Bigmouthmedia search engine news: rss

Google blocks Yahoo's Pipes

Mon, 12 Nov 2007 12:00:00 GMT

The two leading search engines have reached a technical impasse over Google's news service and Yahoo's pipes product.

Pipes is a highly regarded product from Yahoo's Brickhouse team. Users are able to collect data from various sources around the internet, manipulate it, filter it, sort it and then deliver it in another format. For example, with Yahoo Pipes a brand team could monitor news aggregators and blog search engines around the web for mentions of their brand and then deliver this research in one single RSS feed. That's easy to read and easy to monitor.

In the past Google has been used by viruses to query the web looking for forum sites with known vulnerabilities or email addresses. Google's defence to this sort of virus attack is to block automated queries to the search engine and also to Google News.

Google's anti-automated query defense is now blocking the automated queries from Yahoo Pipes. Many of the published pipes in Yahoo's system are now showing as empty and blocked as Google News was an incredibly popular source of information.

Yahoo's Pipes requests for Google News URLs are being forwarded to Google's blocking page. Google is treating Pipes as a virus or other unwanted computer request.

Yahoo Pipes fail gracefully. Pipes constructed from various information sources continue to work and simply exclude the feeds taken from Google. One of the features that sets Yahoo Pipes aside is their unique visualisation of the information stream. Pipes sending data are highlighted in light blue whereas empty pipes, such as those now being blocked by Google, appear in dull grey.

Tim O'Reilly described Yahoo Pipes as a "milestone in the history of the internet" when it launched and Nic Cubrilovic of TechCrunch said, "...my mind is still buzzing thinking about all that can be done with Pipes."

It is within Google's ability to 'whitelist' Yahoo Pipes and allow the internet application to successfully auto-query the search engine, news and blog search. Until the impasse is resolved, however, Pipes may struggle to remain useful.

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Accessible podcasts aid search engine optimisation (SEO)

Mon, 18 Jun 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Unless you've been a hermit over the last few years, you'll be completely aware of what a podcast is and what it does. But for clairification: a podcast is a portmanteau of Apple's "iPod" and "broadcasting", and is basically a method of publishing files on the internet, allowing users to subscribe to a feed and receive new files automatically by subscription, usually at no cost.

In layman's terms, a podcast is an audio file - usually a mp3 or mp4 - that users can download and access from a computer, portable media player or hand-held mobile device.

Podcasts are often syndicated through RSS, which allows users to be shown the most recent podcast updates and additions to a collection. A popular aggregator for news, podcasts and blogs is Google Reader.

Essentially, providing an accessible alternative to a podcast can aid your search engine optimisation campaign, making it more accessible for users with disabilities.

How to make your podcast accessible

Now that you have recorded your podcast, in order to make your podcast accessible to users with a disabilities, such as those with impaired hearing, it is recommended by the W3C in their accessibility guidelines that you create a transcript of your podcast.

A transcript is a written record (usually typewritten) of recorded speech.

Now that you have a fully accessible transcript of your podcast, you can use it towards maximising your search engine optimisation campaign.

How does having a transcript of a podcast aid search engine optimisation?

Search engines cannot listen to podcasts - they are not that developed (yet). In order for a search engine to extract any value from a podcast, it must be provided with an accessible alternative to the audio file. By providing this transcript, the search engines can view and understand what is being conveyed in the podcast. This additional content will be highly beneficial to your search engine optimisation campaign

Conclusion

Ultimately, providing an accessible alternative to your podcast will not only benefit your search engine optimisation campaign, it will also allow users with disabilities to access the full value of your site.

Podcasts do not yet have markers that allow you to easily jump to certain points within the podcast. By providing this in a podcast transcript, you can easily mark-up headers and times which would then allow the user to quickly jump to the area of the podcast in which they are most interested. The likelihood is that this feature will be introduced in the future as the technology of podcasts develops.

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Google buys FeedBurner

Tue, 05 Jun 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Google announced their latest acquisition, FeedBurner, for an undisclosed amount after a week of speculation, although some rumors have mentioned the $100 million figure. FeedBurner has over 400,000 publishers in its network and will help to boost Google's AdSense portfolio of advertisers.

FeedBurner is a Chicago-based company providing distribution and management systems for syndicated content, and they claim to share Google's aim to organise the world's information through focusing on feeds. The small start-up, established in 2003, is now a leading provider of syndicated content in the shape of RSS feeds - which now total well over 700 000, 112 000 of which are videocasts and podcasts. According to Nielson/Net Ratings, FeedBurner growth has been much higher than that of MySpace or Digg, with an outstanding rate of 385% traffic growth year on year.

FeedBurner distributes syndicated content to over 190 countries and its tremendous formula for success, which combines a large audience along with an advertising model on feeds, has caught the attention of the search engine giant. Among other things, FeedBurner notifies its clients when their content is syndicated, providing statistics over time. This type of service is also provided by Google.

This is the fourth company that FeedBurner's four founders have created together. According to Matt Shobe, one of the company's co-founders, its success is partly due to the complementary skill set of its team, with a strong focus on web development, usability and project management.

When FeedBurner was first launched, it was unclear if the advertising model and syndicated content would be appropriate, but it has proven to be a match made in heaven with over two thirds of its publishers using this advertising system.

This deal, closed at the end of last week, is the latest acquisition by Google in what seems to be a prolonged shopping spree for the search engine. Previous to the FeedBurner acquisition, Google also announced its buyout of the Spanish photo sharing company Panoramio, the software security site Green Border Technologies and the video conferencing software Marratech AB.

Before this, Google also splashed out on the information retrieval software Tonic Systems, which has the ability to extract information from Powerpoint presentations and save it to HTML or PDF format, and what has so far been Google's largest acquisition, DoubleClick, for an staggering $3.1 billion.

With recent accusations of monopoly being thrown Google's way, the latest deal with FeedBurner is sure to fuel the fires of Google's critics even further - although hundreds and thousands of people are likely to benefit from the enhanced system.

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It lives! Microsoft launches Windows Live Hotmail

Tue, 08 May 2007 12:00:00 GMT

A year of testing has paid off for Microsoft as they launch a new version of their free webmail application, Hotmail. Microsoft has had to make a series of hefty compromises along the way, however, reshaping their original intention to bring Outlook's interface online.

To start, what was meant to be introduced as Windows Live Mail made its debut as Windows Live Hotmail - and justifiably so: it may simply have been too radical a change to pluck a name as big as 'Hotmail' from a product, however new and improved that product may be.

Secondly, the Outlook interface, similar to that found on Yahoo! Mail Beta, became an option rather than a default setting; the new application now defaults to a classic interface, closer to that found on Gmail. However, Windows Live Hotmail still uses folders, doesn't have threads and is said to be dealing with a few usability issues. The full version also has drag-and-drop functionality, right-click menus, and a reading pane to help users view e-mail quickly, while the classic default version uses check boxes and doesn't include a reading pane.

CNet reports that the shift to the classic version was necessary because:

"The program was too slow to load, too different and just not like the old Hotmail it was intended to replace. It was a painful realization for the more than 100 managers and developers on the project. In banking on a snazzy Web 2.0 application to try to catch up to rivals Yahoo! and Google, Microsoft had dramatically overshot its audience."

Another new feature on Windows Live Hotmail is the "Today" panel that greets users when they open the application. So instead of seeing the messages in your inbox right away, you'll have the option to read top news and articles from MSN - a bonus to some, not so much to others.

But a definite drawback to most is that Microsoft is skimping on - or more accurately, entirely skipping on - support for POP3 or IMAP. Instead, they're pushing Windows Live Mail Desktop - a feature that displays text ads in a similar fashion to Gmail, as well as an Outlook connector software that enables anyone with a copy of Outlook 2003 or Outlook 2007 to use the software to access Windows Live Hotmail messages and contacts.

So whether the new application will take full flight or simply hover over ground is surely the question that Microsoft managers and developers will be facing in the months to come. But given the speedy nature of both the internet market and the developing preferences of its users, it's likely that they should have an answer soon enough.

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Berners-Lee talks on the future of the internet

Wed, 04 Apr 2007 12:00:00 GMT

The chief architect of the World Wide Web has given a talk about the continued development of the internet.

Tim Berners-Lee opened this year's British Computer Society's Lovelace Lecture by discussing the future of the internet and how it will cope with its own growth. In particular, Mr Berners-Lee stressed the need for greater interaction with users to ensure that the media developed in a way that was beneficial to all.

He explained: "By increasing the level of collaboration and creativity improvements can be made to the web. A new geography of free connectivity with more intuitive interfaces and new forms of democracy can be created."

"Ultimately, advances are most regularly achieved through the connection of people's half-formed ideas, whether they are scientific, political or cultural," added Mr Berners-Lee.

He also noted that there would be ongoing changes in the user interface, with increased applications designed to enable people to access data anywhere and from a range of different sources. However, he did warn that there were a number of challenges ahead, especially concerning the use of data policies.

Mr Berners-Lee is credited with creating the internet in 1989 during his employment with CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory.

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Google - now on your television

Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Google has recently announced that it will trial a new service in which television sets will deliver highly targeted advertising to users. In conjunction with their partners Astound Cable and EchoStar, digital trials which use modern advancements in set-top box technology are currently under trial in various areas of the United States.

These advancements allow Google to do what it does best - collate huge amounts of data and implement new solutions based upon that data. In this case specifically, aggregate data from many thousands of anonymous users (anonymous in name; their demographic may be known) will be collated. This data will then be checked for the amount of viewers, the demographic of the viewers, how many times the ad was watched, and whether the ad was watched all the way through to the end.

Google will then use the information to determine how effective the campaign has been and whether the ads are being delivered at the optimum time.

As always, Google is aiming for a large, scalable, fully automated solution - from the planning stages through to the uploading and distribution of the ad, and finally to reporting on the effectiveness of the ad. The similarities to the Google Adwords program is noteworthy in that the system will work on an auction model, with the best prime-time slots going to the highest bidder - perhaps we will see large media agencies eventually controlling both online and television campaigns. Price will be calculated on a CPM (cost per thousand impressions) basis, similar to Google Adwords

Since the entire process is automated, agencies and advertisers should be able to effectively plan their advertising campaigns with ease - but whether the massively successful advertising model that Google uses online will work so well in the traditional area of television advertising remains to be seen.

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Google working on translation programme

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Google is currently developing a translation programme which will translate a document into any of the world's main languages.

The development of the programme centres on statistical machine translation as opposed to expert human translators.

Previous programmes have used human language experts to program grammatical rules and dictionaries into computers. However, the machine logic approach feeds documents people have already translated into two languages; computers then discern patterns for future translations, working on a basis of statistical analysis.

Franz Och, head of Google's translation, admits that the process is not perfect, but that it is an improvement on previous machine translation concepts.

The programme may not be suited to accurate-critical document translations. However, where 'mostly correct translation' is acceptable, this new technology may signify a breakthrough.

The program is being developed to increase accuracy. Test translations have been carried out on certain documents from Arabic to English, and the results have not been perfect but are comprehendible. However, when translations have been tried from English to Russian, the translated documents have been said to be understandable but awkward.

The idea behind the machine logic is that, the more you feed into the system, the better it will be as it will have more data patterns on which to base its translation. Och has been feeding texts in Arabic and English, for example, using United Nations and European Union documents. The languages that are less frequently used, such as Africaans, will be more difficult to find and feed into the system. This means the overall system will be better at translating into some languages over others.

So far, the Google statistical machine translation system is offering translations in Arabic, Chinese and Russian to English. As yet, the tool is free; but if Google develop to a high accuracy standard they are likely to charge for its use in the future.

Limitations of the system have already been highlighted. Some argue that no matter how sophisticated statistical machine systems like this become, they will never overtake the accuracy of human translation. The system is certainly a valuable aid in the further understanding of documents in a foreign language, but not necessarily for producing accurate translations.

Eric Schmidt, Chariman of Google, believes that Google's translation system will be a breakthrough for societies in which language is a major barrier to communication.

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Key science websites not showing up in search

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Important science sites could be failing to show up in internet searches, according to new research.

A study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) discovered that many of the internet's key science-related websites are being missed by leading search engines and this could be having a detrimental effect on users.

In particular, the ESRC has raised concerns that anyone using the internet for research could be opting to "trust" a site simply because it appears in the top 30 results of a search rather than based on its accuracy of information.

Dr Ralph Schroeder, Dr Alexandre Caldas, Professor William Dutton and Dr Jenny Fry of the Oxford Internet Institute discovered that traditional sources of scientific expertise, especially in areas of climate change and Aids/HIV, can struggle to have a strong online presence.

Therefore, more needs to be done to help promote reputable sites and ensure that search engine results provide the best results for users as well as providing access to journal information.

"This will be an issue not just for policymakers," explained Dr Schroeder.

"But for educators, organisations involved in science and research communication, regulators responsible for access to the Web and citizens who are concerned with the diversity and richness of the information world around them," he added.

The ESRC is the UK's largest funding agency for research and postgraduate training concerned with social and economic issues.

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UFO Crawler: the new paranormal search engine

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 12:00:00 GMT

New search engines blossom on the internet almost every week, but the latest search engine to grace the web - UFO Crawler - simply stands out.

The Anomalies Network, in collaboration with IBM's OmniFind Yahoo! Edition, has just launched UFO Crawler, the new search tool which scours the web for information on ghosts, UFO sightings, classified files and any unexplained or paranormal experiences.

UFO Crawler combines thousands of documents from The Anomalies Network archive, which contains the world's largest online database of reported UFO sightings, mysteries and case studies - including abductions, UFO crashes worldwide or conspiracy theories.

The Anomalies Network was created as the S4 Database almost ten years ago, with the aim of becoming the largest online Paranormal Community - and it certainly seems they've achieved this goal. Olav Phillips, chief archivist and founder of The Anomalies Network, wanted to encourage the public to make their own minds about inexplicable phenomena by combining global information available on the web and thousands of unique archives from relevant sources.

With a staggering one million page views per month, almost 4,000 registered users, 240,000 posts on 15,000 different topics and a record one billion pages of archived material, the success of the Anomalies Network is truly remarkable.

When asked by bigmouthmedia how UFO Crawler was born, Olav Phillips explained:

"In this day and age we all use Google and, frankly, it is an excellent search engine on a mass scale; but finding specific information can be very difficult and requires fairly complex search queries. So we felt the right answer was to move to a microsearch model where we had a search engine specifically designed to house paranormal / UFO information."

Searching for the unknown is now easier than ever thanks to the integration of the Anomalies Network database and the free enterprise search software IBM OmniFind Yahoo! Edition - a clear competitor with Google's enterprise search, which is available from $2,000 upwards.

IBM OmniFind Yahoo! Edition was launched in December 2006. It's customized and simple to use; but more importantly, the software can be installed in less than three clicks. The tool supports more than 200 file types and 30 languages, with an indexing capability of half a million documents per server.

The arrival of UFO Crawler has received a warm welcome from the Ufology community and it promises to capture the attention of thousands of users.

In recent weeks, alleged UFO sightings appear to be on the increase, with events reported in Chicago's O'Hare Airport, the Metropolitan Phoenix area and last week's spaceship video footage shot from Burnley in the UK. UFO Crawler provides an outlet for the burgeoning number of searches made on extraterrestrial activity - and the fledgling search engine certainly looks set to cope with the existing demand for information.

UFO Crawler will undoubtedly fill a gap in the market for searches on UFOs and the paranormal. And whether you're passionate about mysteries, ghosts and extraterrestrial encounters, or are instead a sceptical individual, you're sure to love the extraterrestrial delights the site is bound to uncover from the depths of the interwebs!

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Google to reach satellite viewers with targeted TV ads?

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Not content with being the worlds' leading search engine and online advertising company, rumours abound that Google are soon to sign a deal with Dish Network, the US's second largest satellite TV company. The deal will allow Google to develop and deliver targeted ads across Dish's TV network and into homes across the United States.

The news comes hot on the heels of a pilot project recently started by Google in Concord, California, to deliver ads to cable television subscribers. The project, in collaboration with Astound Broadband - a subsidiary of WaveDivision Holdings LLC - is not currently utilising targeted ads, but is seen merely as Google 'testing the water' for its television ambitions and may well highlight things to come in the future. The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday that Google hoped to tailor cable television ads to specific audiences - essentially replicating their online ad service onto TV screens.

If the deal goes ahead, we may see Google purchase advertising slots in advance and then insert its own advertising, as supplied by its advertising clients, using the same structure as its deal with Astound. The end result would be undistinguishable from the current format of TV ad-breaks, other than the fact that Google will be the driving force behind the ads.

These latest projects suggest that Google may be well on the road to obtaining a foothold in the huge television advertising market. Dish is the US leader in HDTV and interactive TV programming, and such a collaboration might allow Google to deliver ads onto TV screens with the same efficiency as those which Google already distributes across the web. However, these TV ads will be targeted more closely to the content of the TV programming currently being viewed and on subjects more relevant to the viewer.

Google has never hidden the fact that it sees the area occupied by TV ads as a wilderness and, with the television advertising market in the U.S valued at around $55 billion, these developments may reap significant rewards for Google's ad revenue - currently estimated at around $10 billion from online ads alone.

However, there are likely several hurdles that need to be crossed before Google's goal of targeted TV ads can be reached, with probably the biggest being the issue of privacy. In order to successfully target ads, consumers may have to share information with Google to receive better targeted ads.

The prospect of a partnership with Dish, however, may be a notable benefit in helping Google achieve their aim. The interactive nature of Dish's network means that users already utilize keywords to search for viewable programming, choose programming themes and create customised TV guides - all of which are indicators of a viewer's watching habits and as such, might allow Dish and Google to obtain permission from users to utilise such information. Google would then be able to work with technology providers to help insert relevant ads into programming schedules.

If Google's project with Astound proves to be successful, it could open the doors for Google to approach other cable network providers with a view to similar schemes. Similarly, if the rumoured deal with Dish Network is signed, then other satellite TV networks may jump on the bandwagon - especially since the amount of money to be made from the venture will be by no means insignificant.

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