added “U.S. Elections Guide” and “U.S. Congressional Districts” information layers. By selecting these layers in Google Earth (not available on Google Maps) you can see boundaries of U.S. voting districts, links to information and news about the candidates, where to vote, campaign finance data and other election-related information….
  • Litigation, Google And CopyrightThe NY Times has an extensive article today on Google and those who would challenge it in the courts. It offers a broad overview of the legal issues surrounding Google, including those coming with the YouTube acquisition, and the company’s attitude toward litigation, which is typically to fight rather than settle. In addition, Charles Cooper at CNET writes what can only be described as an angry column about Google and “Web 2.0,” content and copyright infringement. The article is entitled, “Web 2.0 as a metaphor for ‘rip off’….

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