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Stories Discussed In The Show

• Google's "Submit Your Content" Page Changes Into Content Central, One Stop Shopping For Publisher Advice
  In the old days, getting listed on Google just meant having a web site. These days, you can get in by selling products through a virtual store, by having a book, by having a small local business that's listed in a yellow pages directory and many other ways. To...
• Pro-Life & Pro-Choice Now Side By Side In Google Search Ads
  Anti-abortion groups to buy ads on Google from the TimesOnline reports that Google is now accepting "pro-life" search ads. In the past, Google did not allow anti-abortion groups to advertise against abortion-related keywords. Google stopped that practice a couple days ago after agreeing that the policy it may breach UK's...
• Real Time Quality Score Coming In "Days" To Google AdWords
  The AdWords Blog announced that the new real-time quality score algorithm will be live within days. This means that Google will now calculate the quality score of your keywords at the time of the search query. Second, Google has removed the "minimum bid" metric and replaced it with "first page...
• US Government Hires Lawyer, Google Shares Lose Value In View Of Potential Anti-Trust Action
  Many people have argued that Google is becoming more like Microsoft, especially in how dominant the company is in its core market: search. That dominance has raised the specter of the "M-Word" (monopoly) in some quarters. In particular it has most recently arisen in the context of the pending Google-Yahoo...
• Newspaper Opposition Emerges To Google-Yahoo AdWords Deal
  Last week the Association of National Advertisers sent a letter on behalf of its 400 member companies to the US Justice Department (DOJ) asking the government to block the pending Google-Yahoo search advertising deal. Then there were reports that the DOJ had hired attorney Sandy Litvack, its chief antitrust attorney...
• NY Times On Google's AdWords Quality Score As Monopolistic & Unfair?
  Stuck in Google's Doghouse from the New York Times profiles the story of Dan Savage's Sourcetool.com and how it was hit by Google's AdWords quality score algorithm. The article discusses the practice of arbitrageur in the search ad game. Savage used AdWords to drive traffic to Sourcetool.com and then monetized...
• Amid Economic Wreckage And Political Resistance, The Good Ship Google Steams Ahead With Smart Grid, Android, Chrome & More
  Advertising spending is down across the board and the financial markets are in a crisis not seen since the Depression. Layoffs are happening or appear to be impending at a number of high-profile tech companies, including HP, eBay and Yahoo. Yet Google appears to be navigating through these difficult economic...
• Battlestar Galactica Meet Google TV Ads: Deal With NBC Universal Cut
  Just in -- and brief because it's the end of the day -- Google and NBC Universal have reached an agreement that will see the TV ads that Google sells coming to NBCU cable channels including SciFi, Oxygen, MSNBC, CNBC and others. The full release is below:...
• Yahoo Tests New Home Page
  Yahoo has announced they are testing a new home page in the US, UK, France and India. The new homepage contains information from both Yahoo and non-Yahoo properties, such as AOL Mail and Gmail data. They will also keep the "Featured" section more up to date with "timely content from...
• Yahoo Enhances Music Artist Shortcut
  About a year ago, Yahoo created a music artist shortcut to make it easier to find quick details about artists, such as videos, photos, sample song tracks and even their official website links, directly from the search results page. Now, in partnership with online music service Rhapsody, Yahoo music shortcut...
• Yahoo: How Open When You Compete With Others?
  Yahoo had a press day yesterday designed in part to pump up the media about the company's prospects and progress post the Microsoft-fiasco. As someone who's been positive about Yahoo, I oddly found the day leaving me less reassured, not more. In the end, ironically it might have been...
• Powerset Teams Up With Live Search
  Powerset, the semantic search engine that Microsoft purchased in July, has been collaborating with Microsoft's Live Search team on several projects designed to be released within 30 days. Microsoft is currently testing them on a small, randomly selected audience. The projects include:...
• Google Upgrades My Location, Mobilizes StreetView
  Google has upgraded Google Maps for Mobile with more precise location awareness (My Location) and now brought StreetView into mobile. The new version of Google Maps (for BlackBerry and most Java phones) provides an option to see the StreetView image of the selected address or business. It also offers walking...
• Google Maps Adds Business Listing Quality Guidelines
  Google Maps spam has been a major issue for a long time but it seems Google has taken a step to fight back. Mike Blumenthal reported that Google has added an official document named Local Business Center Guidelines. These guidelines are similar to the webmaster guidelines for web search and...
• Yahoo's Exodus Continues: Director Communications & Search Monkey PM
  We have covered many but far from all of the Yahoo employees who have left the company over the course of the years. I wanted to add two more to the list of those who joined the "Yahoo Exodus." TechCrunch has news on two people leaving Yahoo. The first is...
• Google News Error Aids In United Airlines Stock Drop
  The Google News Blog explains an error that occurred yesterday, which hurt the stock price of United Airlines. Google News picked up a story on the Florida Sun-Sentinel website about United filing for bankruptcy. It was an old story, but it did not contain the original date. Instead, Google found...
• Google News & Indexing Old Stories As New
  Michael Gray noticed that Google News is continuously indexing old stories on some sites as new stories. Yes, this is the exact issue that influenced United Airlines stock price drop just a week ago. Google blamed the Tribune for the article not containing a date, which is a fair accusation....
• Google Launches Newspaper Digitization Project
  Google, in partnership with a number of North American newspapers, ProQuest and Heritage, has begun digitizing printed newspapers, making them both searchable and browsable exactly as they appeared in print, including photographs, headlines, articles and advertisements. From the official Google blog:...
• Live Search Adds Fourth Search Ad Before Organic Results
  The adCenter blog announced that they have added a fourth ad to the top ad location in the Live Search results. This brings the number of search ads displayed on the page from 8 to 9, and pushes the organic search results down by one ad position. Here is a...
• Google Adds Location To Mobile Web Search
  Last November, Google introduced its My Location feature in Google Maps for Mobile. It uses cell tower IDs to triangulate the location of the phone and then identifies that location on the Google Maps interface. With a bit less precision, it essentially does the same thing that GPS does: eliminate...
• SEM Company, iProspect Acquires Range Online Media
  Search Marketing company consolidation continues with iProspect acquiring Range Online Media today. This acquisition increases iProspect's US staff base by more than 60 employees, bringing the them to a U.S. employee base to over 230. How will this impact the respective client's accounts? The current Range customers will continue to..
• Google Halves Data Retention Time Against Backdrop Of EU Pressure, US Regulatory Scrutiny
  The European Union has been trying to get Google to cut the time it retains users' IP addresses and related search query logs. In response to EU requests and pressure, the company adopted a compromise position (in March, 2007). Google said it would still retain data but would make it...
• Happy 10th Birthday Google, Whenever You Celebrate
  A number of stories about Google's 10th birthday have appeared, as rounded-up below. However, the company itself isn't yet celebrating, as its official birthday has tended to happen on Sept. 27 these days. Make sure to read Google Is 10 Years Old? Finding The Real Google Birthday for more about...
• Google To Help Bring Internet To Africa & Beyond Through New Satellites
  Google backs project to connect 3bn to net from the Financial Times reports Google will announce they're contributing to a project to place 16 low-earth orbit satellites to provide internet access to 3 billion people in Africa and other emerging markets. Google is working with John Malone, the cable television...
• Now Blogging: Google Cofounder Sergey Brin
  Sergey Brin becomes the first of Google's three major executives to begin blogging. Spotted via TechCrunch, his blog at too.blogspot.com covers today his personal experience of being at risk for Parkinson's Disease. In his first post, he explains the name of his blog:...
• Search Engine Rap Battle
  Beu sent me a link to the Search Engine Rap Battle. Basically rappers go out it, mocking each other, as if they are Google, Yahoo and MSN. Google vs. MSN, MSN vs. Yahoo and Yahoo vs. Google. You can check out the videos and vote for the winner at searchenginerapbattle.com....
• SMX East Speakers and Attendees -- SEM Who's Who!
  Look Who's Coming... Join your peers at SMX East - search marketers, representing all skill levels, from more than 600 companies looking to get up to speed and stay ahead the ever-changing world of search. Look Who's Speaking... Learn from and network with the search marketing community's most well known...