Blogger.com Captures Musings Market

Fresh from SEM | Antics Labs, the results of a minutes-long research project.

While it doesn't have the majority, at just over 6 million, Blogger certainly owns the plurality of Internet musings, coming in at just under 14% of total. In the following figure, the top portion is pulled from a site-specific search, and the bottom portion is pulled from the general Google index:

Typepad shows a rather meager 4% of total musings, with about 1.8 million total instances.

And, as always, if you can't get the musings you need from Blogger, eBay is right there to help you.

The Rocket-Science Motives behind Google Base

"We view the integration of Google Base and conventional search results as a means to drive traffic to Google Base."

--Piper Jaffray stock analyst Safa Rashtchy

Hmm... Search results as traffic driver? If only we'd thought of that.

Finally ... Danny Sullivan's Salary Exposed

In what we figure is fair turnabout for Search Engine Watch discussing the salaries of SEMs (based on the ClickZ article of the same name), Alan Meckler decided he'd tell us exactly what Danny's bringing home:

more money than most CEOs throughout the world.

Alan's never been one to put too fine a point on it.

Yahoo Scrambles to Bring Back Steve Rubel

Sunnyvale, CA -- In a surprise move today, search giant and internet information portal Yahoo! restated its business goals for 2006. The company's new prime directive?

Bring back Steve Rubel.

Due to Yahoo's stunning admission that they're content with being #2 in search, media blogger Steve Rubel declared

That's it, I am no longer using Yahoo Search. I have no interest in using a product that the company doesn't aspire to make best of breed. If search is no longer hip to Yahoo, then Yahoo Search is no longer hip with me.

Setting off a firestorm of debate at Yahoo's Sunnyvale campus, Rubel's comments spurred a quick reply from Yahoo CEO Terry Semel:

Previously, our main goals were to build tools for advertisers and publishers, improve search relevance for our advertisers, and better target our ads.

But those goals changed when Steve Rubel left our family. Yahoo Search is no longer hip with Steve Rubel -- and that's not hip with Yahoo Search.

In the battle for search market share, users are won and lost every day, with every query. But this is no ordinary searcher. This is Steve Rubel. We're changing priorities now, and we trust the shareholders will understand. Based on data we recently sent to the Department of Justice, Mr. Rubel was a frequent Yahoo searcher with broad search interests and a consistent record of ad clickthrough. Steve, if you're listening, how can we micropersuade you to return?

In further fallout, CFO/EVP Susan Decker, whose original quote appeared in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, has been bridled as well. While no formal demotion is evident, reports from Sunnyvale indicate that in future interviews, Decker will be limited to answers of 70 characters or less.

Including spaces.



This post is intended as satire.

SEO Phrases Co-Opted by Porn Industry

In his cautionary tale "Bush Administration Demands Search Data...," Danny asks an astute question:

Do you know every variation of a term someone might use, that you're going to dig out of the hundreds of millions of searches you'd get? [...] If you do, from talking with the head of a child porn fighting group in the UK, my understanding is that many euphemisms and code words are used that won't immediately register as child porn terms.

While we have our doubts about the Administration's approach to this matter, we fully realize that child pornography isn't a laughing matter.

Fortunately, however, adult pornography is.

Einige Patrioten have gone to great efforts to make it easier for governments to get a closer look at our most private data.

SEM|Antics will do its part too.

Did you know that many terms, phrases, concepts, and other utterances in SEO/SEM have been drafted into the seamy world of double entendre by the Adult Entertainment industry?

Here are just a few optimization and web analytics terms that have recently taken on secondary meanings in the underbelly of the web:

• Mid-day spike
  
• Slurp
• Site stickiness
• Shaking hands with Mr. Ploppy
  
• "Awesome post!"
• Monitoring visitors all the way to conversion
  
• Focusing on your inbounds
  
• "Hopeless cross-linker"
  
• Downloading logs
  
• "Naylor! Naylor!"

Ahem. We're confident that our readers can come up with a few more.

SEO Haiku for January 16, 2006

As we alluded to earlier, we're ready to roll out our new SEO/SEM information delivery system. What's behind the curtain?

SEO Haiku.

Who has precious minutes to waste reading blog after blog? Why download a podcast when all you need to know is contained up in 17 little syllables?

Remember that the haiku form of Japanese poetry offers us insight into the world in shades of gray. Where you seek answers you may find only questions. It requires as much as it gives.

But it's short, so what the hell?

With that in mind, we are pleased to offer...


SEO Haiku for January 16, 2006

Contest terms announced
Winning such a game could mean
The loser is you

SEM | ANTICS to Unleash SEO Content Delivery System

SEM | ANTICS was founded on the notion that in SEO/SEM, there's far too much yin and far too little yang. Too many of us read Sun Tsu, and too few read Lao Tsu.

This is a big industry, and making sense of it is difficult. But we often err by thinking that to understand more, we need to consume more.

To that end, we're unveiling a new SEO information distribution system beginning later today. It is fully cross-platform, scalable, and it integrates old-school philosophies with cutting-edge technology.

It won't receive (or deserve) any venture funding. It will, however, keep you abreast of all the industry information you need. Very, very quickly.

(All of this is, of course, in addition to our sporadic schedule of polluting your feedreader with our typical dreck. So don't think you're getting out of it that easily.)

Twelve Signs You're Taking This Too Seriously

SEO, Web 2.0, New Media, Social Computing ... all peas in the same fetid pod, we figure. Each exacts the same tyrannical toll on its adherents: computational myopia, social withdrawl, and over-consumption of hydrogenated oils.

Without further delay, SEM | ANTICS presents a dozen signs that this whole "nanoculture" thing might be a little too much for you to handle. Why a dozen? Why, one for each donut you ate this morning, silly!

Twelve Signs You're Taking Socio-Techno Convergence Too Seriously:

12. You blew off your daughter's science fair because her report didn't get a single digg.

11. You no longer speak to co-workers, but instead refer them to your comments feed.

10. In less than 60 seconds (and with condescension in your voice), you can describe at least three ways that true podcasting differs from mere audio file recording, distribution, and playback.

9. You make fun of Om Malik's growing popularity because you read him back when he was known as "KiloOm."

8. After your annual performance review, you immediately head to del.icio.us and tag it "bullshit" and "unfair."

7. You're starting to think that maybe the term folksonomy isn't so bad after all.

6. Putting on a link condom is about as close as you're getting to the real thing.

5. You replaced your posters of Lindsay Lohan and Hilary Duff with 5-megapixel glossies of Jeremy Zawodny and Matt Cutts from PubCon X.

4. You spent $400 on an iPod so you can download videos of Microsoft developers playing Xbox 360 in Scoble's den.

3. You know EXACTLY where you stand on the Adam Curry/Wikipedia fiasco.

2. You were totally surprised that your suggested "mashup" between you, your spouse, and the babysitter was poorly received.

... And the number 1 sign that you're in way too deep:

1. In items 2-12, you didn't need any links to know exactly what we were talking about.

Sir, step away from the laptop, and put the coffee down.