Yahoo Dec 1, 08 4:58 PM CST
(Newser)
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Yahoo! has released a list of its 10 most-searched women of the year, including obvious honorees and some more off the radar: Angelina Jolie: The birth of her twins, box-office success, and a dramatic turn in Changeling made Jolie the most-searched woman on the engine. Sarah Palin: Given her brief stint in the spotlight, it may surprise some that she took second—but her beauty and frontier know-how didn't hurt.
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Execs scoff at story of Microsoft dropping $20B on search biz
All Things Digital Nov 30, 08 8:03 PM CST
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A report that Microsoft is buying Yahoo's search business and giving two Internet execs a 30% share is "total fiction," one of the execs tells Kara Swisher at AllThingsDigital. Swisher agrees that the $20 billion deal, reported by the London Times , is likely non-existent. After all, board member Carl Icahn would know about it—and his recent purchase of nearly seven million Yahoo shares "would smack of insider trading" if the purchase went through.
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GOP candidate still dominates web searches
Politico Nov 29, 08 12:05 PM CST
(Newser)
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We just can't seem to let Sarah Palin go. Nearly a month after the election, she continues to dominate user lookups on search engines, cable news sites, and YouTube, reports Politico. Alaska's governor ranks near the top of virtually every major search tool, including Yahoo, AOL, and Lycos, where she dominated the incoming president until just last week. “People are still searching for her in record numbers,” said a Lycos spokeswoman. “How bizarre is that?"
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OPINION
Columnist worries about being so tied to giant, but everything just works so well
New York Times Nov 24, 08 10:28 AM CST
(Newser)
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Despite near-total lack of marketing, Google finds its way into Web lovers’ hearts with an irresistible bundle of applications. “Having grown up in the vapor trail of the ’60s, I learned to be wary of large, centralized organizations,” David Carr writes in the New York Times . “And yet Google, a huge enterprise with a market value of $80 billion, is my ever-present wingman.”
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Millions of vigilantes
rile Beijing by solving mysteries online
Los Angeles Times Nov 23, 08 6:28 PM CST
(Newser)
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If you do a bad thing in China, just hope it doesn't go online. The nation's so-called "human flesh engine"—millions of web-surfers who like hunting for facts—have already gotten a Communist Party secretary fired and identified a woman who stomped a cat to death. Despite an army of cybercops and pricey filtering software, the Communists have been unable to corral these online detectives, the Los Angeles Times reports.
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Software giant outbids Google as competition goes mobile
Wall Street Journal Nov 12, 08 4:01 PM CST
(Newser)
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Insiders say Verizon Wireless is likely to pick Microsoft as the default search provider for its mobile phones, the Wall Street Journal reports today. Verizon had also been in talks with Google to provide the service, but Microsoft’s guarantee of about $600 million in annual ad revenue—about twice as much as Google—seems to be a dealmaker.
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DeepDyve may reach 99% of web Google & Co don't
Wired Nov 12, 08 2:20 PM CST
(Newser)
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Technology designed to sequence the human genome is now being turned to an equally daunting task: probing the depths of the web. DeepDyve, a search engine developed by Human Genome Project researchers, can base its search on up to 25,000 characters, Wired reports, which researchers say allows it to return results from the 99% of the web not indexed by Google.
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New tool makes video, audio clips searchable—though just politics for now
TechCrunch Sep 17, 08 4:05 PM CDT
(Newser)
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Want to get your presidential candidate’s take on health care without suffering his whole speech? A new Google tool will find the relevant clips on YouTube for you—no sifting through piles of junk required, TechCrunch reports. The tool, called GAudi, indexes words spoken in audio and video files, then puts them into a database that works like Google’s regular Web search engine.
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OPINION
He finds dependence stunningly strong
Washington Post Sep 7, 08 10:31 AM CDT
(Newser)
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On the tenth anniversary of Google, Colbert Report writer Rob Dubbin attempts to avoid using the Internet behemoth for 24 hours—and finds its tentacles impossible to escape. He discovers "deeper" dependence than expected, "encompassing personal use" and the "nested dependencies of people and institutions surrounding me"—a "harrowing" discovery. "The blue 'G' found a way to surprise me around corners, grinning like some horrible fanged maw," he details in his diary.
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Giants in their respective fields, the duo will offer simplified mobile search
Wall Street Journal Aug 22, 08 1:30 PM CDT
(Newser)
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Verizon and Google are nearing a deal that would make Google the default search tool on Verizon mobile devices, the Wall Street Journal reports, giving a boost to the under-monetized $244-million mobile search business while setting a precedent for mobile ad revenue sharing. The deal, expected to close within weeks, will simplify mobile search for users while ending a standoff between carriers and Internet heavyweights.
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Founders say Cuil—that's 'cool'—provides better results than industry leader
New York Times Jul 28, 08 12:37 PM CDT
(Newser)
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Google might want to watch its back—a husband-and-wife team that helped build some of its most important code are getting the search game, the New York Times reports. Anna Patterson and Tom Costello think Cuil—pronounced “cool”—will rival the industry leader. “I think it will be better,” says Costello. “But there is no question that the public has to decide.”
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Google tracks major milestone—150 sites for everyone on the planet
PC World Jul 26, 08 7:05 AM CDT
(Newser)
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The internet now hosts a staggering 1 trillion unique web sites, according to Google researchers. The million million sites—over 150 for everybody on the planet—are growing by billions of pages a day, PC World reports. Google doesn't index all those pages, but plots them on a complex graph. A theoretical human researcher trying to check a different internet site each second would finish up around the year 3696.
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Ballmer says company can be more flexible now in Google fight
Wall Street Journal Jul 24, 08 4:21 PM CDT
(Newser)
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CEO Steve Ballmer is spinning Microsoft’s failure to acquire Yahoo expertly, telling analysts today that, unburdened by the search giant, the company can be more frisky and adaptable in its fight with nemesis Google, the Wall Street Journal reports. Actions might speak louder than words, though: Microsoft announced yesterday it would give the leader of its online efforts the boot, and restructure.
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ANALYSIS
Iffy Q2 results make a deal, with Microsoft or Google, best option
BusinessWeek Jul 23, 08 12:09 PM CDT
(Newser)
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Yahoo’s earnings report yesterday didn’t portend an immediate turnaround, Catherine Holahan writes in BusinessWeek , meaning the company must do something to meet the “grandiose claims” it made in rejecting Microsoft’s bid. Some still see Yahoo ultimately taking that path, and expanding its deal with Google is another option that might justify Yahoo standing firm on its third-quarter and yearly forecasts.
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