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Planet Google is proudly presented by Piotr Konieczny, who IS NOT (and never was) affiliated with Google Inc.
If you want to suggest a website or read Planet Google in a different language - let me know.
Google App Engine - the development and hosting cloud that serves up third-party apps and websites - was on the fritz for a good six hours this morning.…
Nothing innovative here really. Just some functional features which should have been added a long time to Google’s Blog Search. Then again, better late than never. So, Google has just added RSS/ATOM subscription, list of the most popular terms that users are using, and latest blog posts from, I guess “more prominent” blogs indexed by Google Blog Search?The RSS/ATOM subscription is nothing new really. It’s just a way for users to subscribe to any topic or story using any feed reader. For those who don’t use feed readers, Google Blog Search front page can now also be added to iGoogle page as a gadget. This can be customized according to topics.
In addition, the main Google Blog Search site is now featuring to ways to get the latest blog stories - via Hot Queries and Latest posts. Hot Queries list down the most popular searches done on Google Blog Search while Latest Posts displays the latest post from popular blogs. Clicking on the
These two features will appear only on the Google Blog Search main site and will disappear on individual blog search results pages.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 02, 2009 08:52 PM under Search Engine News
This week we feature the interview with Fraser Kelton, working at new and exciting social media project Glue, developed by AdaptiveBlue.

1. Please share your background. What brought you to the Web 2.0? Also please tell us a few words about your [other] projects you were doing before joining AdaptiveBlue.
I’m originally from Hamilton, a beautiful Canadian city, an hour southwest of Toronto. I’ve been fascinated with computers since my first Commodore 64 and I’ve been addicted to the web since my first taste. Before joining AdaptiveBlue I was at a seed stage investment firm.
2. You’ve been with AdaptiveBlue since September, 2007. Can you describe the company? What have you been responsible for there?
AdaptiveBlue was founded in 2006 by Alex Iskold with the goal of creating a better web browsing experience by using semantic and personalization technologies.
Basically, the web is fairly dumb - it doesn’t know what you’re looking at, or who you are - and because of this a lot of what we take for granted in the physical world is lost on the web. By utilizing semantics it’s possible for your computer to understand what you are looking at online. It’s possible to automate intelligent ‘next steps’ for the user by combining this understanding with some level of personalization.
Our product, Glue, works hard to make life easier for you on the web. When you’re looking at a movie on a popular site Glue automates a lot of the hard work - it shows you which friends like the movie (and what they thought), it allows you to add it to your queue without leaving the page, you can watch clips from the movie, read a summary of the movie, etc.
Glue works across hundreds of popular sites within a number of categories - things like books, movies, music, and other everyday things that we visit online.
3. How was the idea of Glue born? How is it different from all other Web 2.0 platforms?
There are three unique benefits to Glue.
First, the service is contextual. We share a lot of information on the web. But very little of it is presented to us in a useful place at a useful time. When’s the best time for me to know that you like a movie that I may go see in the theater? It’s not when I’m looking at my Facebook newsfeed at 10 am on Tuesday morning. That information is most valuable when I’m looking at the movie on Fandango, deciding if I should go see it or not. Glue introduces context to the information that we share about the books, movies and music that we like. It brings the information to us, where and when it makes sense.
Second, the information in Glue appears automatically. When I browse to the movie’s page on Fandango, Glue appears automatically with the useful information.
Third, Glue is a web-wide network on top of popular sites about books, movies, music, etc. The benefits of Glue are delivered as you browse these sites like we all typically do.
4. I understand the idea behind the project name (plenty of possibilities for word play with "sticking" concept). Do you foresee any problems with online reputation management though? There are plenty completely irrelevant sites found for [Glue] search in Google (compare to "Twitter" for example).
We were slightly concerned with this before we launched. In the short-term, the truth is that initial growth comes from word-of-mouth that’s generated by a great product. If you tell your friend that Glue rocks - and pass them a link via email, twitter or facebook - then we win.
Additionally, because Glue is a browser add-on it’s not mission critical for us to have the best domain name. GetGlue.com works for our need nearly as well as Glue.com would (and was significantly less dollars to purchase).
We had a great moment recently - when users search for Glue on Google we are now the top search result, even above the Wikipedia entry for glue.
We have run into a problem when trying to track the word in real time search. Searching Twitter for Glue produces a lot of noise that we have to dig through to find the relevant signal. It’s not insurmountable and we’ve found that if a message is important it finds us.
5. Launching a new project is exciting. How do you (plan to) promote it?
We’ve recently launched a number of exciting new things - Glue was made available for Internet Explorer, we launched our API, and we released new support for the broad category of Topics.
Because of the unique benefit that Glue delivers we get a decent amount of press from top sites. We’ve also been lucky to capture the attention of influential early adopters. This buzz and coverage continues to drive interest in the product.
We also run an incredibly fun game through a twitter account that is one week-long puzzle. Contestants have to piece together clues to complete the game. Everyone who completes the game is entered into a drawing for free books, movies, and music.
Finally, we’re really working hard to encourage and support word-of-mouth. We have a page set-up where users can easily share the site with their friends or request free stickers and t-shirts.
6. One most thing that amazed me most was Glue interaction with members. You got in contact with me immediately after I Twittered about my joining the site. One of your employees emailed me a day later asking for the feedback. Can you describe in detail this strategy of yours. How do you incorporate social media?
This is a key strategy for us. Our community is invaluable and we really wouldn’t be where we are today without the support, feedback and contribution from our growing community (we call them Glue-rs). We use different types of social media to engage with the individuals who use Glue and help ensure that they are getting the most from the product. It’s a funny thought that customer service can be a competitive advantage but we’re seeing that that really is the case!
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
Interview with Fraser Kelton of Glue, New Promising Social Network
by Ann Smarty at July 02, 2009 08:26 PM under Social Networking
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Windows only: Free application g2Peer shares files with friends by using your Gmail account as a virtual "IP address."
Once installed, you need to log into g2Peer with your Gmail account information. Then it's as easy as adding Gmail addresses of people you wish to share with and the folders and files you want them to see. Likewise, other users can install g2Peer if they wish to allow you access to their files as well.
If you can't install g2Peer on a computer but you still want access to your shared files, the application also features command line-esque tools that allow you to access files directly from your Gmail account—using email subject lines for the commands. For example, sending an email to your specified Gmail account with either ?_list or ?_download in the subject line have special meaning to g2Peer. Using ?_list will send you back an email listing all the files that are being shared with you. Using ?_download and adding the names of the files you wish to download to the body of the message will send you the files you wish to download via email, along with instructions on how to download/open them. It's a little geeky, but also fairly cool.
g2Peer is freeware for Windows only.
If you can access the mobile internet via your cell phone, then you now have access to newly optimized Google Mobile search. It reaches 38 different languages in over 60 countries.
The optimized Google mobile search experience began last December when it was rolled out to iPhone and Android phones in the US. Then in March, it was rolled out to iPhone and Android phones in over 20 countries.
The optimizes mobile search incorporates universal search when appropriate. There's also a focus on local search due to the nature of searching on the go.
by Nathania Johnson at July 02, 2009 05:03 PM under Google: Mobile
So there are fewer and fewer reasons for SMBs not to be testing their landing pages and sites to optimize conversion rates.
Testing landing pages has long been a preoccupation of mine, particularly because of the traditionally prohibitive costs.
Even if you use a design contest at a place like 99Designs.com, you’re still paying $300 - $500 for a good graphic look and feel. Plus you often need to pay about $100 for a competent graphics slicing shop to handle your job.
(Yes, others can do this for less, but you’re taking a few risks:
And that’s just the first landing page - you need alternatives so you can test! A simple A/B/C split test (eg with three variations) could thus run you $1,200 - $1,800 for graphics and code. (Assuming you start with completely different designs; if you just split test headlines or hero shots or calls to action, you’ll probably be able to do it for “just” $400.)
Oh, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. You still need to buy traffic to send to those pages to test! All of a sudden, you’re paying $300 for the graphics, $100 for the code, maybe another $50 for finagling stuff and creating simple variations, plus traffic! This test is starting to sound like it’ll cost $1000, just to do a decent job of it!
Well, not necessarily. Here are some ideas and commentary on recent SMB landing pages I’ve seen.
1) Affiliate Theme - This is a Wordpress theme that comes pre loaded with various layout and graphical options, such that you can mix and match to customize your design.
The idea is excellent. I was partly happy and partly disappointed when I saw this, because my friend Tyler Shears and I came up with roughly the same idea on our trip back from SMX West, and it was a potential business / revenue stream. Now I’d rather not be second to market, but I am glad that this is available, affordably.
A single Affiliate Theme license goes for $97, says my friend Dev Basu in his Affiliate Theme review (which I wish were a little more review and a little less description :P), while the top line one goes for $197.
The catch with Affiliate Theme, unfortunately, is that it’s Affiliate Theme.
Google hates affiliates (unless they’re Google Money affiliates or Eric Schmidt’s buddies…). Google is quicker to penalize affiliates in the organic results, and is more inclined to slap them in PPC.
Blackhats know that if their networks of sites show a footprint (a common pattern in the code), they’ll get banned more quickly.
If you want to use the same code as hundreds or thousands of other affiliates for serious projects… do yourself a favor and test things first. See how much of a leash Google gives you. I’m speaking theoretically, but this is a risk to be aware of.
2) You can use the following process.
As a member of the Jewish community, I’m usually critical of my community’s associations for not making more use of testing and advanced landing page ideas and knowledge. Yet I saw an ad on Facebook that lead me to this very impressive page. I’m guessing something similar could be done with the above process.
(Click to enlarge)
3) If you do have a few hundred bucks for the design and then a few hundred more bucks for the traffic, you can do really impressive stuff.
An ad I recently saw on my favourite salsa site (which has some nice social media elements, especially for an SMB site…) lead me to a landing page for my salsa school, San Tropez.
(Click to enlarge)
Even though San Tropez’s agency is a competitor in my city, I have to give props to Amauta Marketing for the sweet ass job they’ve done both with San Tropez’s SEO and PPC (assuming they didn’t only do the landing page). I actually signed up for the school back in January after finding them via Google a few times.
In short, making landing pages is getting a lot cheaper, with numerous options available. And for those with slightly larger budgets, you can do really impressive things. That’s one less excuse not to test!
Gab Goldenberg shares advanced seo tips on his seo blog.
[The opinions of SEJ Guest Bloggers are not necessarily those of Search Engine Journal or Search & Social.]
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
Good news for users of Google Chrome, Picasa, and other Google desktop apps on Windows systems: Google Update, previously a background new version checker that was mighty hard to kill off, runs as a scheduled task, either when your system is idle or every so many hours. Better still, if you no longer use Google apps at all, it uninstalls itself. [via Google Operating System]
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 02, 2009 02:34 PM under Google AdWords
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 02, 2009 02:23 PM under Google AdWords
Online office suite Zoho enters the project management realm with a few attention-getting features. One is import support for Microsoft Project files, and another is a consolidate, real-time view of what's going on with, and between, project members.
Tasks, milestones, documents, meeting coordinators, and report generation are all there, as one would hope for in any project management package. But being an online suite, Zoho's Projects 2.0 provides a "Project Stream" that shows a condensed view of all the latest project activity, group chat rooms and forums for back-and-forth discussions, wikis and live document collaboration, and a tabbed interface that seems pretty navigable for anyone.
All in all, it expands on Zoho's strengths and further separates the suite from its Google Docs competition. Here's Zoho Projects 2.0 in video action:

Zoho Projects requires a sign-up to use, and states that it's free for unlimited numbers of users.
by Kevin Purdy at July 02, 2009 02:00 PM under Zoho Projects
Bookmaplet does a really simple thing well. Power browser users (Ubiquity fans, for example) can quickly copy, paste, and map an address, but a simple bookmarklet allows you to highlight an address on a web page, hit the bookmark, and see the location in a Google Maps window that pops in without leaving the page you're on. Know a similar on-page mapper that works as well? Tell us in the comments. [via ResourceShelf]
The topic of your link neighbors is well discussed. It goes without saying that:
But is it actually a separate profile for such sites (that are both selective and lazy linkers) in Google’s algorithm.
There is an interesting discussion over at WebmasterWorld.com (also mentioned at Search Engine Roundtable) calling those conservative linkers “stingy linkers” and discussing how Google may be treating them.
“links from authors who are very stingy outlinkers are more informative.”
When the number should matters:
Does the number matter actually?
If John Doe links to 20 thin affiliate sites from a page and Jane Buck links to Wikipedia, Nytimes.com, and the Internet Public Library from her page, which sends a more positive message to the search engine: The numbers of links on John and Jane’s pages, or the “TrustRank” of the outbound links’ targets?
If the number still matters…
… Then it contradicts to the statements of the official representatives who encourage webmasters to out-link generously.
So what’s your opinion?
![]()
Do you think Google profiles “stingy” linkers?
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Ann Smarty at July 02, 2009 12:58 PM under Search Engine News
Google has disabled a Google News feature that allows personalities featured on the news items to comment on the news stories. When this was announced not so long ago, news media couldn’t quite get the idea behind it. Although it received media coverage for its ingenuity, personalities though didn’t quite like it, well at least based on the low usage of the said feature.
And so, Google probably realized that this is a futile effort at making their Google News service as interactive and social possible, it was then deactivated sometime in May. Unlike the coverage it got when it was launched, Google disabled the feature as quietly as possible.
Quoting official Google statement, Media Decoder reports:
“We’re always experimenting with ways to make Google News more useful, occasionally, this means we have to re-evaluate our efforts to be sure we focus on features that make the most sense for our users.”
What could have gone wrong with this feature? If Google wanted to elicit comments, it should have elicited comments from the users instead of the personalities featured in the news. If you were featured in a news items that runs on Google News, would you even bother commenting on the news item on the site itself?
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 02, 2009 12:51 PM under Search Engine News
Microsoft has added Twitter messages to some search results in a desperate attempt to snatch some market share from Google following the launch of Bing last month.…

Drag and drop has come to Gmail: you can now drag a message by its left-hand grid, and move it into a label/ folder to the left side. Also, you can now re-arrange labels via drag & drop.
[Thanks Cookie Lee and Niranjan!]
[By Philipp Lenssen | Origin: Gmail With Drag & Drop | Comments]
Google has rejigged the labelling toolkit in Gmail to make it more accessible and interactive for users.…
A software company has sued Google not only for trade mark infringement in Google's AdWords advertising system but for making its website invisible to the Google search engine.…
iPhone owners have begun filling forums with grumbles that Apple’s latest firmware causes Google Maps to become more than a little inaccurate.…
On Tuesday, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Real were named in a lawsuit filed by some music publishing companies claiming that each of their online music stores - Zune, Yahoo Music, and Rhapsody - infringe upon their copyrights. If you’re shaking your head and wondering how that is possible, with all the royalties they pay out, you’re not alone.
This copyright business is a real mess. As consumers we know not to illegally download music or share it online, or we could potentially face crazy fines from the RIAA, such as the $1.92 million one recently handed down to Minnesota mom who downloaded 24 songs. For websites and companies looking to distribute or allow the playing of music on their sites, it’s far more complicated than that and the stakes are incredibly higher. In fact the copyright laws as related to music are so complicated that even places we consider to be legitimate sources are being slapped with lawsuits alledging infringements.
In the case of this latest lawsuit, the publishers claim that all three companies may have licensed the copyrights on the recordings, but didn’t license the copyright on the compositions. There are a whole lot of details out yet explaining the legalities and issues at hand in the case, but it is assumed these music services struck deals with record labels, but somehow the publishers and labels are separate entities and the rights are separate.
In many cases we assume that the publishing rights were also covered by the major record labels. But in some cases the publishing rights were owned by independent companies, and the claim looks to be that the publishing rights were never cleared with them.
What this means is that Microsoft, Yahoo and Real were all streaming music that they only had partial rights too. And since the publishers consider each instance a song is played to be an infringement… yikes! They could be looking at some pretty hefty fines if the court agrees.
If you’re interested in reading the entire court filing, which I will warn you is a massive 104 pages long, here you go. Have at it. In the meantime, we’ll definitely be following this closely. Any ruling in favor of the music publishers could potentially have major ramifications for all three companies. I imagine that Google right now is pretty darn happy that they’ve stayed out the music game, and that their search engine competitors are being tested.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
Microsoft, Real, & Yahoo All Sued for Music Store Copyright Infringement
by Julie Kent at July 02, 2009 02:19 AM under Search Engine News
As real-time search and Twitter’s growing importance in producing valuable information is getting into the mainstream, Bing is joining the likes of Facebook, Google and Twitter in bringing real-time search feature in their respective search algorithms. Starting today, Bing will be integrating more real-time data into its search results, beginning first with tweets of famous people - bloggers or celebrities.
While this may be a welcome development, this new feature is somewhat limiting though. To get the tweets of this “prominent” people, you will have to construct your search terms like - “Name Twitter” or “Name Tweets” or “@Name”, where name is the Twitter account of the person. The thing is how many famous people use their full name as their Twitter username? Or how many users do their search on web search engine just to get these people’s latest Tweets?
It would have been great if Bing (or the other search engines for that matter) will start indexing the Twitter stream and display Tweets along with the other web data that they crawl and display as search results. That’s more like a “real-time” search, right?
Anyway, this could be a good start though. As the Bing community blog explained via a post:
We’re not indexing all of Twitter at this time… just a small set of prominent and prolific Twitterers to start. We picked a few thousand people to start, based primarily on their follower count and volume of tweets. We think this is an interesting first step toward using Twitter’s public API to surface Tweets in people search. We’d love to hear your feedback as we think through future possibilities in real time search.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 02, 2009 12:26 AM under Search Engine News
Today, right before my eyes, literally, the Google logo size changed and they added more space for search results on the sides. Phillip reported on this a day or two ago, but it seemed like the change was only for him. I tested in IE, logged in, logged out, Opera, Safari, any browser I could, but I was seeing the same thing, until today.
Logged out, under Firefox, I saw the change happen. Let’s look at it below.
First, the logo size change:

Next, more padding was added to the sides of the search results. This is definitely a change I agree with, much more pleasing to the eye.

A few changes that I think are going to be really good for Google and its users.
Blogged on Google News by Jonathan Dingman © Fireside Media
© jonathandingman for Google News, Inside., 2009. |
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by Jonathan Dingman at July 02, 2009 12:00 AM under Google Search
You've read about the features, you saw the invites going out, but you might be wondering what, exactly, Google Voice could do for you. Here's our guide for the curious and uninvited on whether your phones need some Google juice.
We're not going to explain every feature, quirk, and option in the Google Voice service, which is slowly giving out invites to those who request them. We've already taken a first look at Google Voice, and Google Voice's own Getting Started guide does a nice job explaining the service's ins and outs. We're looking to answer the question we seem to hear most often from commenters, friends, tech pundits, and just about everyone: What would I get out of it?
If the rumors prove true, Google will, at some point this year, allow you to "port," or at least integrate, your existing cell phone number with its service, requiring none of the millions of phone numbers the search giant is supposedly securing. That would eliminate three of the service's biggest barriers to entry:
Regularly use two or more phones: If you've heard about one feature of Google Voice, or its GrandCentral predecessor, this is it—and for good reason. Google excels at giving you one phone number for others to have, then letting you fine-tune which phones that number rings to an OCD level. If you want your wife to ring through to your work line between 9am and 5pm, but not your chatty, unemployed friend, you can do that. If you want your home landline to ring along with your cell during the hours your carrier charges for minutes, you can do that, too.
Loathe standard voicemail: "Please enter your passcode, followed by the pound sign!" "You have ... two ... new messages. To hear your"—You know what we're talking about. Using cell minutes and precious time just to hear your friend say "Try you again later" is almost as annoying as trying to wipe the voicemail icon off your phone screen. Google Voice makes it easy to play voicemail audio and read semi-correct transcriptions from a single web page, and it's a good bet it'll be integrated into Gmail for even easier access. When you're away from your browser, Google Voice sends voicemail notifications through email or text message, making it easy to know that you really don't need to step outside and call your sister back just to confirm you prefer Diet Dr. Pepper to Diet Coke.
Enjoy text messaging, but not phone keyboards (and fees): For anyone whose friends chide them about short or nonexistent text message replies, this is a game-changing feature. When sent to your Google Voice number, text messages are organized on the Google Voice site like chat conversations, with back-and-forth dialogue and options to reply or mark as read and archive. Writing a new message is also easy—hit "M" or click the SMS button, start typing a name or phone number, then choose the contact and type away. You'll still be charged for texts you receive on your phone, but it can be a real money saver when you're near your plan's limit for the month. Those with iPhones, Android handsets, or other smartphones can also make use of Google Voice messaging on the go with apps like the previously mentioned GV (Android) and GV Mobile (iPhone).
Want better filters on who reaches you, and when: Google Voice has four levels of annoyance resistance available to weary phone hostages. You can activate "Call Presentation" to have every unknown caller say their name to Google's servers, which then call you and ask if you want to take the call. If the annoyance is someone you know, you move them into a particular group (like "Annoyances") and make that group always go to voicemail. If they sometimes call about something important, Google Voice's ListenIn features lets you send them to voicemail, but hear what they're saying and pick up, if necessary. If you absolutely can't get a telemarketer or semi-stalker to take the hint, the video at left explains how you can simply have them hear something that sounds like an old-school disconnect notice.
Are down with Skype-like VOIP calling: Want to make calls over a computer-connected headset and not pay a dime for them? Google Voice allows you to add a phone number from the Gizmo Project and control when it rings through. Make a call through Google Voice's web interface, set it to ring your Gizmo number when it's connected, and the other party just sees your standard Google Voice number—you're effectively making an outbound call for free that Skype and the like would charge you for.
Make a lot of international calls: We haven't done a price comparison, but Google Voice's rates to international landlines and mobile numbers are said to be competitive, and you can call from your own phones without having to hunt down the right calling card.
Record calls regularly (and legally): Just hit the number 4 during a call and Google's robotic queen announces "Call recording on." Right now, it only works with incoming calls, but the finished recording is ready for playing, downloading, or embedding in your Google Voice inbox in a matter of minutes. It's how I recorded my Jonathan Coulton phone interview for later transcribing and audio clip pulling.
Have or want an Android phone: iPhones, BlackBerries, Symbian-based models, and Windows Mobile devices will likely get Google-built apps for integrating Google Voice into their dialing, voicemail, and SMS interfaces. But Android phones already have an impressive third-party app for doing so, Evan Charlton's GV, and would be a pretty good bet on being the first, or at least among the first, platforms to get the Google Voice team's attention. Fully integrated Google Voice means free, conversation-threaded SMS, fewer hassles with your one-and-a-half phone numbers, voicemails that don't require talk time, and much more.
Rarely use your cellphone and/or text messages: Unless you're that rare breed of VOIP headset lover who doesn't ever talk on a cellphone, there's not a lot to recommend Google Voice to landline-focused folks. Your office's phone system offers (hopefully) most of Voice's features, and residential internet phone providers can fill in the other gaps. It could be a help to those who absolutely won't type out a text on a phone—but, then again, so can email.
Think Google knows too much about you: There's something to be said for breaking Google's personal data monopoly, and the tinfoil hat crowd have a whole new set of worries with Google Voice—your voicemails, calling history, and text messages are, after all, right on Google's servers, for who knows how long. It's not all that different from Gmail—Google breaking one user's trust could collapse the whole system—but it is something to think about.
Dislike Google's Contacts handling: Google Voice uses the same contacts database, so if its auto-inclusion of names you've emailed a few times drives you batty, well, you'll get the same results from Voice's Click2Call auto-completion. Only the names you've stored phone numbers for show up on Voice's dial feature, but we'd like to see a way to set a "primary" number that's the default when you're typing out a name.
Get annoyed at voice delays: Early Google Voice users (myself included) are noticing an audio delay on certain calls. Sometimes it's ever so slight, like a wonky cell phone connection. Sometimes you and the other party are toppling over the ends of each other's sentences. Google is certainly aware of it, but since it's a service that inserts a server as the middleman between parties, there might be an inevitable bit of latency on Google Voice calls, as there is with most international calls. If you've ever switched carriers because of voice quality or connection problems, you might find a new antagonist in Google Voice.Google's Toolbar gets on-the-fly translation powers, Usenet file traders get a bit of warning, and a whole morning gets compressed into five crazy minutes.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
StatCounter made news fast and furious in Bing's first week when they offered up data showing Bing had surpassed Yahoo! in search. And now they're making a splash again by quickly releasing data for the whole month of June.
Overall, things are relatively steady, but there's an ever-so-slight increase in Microsoft search share.

The data shows Bing gaining .5% search share in June compared to May. But Live Search had gained about .5% in May over April.
One percent growth over the last two months may not seem significant, but it could be the beginning of momentum.
"At first sight, a 1% increase in market share does not appear to be a huge return on the investment Microsoft has made in Bing but the underlying trend appears positive," commented Aodhan Cullen, CEO, StatCounter. "Steady if not spectacular might be the best way to describe performance to date."
Plus, the 1% growth has come at the expense of Google. The search mammoth saw its search engine share according to StatCounter decline by 79.07% in April to 78.48% in June.
By the way, despite that first week of traffic for Bing, Yahoo! still retained its second place status for the entire month of June. Yahoo!'s traffic has remained fairly steady over the past three months in StatCounter data.
You already know that if you want to lock down your Wi-Fi network, you should opt for WPA encryption because WEP is easy to crack. But did you know how easy? Take a look.
Today we're going to run down, step-by-step, how to crack a Wi-Fi network with WEP security turned on. But first, a word: Knowledge is power, but power doesn't mean you should be a jerk, or do anything illegal. Knowing how to pick a lock doesn't make you a thief. Consider this post educational, or a proof-of-concept intellectual exercise.
Dozens of tutorials on how to crack WEP are already all over the internet using this method. Seriously—Google it. This ain't what you'd call "news." But what is surprising is that someone like me, with minimal networking experience, can get this done with free software and a cheap Wi-Fi adapter. Here's how it goes.
Unless you're a computer security and networking ninja, chances are you don't have all the tools on hand to get this job done. Here's what you'll need:
To crack WEP, you'll need to launch Konsole, BackTrack's built-in command line. It's right there on the taskbar in the lower left corner, second button to the right. Now, the commands.
First run the following to get a list of your network interfaces:
airmon-ng
The only one I've got there is labeled ra0. Yours may be different; take note of the label and write it down. From here on in, substitute it in everywhere a command includes (interface).
Now, run the following four commands. See the output that I got for them in the screenshot below.
airmon-ng stop (interface)
ifconfig (interface) down
macchanger --mac 00:11:22:33:44:55 (interface)
airmon-ng start (interface)
If you don't get the same results from these commands as pictured here, most likely your network adapter won't work with this particular crack. If you do, you've successfully "faked" a new MAC address on your network interface, 00:11:22:33:44:55.
Now it's time to pick your network. Run:
airodump-ng (interface)
To see a list of wireless networks around you. When you see the one you want, hit Ctrl+C to stop the list. Highlight the row pertaining to the network of interest, and take note of two things: its BSSID and its channel (in the column labeled CH), as pictured below. Obviously the network you want to crack should have WEP encryption (in the ENC) column, not WPA or anything else.
Like I said, hit Ctrl+C to stop this listing. (I had to do this once or twice to find the network I was looking for.) Once you've got it, highlight the BSSID and copy it to your clipboard for reuse in the upcoming commands.
Now we're going to watch what's going on with that network you chose and capture that information to a file. Run:
airodump-ng -c (channel) -w (file name) --bssid (bssid) (interface)
Where (channel) is your network's channel, and (bssid) is the BSSID you just copied to clipboard. You can use the Shift+Insert key combination to paste it into the command. Enter anything descriptive for (file name). I chose "yoyo," which is the network's name I'm cracking.

You'll get output like what's in the window in the background pictured below. Leave that one be. Open a new Konsole window in the foreground, and enter this command:
aireplay-ng -1 0 -a (bssid) -h 00:11:22:33:44:55 -e (essid) (interface)
Here the ESSID is the access point's SSID name, which in my case is yoyo. What you want to get after this command is the reassuring "Association successful" message with that smiley face.

You're almost there. Now it's time for:
aireplay-ng -3 -b (bssid) -h 00:11:22:33:44:55 (interface)
Here we're creating router traffic to capture more throughput faster to speed up our crack. After a few minutes, that front window will start going crazy with read/write packets. (Also, I was unable to surf the web with the yoyo network on a separate computer while this was going on.) Here's the part where you might have to grab yourself a cup of coffee or take a walk. Basically you want to wait until enough data has been collected to run your crack. Watch the number in the "#Data" column—you want it to go above 10,000. (Pictured below it's only at 854.)
Depending on the power of your network (mine is inexplicably low at -32 in that screenshot, even though the yoyo AP was in the same room as my adapter), this process could take some time. Wait until that #Data goes over 10k, though—because the crack won't work if it doesn't. In fact, you may need more than 10k, though that seems to be a working threshold for many.

Once you've collected enough data, it's the moment of truth. Launch a third Konsole window and run the following to crack that data you've collected:
aircrack-ng -b (bssid) (file name-01.cap)
Here the filename should be whatever you entered above for (file name). You can browse to your Home directory to see it; it's the one with .cap as the extension.
If you didn't get enough data, aircrack will fail and tell you to try again with more. If it succeeds, it will look like this:
The WEP key appears next to "KEY FOUND." Drop the colons and enter it to log onto the network.
With this article I set out to prove that cracking WEP is a relatively "easy" process for someone determined and willing to get the hardware and software going. I still think that's true, but unlike the guy in the video below, I had several difficulties along the way. In fact, you'll notice that the last screenshot up there doesn't look like the others—it's because it's not mine. Even though the AP which I was cracking was my own and in the same room as my Alfa, the power reading on the signal was always around -30, and so the data collection was very slow, and BackTrack would consistently crash before it was complete. After about half a dozen attempts (and trying BackTrack on both my Mac and PC, as a live CD and a virtual machine), I still haven't captured enough data for aircrack to decrypt the key.
So while this process is easy in theory, your mileage may vary depending on your hardware, proximity to the AP point, and the way the planets are aligned. Oh yeah, and if you're on deadline—Murphy's Law almost guarantees it won't work if you're on deadline.
To see the video version of these exact instructions, check out this dude's YouTube video.

Got any experience with the WEP cracking courtesy of BackTrack? What do you have to say about it? Give it up in the comments.
Gina Trapani, Lifehacker's founding editor, is tired of typing commands that start with "air." Her weekly feature, Smarterware, appears every Wednesday on Lifehacker. Subscribe to the Smarterware tag feed to get new installments in your newsreader.
Google's data-crunching ways found that the majority of Gmail users aren't actually using the webmail service's labels. Starting today, those label names get higher placement, and drag-and-drop labeling aims to make Gmail's labels more like familiar email folders.
By placing users' own labels higher up on the left-hand sidebar, right below the main Inbox/Starred/Sent/Drafts/All Mail destinations, Gmail admits that keeping them in their own box, stuck underneath the chat widget, implied they weren't that important before. Fixes like those contained in Gina's Better Gmail 2 Firefox extension and the "Go to label" keyboard shortcut in Gmail's Labs section helped, but now labels are easier to reach, and kept more at the front of your email-clearing mind.
The three labels you use most are automatically shown below your main links, with the rest accessible from an "X more" drop-down. You can add more labels to your shown list, however, by clicking the downward-facing arrow next to a label and choosing "Show label."
Those higher-up labels are also a boon to frequent mouse users, as you can now click and drag single email messages, or multiple selected messages, onto a label to "move" it into that label (kind of like a folder, no?), or drag the label onto the messages to, uh, label them.
All these features and functionality will be "rolling out gradually" to Gmail users.
Google has updated their Toolbar for the Internet Explorer browser to make language translation easier. Instead of manually copying and pasting text into Google Translate, the Toolbar now automatically detects if a language is different from the one set as your default.
Google will then serve up a message saying it has detected a language foreign to your own and asking if you would like it translated. Simply click the "Tranlate" button in order to receive the translation.
The new feature is available for all languages of the Toolbar (but again, just for Internet Explorer). The languages include: English, and the translation service supports 41 different languages: Albanian, Arabic, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Galician, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian and Vietnamese.
by Nathania Johnson at July 01, 2009 03:54 PM under Google: Toolbar
The overwhelming winner in my 30 day poll was “Bike to work” so that’s what I’m doing during the month of July. In the third week of July I’ll be out in Boston to speak at SIGIR, but any time I’m heading into the Googleplex during July, I’m planning to bike there.
Is there something good for yourself that you’ve been meaning to do? Why not try it for 30 days this month? The month will end whether you try something new or not, so why not tackle something new?
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 01, 2009 01:37 PM under Google Search Engine
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 01, 2009 01:26 PM under Google Optimization
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 01, 2009 01:20 PM under Google AdSense
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at July 01, 2009 01:10 PM under SEO Forum News
Google Apps Sync, an Outlook plug-in that connects Google Apps accounts released earlier this month, has updated with a version that doesn't block Windows Desktop Search from indexing Outlook data, along with offering more control over auto-archiving and making it "more clear where data in other Outlook accounts is located." Existing Apps Sync installations should get an automatic update notice, while the IT curious can grab the fixed version now. [Google Enterprise Blog]
SEOquake addon developers continue to impress us with always new awesome tools. This time they are launching a new one called SEOpivot.
This tool finds your site most promising keywords by looking at your site current Google rankings and identifying most powerful words that your site already ranks high enough. In a way, the tool works the way I described in a previous article on doing keyword research for an established site.
Our report will show you all keywords, for which any URL of your domain ranks high enough to get into TOP100 Google Search results, as well as how much traffic you’ll get if you improve the position of the URL we found on interesting keyword.
Each report looks exactly like this:

where:
The index is limited but it is large enough to give you very useful data:
We studied TOP100 Google Search results for 500 thousands of most high-frequent keywords and received information on more than 3 400 000 domains.
The tool was reviewed under SEJ policy.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Ann Smarty at July 01, 2009 12:03 PM under Search Engine Tools and Downloads
When the news about Michael Jackson’s death broke out, it was TMZ who scooped it beating other news outlets and was quoted as a source throughout Twitter, Facebook, traditional media and various online properties.
As a result, Hitwise numbers are showing that TMZ’s site traffic on that day was able to achieve a 3 year all-time high. The news created a spike and brought a 5x increase in volume as compared to the previous day’s site traffic.The incident even surpassed the 18% market share of TMZ site visits when it featured photos of controversial singer Rihanna badly beaten and bruised. Overall, TMZ became the 60th most visited site on the day of Michael Jackson’s death. A day before that event, TMZ’s site visit was ranked 305th in terms of market share.
But perhaps the best result that came out from this incident was the fact that it gave TMZ around 61% new unique visitors.
From an SEO perspective, the blog post that broke the news has over 12,000 incoming links. I wonder how TMZ will be taking advantage of that link equity?
Right after other “established” news sources beat TMZ in page visits. Yahoo! News, CNN, MSNBC, and Google all received some good spike in terms of site visits from fans and onlookers wanting to find the latest development in the cause of death of MJ. Both MSNBC and CNN got the highest page visits on Thursday, registering 67% and 64% increase respectively.
And that goes to show our dear readers the importance of being the first to report any controversial item on the Internet - be it in the form of news or blog posts.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 01, 2009 12:02 PM under Search Engine News
Expect more of these kinds of post in the next couple of days as search analysts will be on the lookout for statistics on Bing’s first month of operation. The latest of these data is coming from StatCounter which is reporting that Microsoft’s search market share went up to 8.5% one month after Bing’s launch.
Although Bing’s market share is still miles away from Google’s , Microsoft would be glad to know that part of the increase from previous month’s 7.81% to this month’s 8.5% seemed to have been taken from Google’s market share.
Google’s market share drop a few notch from 78.72% to 78.48. While Yahoo’s market share increased from 10.99% to 11.04%.
Interestingly, during its first month of operation, Bing’s market share was not steadily increasing. It had its peak during the first week after launch before dropping during the middle two weeks of June and then finally rising again during the last week.
While this may seem good news for Microsoft, it’s still too early to tell whether Bing could sustain its momentum and continue to get some more market share. Let’s wait until other Internet analytics reports come out in the coming days and compare this report to see whether Bing is really registering positive numbers.
In the meantime, let us allow Microsoft and the whole Bing team to rejoice for the fruits of their hard labor.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 01, 2009 11:45 AM under Search Engine News
by Garett Rogers at July 01, 2009 02:05 AM under Uncategorized
With Google Chrome threatening its dominance in the browser arena, Firefox certainly has got many things to consider to prevent Google’s browser from inching in closer in terms of popularity and user base. At the rate things, it seems like the Firefox folks have done their job as they are releasing Firefox 3.5.
But you’ve probably downloaded Firefox 3.5 and have used it since its first RC… So, while we await for the next stable release of Firefox 3.5, like the Firefox team, we might as well ponder on what could be in store for Firefox 3.6. aka Firefox.net, codenamed Namoroka.
Mashable’s Josh Catone enumerated some of the top priority changes that we might see in Firefox 3.6 which is scheduled for release sometime in 2010.
The Firefox Team must no rest on their laurels. There are certainly many work that needs to be done. The browser war is getting hotter now as rival browsers are gearing up to outsmart each other in features, performance and speed.
Hopefully Firefox 3.6 will answer these issue and put a mark on Firefox dominance in the browser market.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Arnold Zafra at July 01, 2009 01:51 AM under Other Internet Stuff
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Structure 09 Google is developing some sort of back-end technology that automatically - and nearly instantly - redistributes live compute loads when a data center is in danger of overheating. Or maybe this is just talk. Google prefers to at least maintain the illusion of data-center nirvana.…
Chris Crum at WebProNews.com has pieced together some very interesting pieces of information regarding Facebook, a former Googler and a new payment system.
Facebook in May announced that it was testing a new payments system that would deal in real money, rather than virtual currencies that it had been using for any number of applications. This might work fine for Mafia Wars and other light games that Facebook has increasingly added, but if you were to want to move into, say, storefronts or product comparisons, you'd clearly want to be able to deal in real currency.
Enter announcement two: Facebook has hired an ex-Google Checkout director to develop these payment systems. Given Facebook's immense and growing popularity, its standing as place for sharing opinions and favorites, its open platform and an army of marketers desperate to monetize work on Facebook, it could wind up being an absolute perfect storm.
Imagine classified ads or, bigger yet, entire storefronts integrated directly into a social networking site a la A Small World - except instead of a half million very exclusive members considering five and six-digit purchases in between their social networking activities, it's 200 million+ people worldwide who could have their friends' opinions of a product just a click away from being able to purchase it.
Chris has screenshots and more details - worth checking out.
What do you think? Would you purchase or shop on Facebook? Would your customers?
by Herndon Hasty at June 30, 2009 10:03 PM under Social Media
The New York Times' Gadgetwise blog asked its readers to call a Google Voice number and leave voicemails to test and stretch the service's transcription prowess. They responded with glee, reading parts of the Declaration of Independence (translation: "We hope you straight to be self evident ..."), Monty Python skits ("this carriages no more in tennessee seems to be hey it's expired"), and more. We gave Google Voice transcriptions a "not bad," and it holds. It's fast and search-able, but don't rely on it—just yet, at least—for legal briefings or turn-by-turn instructions. [Gadgetwise]
You only have a couple of weeks left to submit an entry to this year's Search Engine Watch Awards. The deadline is July 17, 2009.
The objective of the SEW Awards is to recognize excellence, as well as inspire innovation and encourage new ideas in search marketing. The SEW Awards will honor 14 outstanding search marketers, search engines and technology providers, as judged by a panel of industry experts and the Search Engine Watch editorial staff.
The categories are:
* Search Engine with Most Relevant Results
* Most Innovative New Search Engine
* Best Search Engine Ad Platform
* Technology Platform Search Marketers Can't Live Without
* Best SEM Technology Platform for SMBs
* Best Social Media Platform for Marketers
* Best Web Analytics Platform
* Most Innovative Use of Search Engine Optimization
* Most Innovative Paid Search Campaign
* Best Social Media Marketing Campaign
* Best Business-to-Business Search Marketing Campaign
* Best Use of Local Search
* Best Integration of Search with Other Media
* Most Effective Use of Web Analytics
And who are the judges? They are:
* Chris Boggs, Director, SEO, Rosetta
* Jessica Bowman, SEO Strategist and in-house SEO Expert, SEMinhouse.com
* Eric Enge, President, Stone Temple Consulting
* PJ Fusco, Natural Search Director, Netconcepts
* Bill Hunt, President, Back Azimuth Consulting
* Mark Jackson, SEW Expert & President/CEO, VIZION Interactive
* Ron Jones, President/CEO, Symetri Internet Marketing
* Cindy Krum, Chief Executive Officer, Rank-Mobile, LLC
* Sage Lewis, President, SageRock.com
* Melissa Mackey, Online Marketing Manager, Fluency Media
* John Marshall, SES Advisory Board & CTO, Market Motive
* Lee Odden, SES Advisory Board & CEO, TopRank Online Marketing
* David Szetela, CEO, Clix Marketing
* Brian Ussery, Director of SEO, Search Discovery
* Matt Van Wagner, President, Find Me Faster
By the way, in case you think I'm sucking up to the judges by listing their names, my firm can't enter because SES is one of our clients. This wasn't in the rules a year ago, but now that it has, I am free to comment on the process and the outcome.
Entrants may submit nominations for multiple categories, but each submission must focus on the four key areas of consideration:
1. Overall approach and category relevance
2. Innovation in methodology and execution
3. Excellence in tactical execution
4. Achieving success goals
Submissions will be accepted through July 17, 2009. There is an application fee of $145 per entry. Up to four award finalists will be determined for each category. Finalists will be notified by July 27, 2009, and will receive 1-day passes (limit 3) to the SES San Jose sessions and Orion panels on the day the winner in their category is announced. Winners will be announced during Search Engine Strategies San Jose, August 10-14, 2009.
Submitting companies will be recognized at the event, as well as in the SES Magazine and on Search Engine Watch. I also plan to interview as many winners as possible for SESConferenceExpo's Channel on YouTube.
Oh, there is one other thing you should know about the Search Engine Watch Awards. The winner of the 2000 SEW Award in the "Outstanding Search Service" category was a little known start-up named Google. And Google was also the winner in the "Most Webmaster Friendly" category, as well.
Not bad for a company that had just announced a $25 million round from Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins a year earlier. Where are they now, I wonder?
by Greg Jarboe at June 30, 2009 04:16 PM under SEM Industry: Trade Shows
Sharing stories on social voting and bookmarking sites both grows your social media profile power and enables you to reach your audience. Surprisingly enough, being one of the most important element of the story success, proper tagging is very often overlooked.
Let me first make it clear why you should do at least some research on relevant tagging before sharing the story:
StumbleUpon has one of the most intricate network of tags and categories - so let me share how to use correct ones: make sure to use tags popular within the community (using relevant keywords isn’t enough).
1. Identify a few main keywords associated with the story;
2. Run Google search for [site:stumbleupon.com keyword];
3. Find SU submissions of the stories on similar topic:

4. Open a couple of them and check if they were popular (StumbleUpon stars are good indicators of popularity):

5. See what tags it was shared in:

You are done! Use these (add yours too!) tags when submitting the story.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
StumbleUpon Tip: Use Google to Choose the Best Category and Tags
by Ann Smarty at June 30, 2009 02:58 PM under Social Networking
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at June 30, 2009 01:40 PM under Google AdSense
by barry@rustybrick.com (Barry Schwartz) at June 30, 2009 01:23 PM under Google AdSense
Toodledo, a web-based task manager that's friendly to Getting Things Done adherents or anyone looking for a serious but customizable reminder setup, adds a Gmail gadget to its arsenal of tools that let you track your to-dos anywhere you're looking.
We've been impressed in the past by Toodledo's exportability and convenience, along with a clever paper booklet option. Toodledo was already available on iGoogle start pages and Google Calendar, so a Gmail gadget closes the loop for Google app fans.
The gadget can't, unfortunately, directly create new tasks out of the emails you're running through—that remains a unique feature of Google's own Gmail Labs task manager. But if you're used to Toodledo's creation system, or Google's tasks tool is a bit too simplistic for your needs, this new gadget should fit right into your work flow. Free to use, requires a free Toodledo account to use in the sidebar. Hit the link below for installation instructions.
Your reputation, online or offline is vital extremely important. Recently, a friend of mine owned a travel business. After hiring an employee with a light criminal background and having thousands of dollars embezzled from him, he started to pursue legal action against this individual. This person decided to get revenge by badmouthing the owner and business through Rip Off Report and other online platforms. Now, anytime you Google his name or business some very offensive things are displayed as a #1 result. Consequently, his business has suffered tremendously.
This situation is the perfect example of the need for reputation management. One of the most powerful (and easiest) methods to begin to control your reputation in the search engine result pages (SERPs) is to create social profiles on major social media websites. Since domains like Twitter or MySpace have such high authority it takes a lot less effort to rank, than creating your own site, by creating a profile that will outrank and push down undesired search results. Also, these search results gives you the added benefit of having control over your brand and being accessible and available on multiple platforms strengthens your overall branding efforts.
Once you understand that you should be monitoring and repairing your reputation, you will need to figure out how to do it. As a rule of thumb the Big 4 social media sites are a great place to start. Generally your goal would be to obtain user profiles that are an exact match as the keyword you are trying to manage. In most cases this is a branded term such as your company name. Additioanly branded usernames are generally available on social media websites. Many sites, particularly niche sites, can be useful to your company and your specific ORM situation. But the 4 you must have are:
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• MySpace
If you want to check across 120 different social sites to see which keywords or names are taken you can do so very easily with KnowEm.com. Just type the desired username and click “Check Username”. Additionally, they offer a service that will register you on all those different social media sites as well for .50 cents per social media site.
Once you have your accounts setup, you will need to do a few things before your campaign can be effective.
1. Create a complete profile
Simply obtaining the name twitter.com/companyname, isn’t enough. You need a complete and full profile to have a legitimate working account, this includes bios, avatars etc. As much information that you can fill in and feed to search engine spiders, the better.
2. Engage and Interact
Participating in the community strengthens your profile and gives your account credibility. An account that has your name but nothing else looks like a spam account.
Also, you gain the added benefit of internal links from these social sites. If you just create a profile and let it sit then it doesn’t gain internal link equity it needs, for high SERP rankings, from other profile pages, group pages, etc.
Interacting (e.g. returning messages, commenting, voting) is vital to the strength of your profile. For an example, check out the hat tip to Steve Espinosa for showing how to get DoFollowed links on YouTube here.
3. Monitor
When a company engages in social media they are opening themselves up for a lot of commentary regarding their brand. Be prepared to monitor the sentiment to measure if it’s positive or negative. Have a contingency plan for when you come across negative sentiment. I’ll spare the lesson on monitoring and handling sentiment and direct you to The Online Reputation Management Guide by Outspoken Media. Another good resource on ORM is The M&Ms of Online Reputation Management by @DaveSnyder.
Remember that social media profiles are only one small part of online reputation management but a critical step indeed. Even if you don’t have any negative sentiment in the SERPs, pre-empt now by registering and building out your profiles today to prevent it from happening in the future.
Jordan Kasteler (aka. Utah SEO Pro) is a co-founder of Search & Social, the parent company of Search Engine Journal. Search & Social integrates social media marketing into the Online Reputation Management, SEO, link building & search marketing mix.
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
by Jordan Kasteler at June 30, 2009 12:50 PM under Search Engine News
We have way too many resources to track today: thousands of blogs, social media networks, forums - somewhere someone may be talking about you and you may be unaware.
Here’s a cool solution to keep an eye on everything: create your own united, customized RSS feed and add it to your preferred feed reader.
Feed Killer is one of the tools for that too consider. It is very basic, yet offers all necessary features and, what is also great, requires no registration. Two features you are going to love:
Now, let’s say I want to track my name in Twitter and throughout the blogosphere; what I need to do is:

Feedstitch is another similar tool with some added options (It supports RSS, Twitter, Twitter search, Delicious, Tumblr, GitHub and Flickr data feeds.):

More tracking tips:
Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
How to Track Your Reputation or a Keyword in Multiple Resources via One Unifed Feed
by Ann Smarty at June 30, 2009 12:11 PM under Search Engine Tools and Downloads
Windows: Free Office 2003 & 2007 plug-in OffiSync lets desktop users open documents from, and save to, Google Docs' online servers, but that's nothing amazingly new. A newer Google Search option does, however, integrate powerful image and web searches.
That means that, rather than relying on Microsoft's Clip Art repository, or switching away from Office to search for a usable picture, you can hit the Google Search button on your Office toolbar. Hit that button, click the drop-down box to choose the license you want or need, set parameters for sizes and faces, and then find, click, and quickly insert that picture into your document or presentation. That feature, and OffiSync's basic functionality, are pretty well explained in the video introduction below.

OffiSync is a free download for Windows systems with Microsoft Office 2003 or 2007 installed. What's your favorite Office/web syncing solution? Tell us in the comments.
Thanks to Thomas Bindl at Refined Labs for pointing out the launch of a new Adwords API - v2009. Seems they have created an entirely new API that offers some interesting new services.
* We've created new web services for managing campaign targeting options and campaign-level criteria.
* All web services share a consistent, data-centric interface with two operations: get and mutate.
* A secure authentication token replaces the login credentials required in v13 request headers.
The information about the new Google Adwords API can be found here.
by Frank Watson at June 30, 2009 10:12 AM under Google: APIs
Are you in need of some video inspiration? Need some fresh air? Let’s have a look at a few video search engines that can help you refresh ideas for your upcoming creation (note: I didn’t mention here most popular engines, like Youtube and Google as I am sure you are well aware of those):
| Video Search Engine | Video Sources | Search Goodies |
| Truveo | Fox news, Howcast, blip.tv,etc | Boolean operators support |
| VideoSurf | Youtube, Metacafe, Revver, Dailymotion, 5min, Vimeo, blip.tv, Spike, Hulu, Crackle, MSN video, etc | Refine search based on the “face” search; exclude/include any video channel, category or content type |
| TagBulb | Youtube, Blip.tv, DailyMotion, Metacafe, Google, Grouper and Revver | Tag search |
| CastTV | YouTube, iTunes, CNN, CBS, hulu, ESPN, 5min, blip.tv, Dailymotion, etc | Multiple sorting and filtering options |
| Tagoo | N/A | Filter by: Music / Video / Soft |
Truveo is a video search engine with multi-lingual support. It supports boolean operators (OR, AND and -) and exact match search (”your search phrase here“). Another fun thing about the platform is that it has cool Twitter integration allowing to see most “Twittered videos.”

TagBulb is a tag search for images and videos aggregating several popular platforms. Its search results page is no more than a list of video thumbnails:

VideoSurf aggregates results from popular video sharing sites like Youtube and links them together using combination of facial recognition and text search (based on video description and tags).
It also offers handy search suggestion feature. It also lets you refine your results by excluding any search channel, category or content type (e.g. Slide shows, full episodes, web series, clips).

CastTV is an excellent search engine for tv shows, movies, news, sports, celebrity, and viral online videos. The site is divided into categories and also offers a handy search option.
Each search result includes a source link, description and a video thumbnail. Besides, you are able to sort and filter search results in multiple ways: by source, genre, type, etc:

Tagoo is a search platform that lets you search for all types of media-content: mp3 audios, music albums, audiobooks, music videos and podcasts. The site contains a huge database of sites to crawl but the overall result quality leaves much to be desired:

Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.
Google is extending its services to mobile phone users in Africa via Google SMS. Google SMS is a suite of mobile apps that provide access to information covering various topics such as health and agriculture tips, news, local weather sports and more. This is Google’s way of extending its services and reaching out to African mobile users who rely so much on SMS in carrying out their day to day activities.
Google SMS features Google Trader, a mobile app which African users can use to sell or buy any any type of products or services. It’s like an SMS-based eBay where you can find used cars, mobile phone, crops, livestock, jobs and other consumer goods which are up for sale.
Aside from this, Google SMS also features SMS Tips which is SMS-based query-and-answer service which works like a mobile search interface. Of course the answer is delivered through SMS.
Google Trader and SMS Tips are the products of collaboration among Google, the Grameen Foundation, MTN Uganda and other African local organizations.
The African region has the world’s highest mobile growth rate. Compared with the Internet, mobile phones has a higher penetration rate on the African population. It’s no wonder that Google focusing on this avenue especially since one third of the African population own a mobile phone.
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by Arnold Zafra at June 30, 2009 12:07 AM under Search Engine News
Philip Lenssen over at Google Blogoscoped noticed a variance in the size of Google logos in the search results from browser to browser.
I did a little experimenting and noticed the same thing. On Firefox and Safari, the Google logo is proportionately smaller than on IE and Chrome for me. Check out the images below.
Anyone else seeing the same thing?
Firefox

Safari

Internet Explorer

Chrome

I’m currently seeing a slightly changed layout for Google results. The Google logo has gotten smaller, and there’s more padding to the left. In Firefox, the file holding the logo for the new layout is called nav_logo6.png (when I open the old layout in Chrome, it’s nav_logo4.png).
This redesign could well be just an experimental prototype, and nothing that’s rolled out for everyone, I don’t know... who else is seeing the changed layout?
(Recently, the Google homepage also presented itself with less padding below the search box, but that may have been a temporary bug... it doesn’t show anymore to me.)
[Hat tip to WebSonic.nl and Tony!]
[By Philipp Lenssen | Origin: A Changed Google Results Layout, Perhaps Expe ... | Comments]
Google Android applications are currently written in Java and run off Google’s Dalvik Java virtual machine, however, that will soon change. Last week Google announced the Android Native Development Kit (v. 1.0) that will allow software to run natively on the Linux layer below. Without getting into the nitty gritty details of software development, what this all means is that Mozilla is likely to bring the mobile version of Firefox, called Fennec, to the Android platform.
A year ago, Mozilla decided not to focus on Android because of the Java constraints and because it already had a browser of its own. They wanted to first focus on platforms that either didn’t already have a browser, or didn’t have a good one. However, Mozilla did note that they were anticipating the day that Google would open up the platform.
Jay Sullivan, Mozilla’s vice president of mobile, said recently:
“Developers are taking a look at the NDK to see if it provides the capabilities we need to bring Fennec to Android. If it’s possible, I think our community would be interested in doing it, because Android will be appearing on more smartphones with the capabilities to provide a good browsing experience.”
In addition to expressing interest in an Android version of the Firefox/Fennec browser, Mozilla also has interest in a variety of sub-PC devices, including Netbooks.
In other Mozilla news, a new version of the desktop Firefox is about ready to be released. On Friday the company said that Tuesday looked like it would be the ship date for version 3.5. Then again, it could still be a couple days. You’ll know when it happens though - your browser will alert you that a new version is available to install.
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by Julie Kent at June 29, 2009 07:38 PM under Search Engine News
Google currently has more than 25,000 news sources that contribute content for Google News, and now they are inviting them to share professional news videos via YouTube. After being approved as a YouTube Parnter, these news sources will be permitted to host videos for free on YouTube. While that in itself probably isn’t enough to convince them to share their videos that way - there’s more to it that makes it a very enticing option.
YouTube news partners get some nice perks:
In addition, by participating in this program, it can create a larger audience for the news sources by sharing videos on a site that reaches millions, instead of being limited to just their own smaller audiences.
As the owner of a Google News participating website myself, I am definitely going to check this out, and see if we can ramp up our production of news videos. I’ll let you know how that goes. In the meantime, if your a part of a news organization interested in becoming a Google News partner, you can apply here at Google News. After that, if you would like to be involved as a YouTube partner, you can apply here.
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by Julie Kent at June 29, 2009 06:45 PM under Search Engine News
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Microsoft and advertising agency Publicis have formed a advertising alliance, according to ClickZ. The partnership involves online advertising as well as a TV ad exchange. This could put a damper on Google's inititave to create a tv ad exchange. Google is also a partner with Publicis, with the companies having staff working out of each other's offices.
But another interesting tidbit of the Microsoft-Publicis partnership is breaking today. Rumor is that Razorfish, ad interactive advertising agency arm owned by Microsoft, is for sale. Razorfish was part of the $6 billion aQuantive acquisition in 2007. Microsoft has contacted Morgan Stanley to arrange the sale. The even bigger rumor is that Publicis is poised to buy.
This all comes on the heels of comments by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer that traditional media is heading to its grave.
by Nathania Johnson at June 29, 2009 04:31 PM under Advertising
Windows only: Tiny utility MonitorES pauses your media player, turns off your monitor, and sets Google Talk to away whenever you lock your PC.
Using the utility is a no-brainer: just start it up and choose whether to start the screensaver or turn off the monitor when you lock the workstation—the options for pausing media or setting your messenger status are under the Options button. Once it's running, locking your workstation with the Win+L shortcut key combination will also turn the monitor off at the same time.
MonitorES is free and open source, available for Windows only. If you simply want to shut the monitor off without anything running in the background, I've written an article about how to shut off the monitor and alternately lock your PC with a shortcut, or you can use previously mentioned PushMonitOff to turn off the monitor.
Google is inviting the more than 25,000 news sources that partner with them for Google News to share professional news videos to YouTube. They'll be able to host videos on YouTube for free once being approved as a YouTube Partner.
YouTube's news partners get featured placement on the YouTube news page and have opportunities to generate revenue via advertising, something traditional news organizations are struggling to do. But this program can generate a bigger audience for newspapers by sharing videos on a site that reaches millions.
The videos will also be visible through Google News. In May, Google News began adding YouTube videos to its results and homepage.
If you're a news organization that's interested in becoming a Google News partner, you can click here to apply. After approval, then you can apply for the YouTube partner program.
by Nathania Johnson at June 29, 2009 03:28 PM under Google: News
Apparently the attachment size limit we casually mentioned last week was actually a new upgrade. All Gmail users should see a bump from 20MB to 25MB limits in their accounts, according to the Google Operating System blog. As Alex notes there, Gmail's convenient-but-crash-prone Flash uploading tool may make it very hard to actually get a 25MB file up and going, so clicking to use the older tool that uploads upon hitting "Send" is probably the way to go for gigundo-sized files.
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