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WebmasterWorld News and Discussion for the Web Professional
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What To Change to be Google Panda Compliant
WebmasterWorld Members discuss tactics and techniques to employ to make a site Panda-compliant.
Symantec Being Blackmailed Over Source CodeNegotiations between Symantec and the hacker reportedly broke down however, culminating with an email on Monday that threatened to release the company's source code if Symantec didn't deliver funds within 10 minutes.Yamatough was apparently unwilling to afford the company more time, however, as a 1.2GB file titled "Symantec's pcAnywhere Leaked Source Code" was posted to the Pirate Bay Monday evening.
Wolfram Alpha To Launch "Pro" Version For User Data ManipulationChief executive Stephen Wolfram said it was his firm's "biggest single step" since launching the computational tool two-and-a-half years ago.
Google Announces Search Changes for January 2012Here's the latest installment of our monthly series on "search quality highlights," with 17 new quality improvements to read about for January.
Google Updates and SERP Changes - Feb 2012WebmasterWorld's monthly look at Google's SERPs changes.
February 2012 AdSense Earnings and ObservationsWebmasterWorld's AdSense barometer - a monthly look at Google AdSense earnings and observations.
Changing Titles, The Potential Google PenaltyWebmasterWorld Members discuss title changes, and the potential for a site/page penalty.
E.U. Regulator Tells Google To Pause Privacy ChangesIn a letter to Google's chief executive Larry Page, Europe's 'Data Protection Working Party' wrote that "we call for a pause in the interests of ensuring that there can be no misunderstanding about Google's commitments to information rights of their users and EU citizens, until we have completed our analysis".
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup February 2WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
SEC Filing: VeriSign Security Repeatedly BreachedThe VeriSign attacks were revealed in a quarterly U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing in October that followed new guidelines on reporting security breaches to investors.In written Senate testimony on Tuesday, U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper called the known certificate breaches of 2011 "a threat to one of the most fundamental technologies used to secure online communications and sensitive transactions, such as online banking." Others have said SSL as a whole is no longer trustworthy and effective.
French Court Fines Google Maps Over Unfair CompetitionThe French company provides the same services for a fee and claimed the Google strategy was aimed at undercutting competitors by temporarily swallowing the full cost until it gains control of the market.
Facebook Files Its IPOFacebook, the vast online social network, took its first step toward becoming a publicly traded company on Wednesday as it filed to sell shares on the stock market.
Keydrive Acquires Moniker and Snapnames From OverseeMoniker once had a reputation for providing the highest level of service to many of the most successful domain portfolio holders.What will Keydrive bring to the domain name game to regrain or restore that reputation?
100 Million DotCOM DomainsThe .com TLD has broken the 100 Million active .com domains barrier.
Mozilla Firefox 10 Released, With Added Developer ToolsFirefox for Windows, Mac and Linux adds powerful built-in developer tools and delivers smoother updates by making add-ons compatible by default.
ICANN Plans To Make Verified Customer Identities Mandatory For Domain RegistrationsThe changes would not affect registrars' ability to offer Whois privacy services for an additional fee, though other amendments could formalise the process of unmasking such registrants accused of criminal behaviour or cybersquatting. And it's not certain yet that Whois verification will become mandatory.
Google, Microsoft and Others Team Up To Develop Anti-Phishing SystemWork on DMARC started about 18 months ago. Beginning Monday, other companies can sign up with the organization, whether they send emails or provide email services. For email users, the group hopes DMARC will mean fewer fraudulent messages and scams reaching their inbox.
SPY World - Search Plus Your World"Have any of you noticed that Google's new "Search Plus Your World" can be shortened to SPY World?"
Why Some Homepages Get BuriedWebmasterWorld members discuss why this happens to some sites and not others.
Facebook Files Clickjacking LawsuitFacebook and US state of Washington have filed lawsuits against marketing firm Adscend Media over alleged clickjacking and spam practices, as the social networking giant finally gets tough with scammers operating on the site.
Report: Facebook May File For IPO As Early As Next WeekMorgan Stanley, people familiar said, is the strong frontrunner for the much-coveted "lead left" position on Facebook's IPO documents to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Twitter Can Now Withhold Content From Users In A Specific CountryWe haven't yet used this ability, but if and when we are required to withhold a Tweet in a specific country, we will attempt to let the user know, and we will clearly mark when the content has been withheld.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup January 26WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Will Existing Google AdSense Publishers Have To Maintain a G+ Account?In light of Google's new privacy policy, I wonder if Google might someday soon require all Adsense publishers to establish and maintain a Google+ account and provide a public profile that matches the identity information they've provided for Adsense.
Busting Google : The Justice Departments $500 Million Dollar Sting"We simply know from the documents we reviewed and witnesses we interviewed that Larry Page knew what was going on."... The government built its criminal case against Google using money, aliases and fake companies-tactics often used against drug cartels and other crime syndicates, according to interviews and court documents. Google agreed to pay a $500 million forfeiture last summer in a settlement to avoid prosecution for aiding illegal online pharmaceutical sales.
Businesses May Face Fines of 2pct of Sales For Breach of New E.U. Privacy LawThe EU overhaul would also clamp down on data lapses such as Sony Corp.'s six-day delay in warning customers about a cyber attack that exposed more than 100 million customer accounts, the second-largest online data breach in U.S. history.Industry groups with members including Microsoft Corp. and Google Inc. have warned against overly strict data-privacy rules that may stifle innovation.
Apple Reports Highest First Quarter Revenue, Ever, $46.33 BillionThe Company posted record quarterly revenue of $46.33 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.06 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $26.74 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter.
Google's New Privacy Changes Mean Users Must Be Logged In Across All Its ServicesGoogle has already been collecting some of this information. But for the first time, it is combining data across its Web sites to stitch together a fuller portrait of users.Consumers won't be able to opt out of the changes, which take effect March 1. And experts say the policy shift will invite greater scrutiny from federal regulators of the company's privacy and competitive practices.
Facebook Coalition To Google, Don't Be Evil, Focus On The UserWhen engaged, this "Don't be evil" bookmarklet did indeed do one simple thing: It turned back the hands of time, and made Google work the way it did before the integration of Google+ earlier this month.
Google Webmaster Tools Diagnostic Centre Gets a Face Lift"Logged in to Google Webmaster Tools this morning and saw that there has been an update to the Diagnostic Centre and the way the URLs and content is displayed on the results page."
E.U.'s Tough, New, Data Protection Rules ProposedThe European Union will propose tough new rules in the coming days on how corporations handle Internet users' personal data, a long-awaited move that could have far-reaching implications for Web giants such as Google Inc and Facebook.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup January 19WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Matt Cutts Announces an "Above The Fold" Algorithm Launchin a blog article today (January 19) Matt Cutts wrote: "In our ongoing effort to help you find more high-quality websites in search results, we're launching an algorithmic change that looks at the layout of a web page and the amount of content you see on the page once you click on a result."
Google Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2011 Results "Google had a really strong quarter ending a great year. Full year revenue was up 29pct, and our quarterly revenue blew past the $10 billion mark for the first time," said Larry Page, CEO of Google.
Apple Launches iBooks 2 Textbooks for iPad: Now Anyone Can Be An AuthoriBooks Author is also available today as a free download from the Mac App Store and lets anyone with a Mac create stunning iBooks textbooks, cookbooks, history books, picture books and more, and publish them to Apple's iBookstore.
Facebook Launches Apps For TimelineOnce you've added an app, you can begin updating your timeline with your activities as they happen.
SOPA and PIPA Protests To ContinueTwo of the bill's co-sponsors, Marco Rubio from Florida and Roy Blunt from Missouri, are among those who have withdrawn their support after "legitimate concerns".But backers of the legislation, led by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), described the action as an "irresponsible" publicity "stunt".
World IPv6 Launch Day June 6 2012Leading internet firms have set 6 June as the World IPv6 launch day.
Jerry Yang leaves YahooYahoo has announced that Jerry Yang has resigned from his position with the Board of Directions, as well as with the boards of Yahoo Japan and Alibaba.
Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales Defends SOPA Protest BlackoutJimmy Wales, the co-founder of Wikipedia, has defended the decision to blackout the website around the world tomorrow, despite other American technology companies refusing to follow suit.
SOPA Set To Be Shelved After Obama Says He Won't Support It"Let us be clear, online piracy is a real problem that harms the American economy, threatens jobs for significant numbers of middle-class workers and hurts some of our nation's most creative and innovative companies and entrepreneurs," the White House said in its first official comment on Sopa and Protect IP.However, the White House said it would not support legislation that "reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risks or undermines the dynamic, innovative global internet."
24 Million Customers' Account Details Hacked From ZapposThough the company says that no complete credit card numbers were revealed in the breach, the intruders may have accessed customers' names, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, addresses, the last four digits of their credit card numbers, and encrypted passwords.
Writing Better SEO Page Titles For SERPs We all know how to write great page titles, don't we?
Online Marketing Ideas For Authors Ready To Launch a BookIdeas on how to promote a book launch on the eve of publication. Long-term strategies included, too.
Google Admits Abusing Its Data From Kenyan Rival, MocalityGoogle has admitted that employees in its Kenyan office have pillaged a local rival's database to try to sell their competing products to its customers.In an embarrassing lesson for any company that is growing fast internationally, Google - motto: Don't be evil - was caught out by its victim, Mocality, in a sting operation.
How to Get Four .edu Backlinks In Three DaysWebmasterWorld Members' practical advice on how to get .edu backlinks.
US Search Share December 2011, Google 65.9, Bing 15.1, Yahoo 14.5 pctMore than 18.2 billion explicit core searches were conducted in December (up 2 percent). Google Sites ranked first with 12 billion (up 3 percent), followed by Microsoft Sites with 2.7 billion (up 2 percent) and Yahoo! Sites with 2.6 billion. Ask Network delivered 531 million searches (up 3 percent), while AOL, Inc. rounded out the top five with 287 million.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup January 12WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Grab Generic TLD Domain Real Estate Today for $185,000 Per ApplicationICANN's gTLDs go on sale today.
Mozilla Firefox To Provide Extended Support ReleaseOnline life is evolving faster than ever and it's imperative that Mozilla delivers improvements to the Web and to Firefox more quickly to reflect this. Providing updates to Firefox more frequently allows us to secure users against emerging threats and provide the platform for innovation that today's rich and compelling Web experiences demand. However, this created challenges for organizations that have to deliver lots of mission-critical applications through Firefox, so we worked closely with the Mozilla Enterprise User Working Group to develop the Mozilla Firefox ESR plan.
PayPal Reports Mobile Payments Reached $4 Billion in 2011He attributes the massive growth to an overall increase in mobile commerce, more useful mobile payments apps blending online and offline capabilities (PayPal is one of the most popular ways for Starbucks customers to top off their in-store credit via its app), as well as a massive uptick in iPad-based e-commerce.
Twitter Criticises Google For Google+ In SERPs, a "bad day for the Internet."Twitter General Counsel Alex Macgillivray, among other thought leaders who criticized Google's Google-centric approach, had already personally called today's launch a "bad day for the Internet."
Google Search With Personalized Results, Google+ , People and PagesWe're transforming Google into a search engine that understands not only content, but also people and relationships. We began this transformation with Social Search, and today we're taking another big step in this direction by introducing three new features... Personalized ResultsProfiles in SearchPeople and PagesSearch plus Your World will become available over the next few days to people who are signed in and searching on https://www.google.com in English.
Chrome Beta Release, Now Prefetching FasterChrome will now start loading some web pages in the background, even before you've finished typing the URL in the omnibox. If the URL auto-completes to a site you're very likely to visit, Chrome will begin to prerender the page.
Google's December Search Quality HighlightsCodenames make changes easier to talk about and remember, and they can also be a lot of fun. You might remember 'Panda' and 'Caffeine,' but you probably don't remember last month's 'Top result selection code rewrite.'
Google Updates and SERP Changes - Jan 2012WebmasterWorld's monthly look at Google's SERPs changes.
January 2012 AdSense Earnings and ObservationsWebmasterWorld's AdSense barometer - a monthly look at Google AdSense earnings and observations.
How Google's Panda is Creating an Era of New Domain SpamWebmasterWorld Members discuss how getting hit by Panda may result in even more domain spam.
ICANN To Press Ahead Expanding TLDs, Despite CriticismEach top level domain would cost $185,000. Applications will be accepted beginning on January 12, although it is not known when the first new registries will be up and running."Of course, we're going to go slow," said a source close to ICANN.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup January 5WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Vint Cerf: Internet Access is Not a Human RightImproving the Internet is just one means, albeit an important one, by which to improve the human condition. It must be done with an appreciation for the civil and human rights that deserve protection, without pretending that access itself is such a right.
Microsoft Declares IE6 DeadMicrosoft is celebrating the news that Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) use in the US has officially dropped below one per cent of internet visits.
Verified Account Mistake By TwitterFor an entire day, the account purporting to be Rupert Murdoch's wife was verified, even though it was fake.
WordPress 3.3.1 Security and Maintenance ReleaseThis maintenance release fixes 15 issues with WordPress 3.3, as well as a fix for a cross-site scripting vulnerability that affected version 3.3.
Yahoo Names New CEO, Scott ThompsonPayPal President, Scott Thompson, names as Yahoo's new CEO.
Google Testing New Homepage DesignGoogle is testing a new homepage design to selected users.
Google Gets Mixed Up In Sponsored Post Campaign For ChromeIt looks like Google's been caught up in a sponsored post campaign for Google Chrome.
Happy New Year 2012Happy New Year to all WebmasterWorld Members around the World!
Bing Now Correcting and Offering Alternative Search QueryBy way of comparison-checking, I stopped by bing and searched for the single word "swagrat". First 10 results:Jimmy Swaggart (accompanied by list of related searces, all involving "swaggart")swagat restaurantswagratswagratsuhagraat... and so on. Bottom of page says "Some results have been removed". Those were probably the correctly spelled ones.
QR Codes on Posters - Might Be Stickers for Malicious SitesCybercriminals are exploiting QR code popularity by placing their own stickers on top of the origiinal QR codes to take people to more nefarious sites.
U.S. Removes Baidu From "notorious markets" ListBaidu, which has been on the notorious markets list for years, in July inked an agreement with top music studios to distribute licensed songs through its mp3 search service, ending a legal dispute over accusations the company encouraged piracy.
Facebook Instructed To Stop Indefinitely Holding Users' Advertising DataThe social network has also been told to improve users' control over social adverts, and simplify its explanations of its privacy policies which must also be made more prominent for new users, following a detailed report by the commissioner.
Firefox 9.0 Claimed Up To 30 pct FasterThe latest update to Firefox includes Type Inference which boosts JavaScript performance and allow rich websites and Web apps with lots of pictures, videos, games and 3D graphics to load and run much faster.
Large Blue Arrows Showing On AdSense Ads On iPads160x600, 300x250 and 336x280 all have these huge blue arrows.
Mozilla Signs New Firefox Search Deal With Google"Mozilla has been a valuable partner to Google over the years and we look forward to continuing this great partnership in the years to come," said Alan Eustace, Senior Vice President of Search, Google.
Sens. Herb Kohl and Mike Lee call for Google antitrust probeThe chairman and top Republican on the Senate antitrust subcommittee have asked regulators to investigate Google Inc.'s search practices, saying they were concerned the company was biasing results to favor its own products.: "We believe these allegations regarding Google's search engine practices raise important competition issues, We are committed to ensuring that consumers benefit from robust competition in online search and that the Internet remains the source of much free-market innovation."
Google's Panda - The Main FactorsWe know that panda mainly targets sites with a lot of pages and I am seeing that as well. Some of my theories may have been mentioned elsewhere but some of them have not. This is what I have seen from my own experiences. Of 9 clients I have worked with, 4 of them have made some sort of recovery. There were 11 test subjects but it turns out that 2 I did not feel were effected by panda, but a regular google penalty.
Small Site Advantages Against eCom PowerhousesWebmasterWorld Members discuss how small retailers can compete with the big retailers.
Microsoft/Stanford Paper: Domain Bias In Web SearchThis paper uncovers a new phenomenon in web search that we call domain bias, a user's propensity to believe that a page is more relevant just because it comes from a particular domain.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup December 15WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Microsoft So.cl: A New Way For Students to CollaborateCalled So.cl and pronounced 'social,' the experimental research project is being made available to students in information and design schools at the University of Washington, Syracuse University, and New York University.In time, more schools will be added, potentially expanding So.cl's use as a learning and information-gathering tool.
Internet Explorer To Start Automatic Upgrades For XP, Vista, Windows 7Our goal is to make sure that Windows customers have the most up-to-date and safest browsing experience possible, with the best protections against malicious software such as malware.
Facebook Makes Timeline Avaliable to All, WorldwideAs you explore your timeline, you may see stories that you want to feature, like your graduation or the day you bought your first car. There might also be stuff that you want to remove or hide from your timeline.
Google and eBay Founders Attack Anti-Piracy LegislationToday's letter was signed by 16 executives including Google co- founder Sergey Brin, PayPal Inc. co-founder Elon Musk, EBay founder Pierre Omidyar, and Yahoo Inc. co-founder Jerry Yang.
eBay's PayPal Plans To Challenge Groupon With Daily Deals CouponsThe company will make its first foray into mobile deals in the first quarter of 2012, partnering with some of the top 200 U.S. merchants,
Google Announces Analytics Enhancements For Mobile AppsGoogle mobile App tracking analytics enhancements announced.
WordPress 3.3 'Sonny' ReleasedThere is a ton of candy for developers as well. I'd recommend starting your exploration with the new editor API, new jQuery version, better ways to hook into the help screens, more performant post-slug-only permalinks, and of course the entire list of improvements on the Codex and in Trac.
The Future of Ecommerce, If You're Not Amazon Or GoogleWebmasterWorld Members discuss the future of Ecommerce for a smaller business in an environment lead by giants such as Amazon.
How To Block Thousands of Spambot IPs Hitting a SiteWebmasterWorld members discuss the best methods of handling and blocking spambots with thousands of unique IP addresses hitting a site, causing bandwidth to rise from 1GB a month to 12GB a day.
HP's WebOS Released As Open Source"By contributing this innovation, HP unleashes the creativity of the open source community to advance a new generation of applications and devices," said the firm's president and chief executive, Meg Whitman.
How To Make Your Web Site Content More ReadableWebmasterWorld Members discuss an important topic, web site readability. Making a site readable may significantly improve time-on-site, earnings, enquiries, and business.
US Senator Calls For Slowing and Caution Over Introduction of New TLDsThe Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers should consider scaling back the initial round of domains to be introduced in 2013, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat who leads the Commerce Committee, said Thursday at a hearing on the program.
Adware Hitting Facebook, Google, etc.A new generation of controversial advertising software is wreaking havoc on the ad businesses of Web giants including Facebook Inc., Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc., inserting a layer of ads on websites or covering up other paying ads.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup December 8WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
New Twitter Rolling Out, 'Let's Fly'We'll be rolling out the redesigned Twitter over the next few weeks. You can see it immediately on the just-updated versions of mobile.twitter.com, Twitter for iPhone, and Twitter for Android.
Google Image Search Framing Thwarts Malicious Script, But Site Owner Loses IPWebmasterWorld Members discuss frame busting of Google's image search to retain the image owner's intellectual property. It seems it's now much harder to thwart the new Google framing.
Blogger Not Covered By Journalists' Legal Protection: Fined $2.5 MillionA blogger in the US state of Oregon has just been ordered by a court to pay $2.5m to an investment company because of a defamatory posting.
Instant Panda Recovery ExperimentIt took a little over 24 hours for Google to start indexing the pages on the new site so I'm not sure if Monday results represent a full day. Of the half dozen pages, three were slightly above their pre-Panda level (year-over-year) on Monday, and three were around 20% under. The average Google traffic for the six pages Monday was around 250 visitors each.
Reports of lilupophilupop SQL Injection Attack On NowThousands of ASP and Coldfusion sites with MS-SQL back-ends and are being compromised by a SQL injection attack.
.X X X Domains Go On General Sale TodayThe controversial domain name .x x x goes on general sale from 16:00 GMT, as legal efforts continue to scupper it.
Facebook Acquires GowallaGowalla, as a service, will be winding down at the end of January. We plan to provide an easy way to export your Passport data, your Stamp and Pin data (along with your legacy Item data), and your photos as well. Facebook is not acquiring Gowalla's user data.
U.S. Online Holiday Spending Sets New Record Up 15 pct"Cyber Monday kicked the week off with a bang as consumers opened their wallets to the tune of $1.25 billion, but it was only the beginning of a very strong week of online holiday spending," said comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni. "Tuesday and Wednesday followed with billion dollar spending days, helping Cyber Week reach a record weekly total of nearly $6 billion in spending."
Top 25 Google AdSense TipsThe top 25 things that made a difference to AdSense income.
Google Updates and SERP Changes - Dec 2011WebmasterWorld's monthly look at Google's SERPs changes.
December 2011 AdSense Earnings and ObservationsWebmasterWorld's AdSense barometer - a monthly look at Google AdSense earnings and observations.
Content Writing Scam UnveiledI ordered a few original articles using an online service. They were exceptionally cheap, and I was thrilled when I received them: they were 100% original (copy / paste several 10-word strings between "" into Google produced no results whatsoever).Find out how the scammed article was uncovered.
15 Latest and Best Link Development IdeasWebmasterWorld Members review some of the latest and best link development ideas.
Monthly Algo Changes Summary - a New Google SeriesThe community here is pretty good at catching algorithm changes, but there's no way we catch them all. So in November, here are some of the areas that changed...
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup December 1WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Twitter Is Rolling Out Its Self-Serve Ad PlatformThe advertisers using the self-serve platform are small and midsize businesses, and they can make payments with credit cards rather than be invoiced. The ultimate goal is for advertisers to set up campaigns without ever making contact with a Twitter sales rep, in the vein of Google AdWords and Facebook's self-serve platform, but the advertisers in this launch were already customers."This is an important step in continuing to grow Twitter's business," the company said in a statement. "Our promoted products can help small and medium-sized businesses build their audience on Twitter and better engage with the people they want to reach. As with all of our advertising efforts, we're starting small, testing carefully and making improvements as we learn what works. We will slowly roll this capability out to more advertisers in the coming weeks and months."
Worldwide Browsers Stats Show Chrome Gaining On FirefoxFirefox dropped 0.4 percentage point to 22.1 percent of usage in November, while Chrome gained 0.7 percent to 18.2 percent. If that rate was to continue, Chrome would outpace Firefox in March 2012, but fluctuations make such predictions difficult.
Google's Dated Algorithm, From a Webmaster's Point of ViewWebmasters are just plain tired of adding links where in the past they were more likely to be willing to add.
Internet Sales Tax Fight Coming Back To US CongressThe online auctioneer plans to tell a congressional panel considering the legislation tomorrow that the measure would merely consolidate the market power of Amazon.com and the largest big box retailers while putting eBay's small sellers out of business.
U.S. Q3 Online Ad Revenues Up 22pct To $7.88 Billion"Brand marketers recognize that their messages need to be where their consumers are spending time, and that is increasingly in digital media," said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO, IAB. "Digital marketing has delivered the kind of results that have made more marketers stand up and take notice, as these latest numbers clearly demonstrate."
US Judge Orders Hundreds of Sites Be Removed From Google, Bing, etc.Concerned about counterfeiting, Chanel has filed a joint suit in Nevada against nearly 700 domain names that appear to have nothing in common.When Chanel finds more names, it simply uses the same case and files new requests for more seizures.
YouTube Analytics Launched, Replacing InsightYou've been able to discover who is watching your videos and where they're coming from for awhile now on YouTube, through Insight. Now we want to make it even easier to learn about your audience, so we've replaced Insight with YouTube Analytics.Analytics will be released to everyone on a modern browser over the course of the day.
Facebook Settles FTC Charges That it Deceived Consumers About PrivacyThe social networking service Facebook has agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it deceived consumers by telling them they could keep their information on Facebook private, and then repeatedly allowing it to be shared and made public.The proposed settlement requires Facebook to take several steps to make sure it lives up to its promises in the future, including giving consumers clear and prominent notice and obtaining consumers' express consent before their information is shared beyond the privacy settings they have established.
WordPress Launches WordAds, An AdSense Alternative For WordPress SitesOver the years one of the most frequent requests on WordPress.com has been to allow bloggers to earn money from their blog through ads. We've resisted advertising so far because most of it we had seen wasn't terribly tasteful, and it seemed like Google's AdSense was the state-of-the-art, which was sad. You pour a lot of time and effort into your blog and you deserve better than AdSense.
E.U. Directive on Privacy To Hit Facebook and Other Social Media Sites...following concerns over the privacy implications of the practice, a new EC Directive, to be introduced in January, will ban such targeted advertising unless users specifically allow it.
AdWords Tips For AdSenseWhat was a simple question went into some detail on how AdWords gets the best out of AdSense. It indicates how AdSense publishers might get more out of program.
Yahoo Sued By Singapore Press Holdings Over Copyright InfringementSingapore media organization Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Yahoo for reproducing content from its stable of newspapers. The Web giant has refuted the charge, however, saying it intends to "vigorously defend" itself.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup November 24WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Bing SERPs UpdateWebmasterWorld Members are reporting a Bing SERPs update.
E.U. Court Rejects ISP Illegal Content Filter"This judgement is a victory for freedom of expression online. It draws a thick line in the sand that future copyright enforcement measures in the UK cannot cross."Invasive and general surveillance of users is unacceptable. This helps to nail down the limits of powers to curtail people's freedom to communicate online."
U.S. Online Spending Predicted To Reach $37.6 Billion For Nov and DecThe bullishness over e-commerce sales comes as retailers both on and offline prepare for the key U.S. Thanksgiving holiday weekend when people head to stores -- or to their computers -- in search of bargains.
New Mac Trojan horse disables Apple's automatic malware updatesNew Mac malware has been found masquerading as a Flash installer.
Google To Close Bookmark Lists, Friend Connect, Gears, and Others Google has decided to close a number of its services.
New Proposal To Strengthen Public Key Infrastructure, SSL ChainThe SK specification, which is still in the design stage, has safeguards in place to ensure that clients only trust the most recent entries in the timeline, that associations can easily be revoked and modified by the sovereign key owners, and that browsing performance is not severely affected by the additional traffic.In essence, the SK model reduces the number of attack points from hundreds of CAs to 30 or fewer servers where any compromise can be detected automatically. Suspicious entries and other indications of a security breach will cause a compromised server to be immediately ignored by mirrors and clients alike.
How Big Brands Have Begun Gaming Google NewsI'm an avid watcher of Google News. Understanding how it works is always something of a mystery. But what's clear is that whoever ends up as the top story on the front page or in each section of GNews, gets the most traffic.
Adult Companies Sue ICANN Over . X X X...the creation of the .X X X TLD forces owners of trademarks and domain names to purchase expensive 'defensive registration' from ICM to prevent cyber-squatters from exploiting those names in .X X X.
AdSense For Search Now Shows Thumbnail ImagesWe're happy to announce that with our latest layout improvement, Custom Search Element users who have not manually added thumbnails will get them without any additional work.
Minor Google Panda Update19 Nov"Tiny weather report: Minor Panda algorithm data refresh..."
Yahoo Site Explorer Closes Down November 21stWith the completion of algorithmic transition to Bing, Yahoo! Search has merged Site Explorer into Bing Webmaster Tools. Webmasters should now be using the Bing Webmaster Tools to ensure that their websites continue to get high quality organic search traffic from Bing and Yahoo!. Site Explorer services will not be available from November 21, 2011.
Search Results with no Corrections - Google Introduces Verbatim SearchWith Google's new verbatim search, the results use the exact words you've entered without automatic spelling correction, personalization, synonyms, similar terms, stemmed versions, or making some of your terms optional. Verbatim Search can be accessed in the left hand menu by clicking on "More search tools."
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup November 17WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
U.S. Government Shuts Down Scams Promoted Via Google AdWordsThe crackdown announced Wednesday renews questions about the role that Google's massive advertising network plays in enabling online misconduct.
Google Launches Android-Based Music Store With Added Google+Google has launched an online music store in the US, which will allow devices running its Android software to buy, store and stream MP3 files.Google is also integrating its new service with its Google+ social network.
Microsoft Bot 157 Ranges UpdatedMicrosoft's 157. range bots list updated.
Google Tests Third Party Tools To Manage Google+ PageThese companies will offer a subset of their clients the ability to manage circles, publish to Google+, and monitor usage.
Twitter's Real Time URL Fetcher: SpiderDuck...we decided to design a new system that could meet Twitter's real-time needs and scale horizontally with its growth. Rather than reinvent the wheel, we built the new system largely on top of open source building blocks, thus still leveraging the contributions of the open source community.
How Little Brands Become Big BrandsOne of the common responses to anyone taking issue with Google's recent moves to give Big Brands preferential treatment over little brands has been... well then become a Big Brand!
Google's Ten Recent Algorithm ChangesIf you're a site owner, before you go wild tuning your anchor text or thinking about your web presence for Icelandic users, please remember that this is only a sampling of the hundreds of changes we make to our search algorithms in a given year, and even these changes may not work precisely as you'd imagine.We've decided to publish these descriptions in part because these specific changes are less susceptible to gaming.
PubCon, Matt Cutts: Only the Links Google Trusts Count.Q. Everyone says I need more links. How do links improve the quality of the site? I don't want to play this game and I don't want to do this.A: What matters is bottom line. Links are a part of search, they represent online reputation.
Adobe Discontinues Flash on Mobile DevicesAdobe announced it is ceasing development of its Flash plugin for mobile devices, as the company refocuses its efforts on HTML5.
Pubcon info: Content/Ads Position Is Becoming a Ranking FactorGoogle announced in Pubcon that Content/Ads position on a certain page is going to be a factor in ranking.
ecommerce: 35 Key Points For New Product Niche EvaluationA comprehensive list of key points used to evaluate new products for an ecommerce site.
PageRank Update - November 7 2011I just looked up the PR of my site and found out that I suddenly have a PR3 for the home page and the subpages have PR2.
Google+ Pages for Business LaunchedFor businesses and brands, Google+ pages help you connect with the customers and fans who love you. Not only can they recommend you with a +1, or add you to a circle to listen long-term. They can actually spend time with your team, face-to-face-to-face. All you need to do is start sharing, and you'll soon find the super fans and loyal customers that want to say hello.With Google+, we strive to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software. Today's initial launch of Google+ Pages brings us a little bit closer, but we've still got lots of improvements planned, and miles to go before we sleep.
November 2011 AdSense Earnings and ObservationsWebmasterWorld's AdSense barometer - monthly look at Google AdSense earnings and observations.
Firefox 8 now availableFirefox 8 is available on Mozilla's servers now.
Google Updates and SERP Changes - Nov 2011WebmasterWorld's monthly look at Google's SERPs changes.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup November 3WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Google Freshness Algo TweakBuilding upon the momentum from Caffeine, today we're making a significant improvement to our ranking algorithm that impacts roughly 35 percent of searches and better determines when to give you more up-to-date relevant results for these varying degrees of freshness.
Alibaba Group Invests RMB 1 Billion into ETao Search EngineChinese e-commerce conglomerate Alibaba Group has announced plans to invest RMB 1 bln in its ETao e-commerce search engine.
Socialbots Scrape Facebook For DataWhat makes a socialbot different is that it is able to pass itself off as a real Facebook user.The software takes over control of a social networking profile and from there performs basic activities such as posting messages and sending requests.
Googlebot Can Now Execute AJAX/JSGooglebot can now get access to some dynamic content, potentially making Facebook comments, and similar, indexable.
Are We Seeing Google Vince Update 2.0?Could there be a lot of confusion in attributing ranking success of brands post-Panda with Panda instead of Vince? We talk a lot about different iterations of Panda (1.0 to 2.5), but not about Vince.
Yahoo Acquires Ad Targeting Software Firm, Interclick, For $270 MillionAccording to Yahoo, Interclick will give it data targeting, optimization technology and more premium inventory to sell. Yahoo has been exploring an ad partnership with Microsoft and AOL to compete better with Google. That partnership would pool inventory into premium packages.
Ubuntu Linux To Be Developed For Smartphones, Tablets, And Smart TVsThis is a natural expansion of our idea as Ubuntu as Linux for human beings. As people have moved from desktop to new form factors for computing, it's important for us to reach out to out community on these platforms. So, we'll embrace the challenge of how to use Ubuntu on smartphones, tablets and smart-screens.
New Google AdWords Location TargetingTo provide an even better experience for our advertisers, we've connected the location targeting feature within AdWords to Google Maps. This will allow us to provide more information about locations, make relevant location suggestions, and improve the level of accuracy of our location targeting. We think these changes will make location targeting an even more useful tool for improving your campaign results.Today we're announcing the first of these changes: a makeover to the location targeting interface within AdWords. The new Location Targeting Tool will make it easier to discover and obtain more detail on potential target locations.
Are you going to have to pay access for Google Maps API?Is your free ride over? WebmasterWorld members discuss options ...
Baidu Profit Up 80 Percent, Forecasts More GrowthBaidu Inc., which operates China's most popular search engine, said Friday its latest quarterly profit jumped 80 percent as strong growth in usage of its site helped to drive advertising revenue higher.
Google AdSense Now Adds Report Views of Earnings From Third Party Networks...you'll be able to see a breakdown of impressions, clicks, and earnings by Google-certified ad network. Please note that there is no historical data prior to September 27, 2011.
What To Do With A Great Google SEO TrickI discovered something in one of my zillions of tests I always have running, something huge. Something so huge in fact that after several additional tests has me shaking today.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup October 27WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Following Google AdSense Team Advice, Or NotWebmasterWorld Members discuss whether following the Google AdSense Team advice is the best solution.
Facebook's Security System Handles 25 Billion Read-Write Actions Per Day"It's a big challenge," says Jim Larus, a Microsoft researcher in Redmond, Washington, who studies large networks. The only network bigger, Larus suspects, is the web itself. That makes Facebook's defence system one of the largest in existence.
Firefox Now With BingFirefox with Bing offers the latest version of Firefox with Bing set as your home page and the default setting in the search box and AwesomeBar (where you can also type in queries as well as Web addresses). If you already have the latest version of Firefox, then you just need to download the Bing Search for Firefox Add-on to set the same preferences.
Targeting Web Ads Using Credit Card Purchase DataThe two largest credit-card networks, Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc., are pushing into a new business: using what they know about people's credit-card purchases for targeting them with ads online.
U.S. And U.K. Trial Of Bid Per Call In Google AdWordsOver the next few weeks in the US and UK, we'll be rolling out the ability for advertisers to bid for phone calls, in addition to bidding for clicks, when they show Google search ads on computers and tablets.Today, a combination of your ad's Quality Score and max cost-per-click (CPC) bid determine your Ad Rank, which influences your ad's position. But with bid-per-call, your bid for phone calls and phone call Quality Score can directly factor into your Ad Rank, too. Higher ranked ads are more likely to be seen and can therefore generate more phone calls (and clicks, too).
Google Removes + Search Operator, Expands Quotation Marks FunctionalityWe've made the ways you can tell Google exactly what you want more consistent by expanding the functionality of the quotation marks operator. In addition to using this operator to search for an exact phrase, you can now add quotation marks around a single word to tell Google to match that word precisely.
Google Explores The Possibility of Making a Bid for YahooGoogle is exploring the possibility of helping to finance a possible deal by others to acquire Internet search company Yahoo,
How Are You Applying The Pareto 80/20 PrincipleThis is one concept changed my life quite frankly.
So Long Google And Thanks For All The FishTwo months ago I sold my main business. It was a website that depended 100pct on free Google traffic. We had owned the site since 1995 and after I visited a conference and found out what Google wanted to see to rank well, it started making money in 2001.Then came Panda. The time I had feared for over 10 years had finally arrived and Google no longer loved us, they liked us, but the heavy petting of the past was over between us. Our income dived by 45% which was tough to swallow.
E.U. Could Fine Facebook 100.000 Euro Over Deleted User Data ArchiveSchrems was shocked when he eventually received a CD from California containing messages and information he says he had deleted from his profile in the three years since he joined the site.
Minor Google Panda Update Reported Oct 19/20It would seem my previous Panda slap has been reversed although I hesitate to say that for sure since the day is only half over.
A Fix for Google, How to Implement Referral Privacy CorrectlyWebmasterWorld Members discuss a possible solution to the issue of Google referrer data under SSL.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup October 20WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Yahoo Microsoft Search Alliance Global Algo Transition CompletesIt is with great pleasure I'd like to share that Yahoo! has completed the algorithmic transition to Bing in all global markets (except Korea), across desktop and mobile, for all Yahoo! and syndication traffic.This has been a huge effort spanning 20-plus months involving many people across Yahoo! and Microsoft.Only Korea, which involves a three-way integration between Yahoo, Microsoft and Daum, remains, and is expected to complete by the end of the year.
Report: U.S. Mobile Media Audience Up 37 pct in the Past YearThis behavior is even more prevalent among smartphone owners with three in five accessing social media each month, highlighting the importance of apps and the enhanced functionality of smartphones to social media usage on mobile devices."
Google To Shut Down Code Search, Google Buzz, Jaiku iGoogle and OthersGoogle made some announcements of services it is planning on closing.
Google Panda Update ContinuesWebmasterWorld Members discuss the latest Google Panda update of the last few days.
Skype officially becomes a new business division within MicrosoftWell, it's official. The Microsoft-Skype deal has officially closed as it was approved by the board of directors of both companies, as well as the FTC.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup October 13WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Google Third Quarter Results: Revenues Of $9.72 BillionGoogle reported revenues of $9.72 billion for the quarter ended September 30, 2011, an increase of 33pct compared to the third quarter of 2010.
AdSense Publishers - How Many Invited to Alternate Networks?There are some emails that are clearly bogus networks, link sellers. But there are a lot of other networks that are partners with large advertisers and advertising agencies.Have you been approached by these networks?Have you tested them out?
iOS 5 and Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2 ReadyMoments ago iOS 5, the latest update to Apple's mobile operating system went live in iTunes.Also now available for download: Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2 which brings with it support for iCloud.
Foursquare Launches RadarNow, if you follow a list, like the 101 Best Dishes of 2011, foursquare will let you know when you're next to one.
Google Engineer Calls Google+ a Pathetic Afterthoughta Google engineer, accidentally posted a rant about Google to his public Google+ profile. It's revealing and absolutely rips Google+.
comScore: U.S. Search Share For September Sees Google at 65pctSeptember search share bounced back to 65.3 percent one month after a slower August in which the market leader totaled 64.8 percent of the search market, according to comScore.Meanwhile, comScore said explicit core searches were up 8.6 percent for the third quarter, led by Google's core growth of 7.4 percent for Q3.
Study: Online User Tracking EscalatingA new study from a Stanford University researcher has found that a lot of the little bits and pieces of supposedly anonymous data being deposited by your web browser are actually being gathered and reassembled by dozens of companies and sold. And stopping that from happening takes more than a little bit of effort, helped by a growing movement for 'do not track' legislation.
Twitter's t.co URL Wrapper Will Eventually Handle All LinksAll links submitted within tweets and direct messages, regardless of length, will eventually be wrapped with t.co.
New Photoshop Antiblur Feature DemonstratedThe new feature was demoed at the company's MAX 2011 event, drawing gasps of amazement from a crowd that witnessed a blurred photo, retouched and perfected in seconds.
Report: Twitter and Twittad 'Tweet' Trademark SettlementOn Monday, James Eliason, CEO of Twittad, said in an interview that Twitter would drop a lawsuit it filed against his company last month that sought to nix Twittad's registered trademark of the word 'tweet.' In return, Des Moines-based Twittad would transfer its registered trademark of 'tweet' to Twitter, he said.
Google Updates and SERP Changes - Oct 2011WebmasterWorld's monthly look at Google's SERPs changes.
Europe Clears The Way For Microsoft's Acquisition of SkypeThe European Commission said that its investigation of the takeover showed that the firms' activities mainly overlapped for video communications, where Microsoft is active through its Windows Live Messenger."However, the Commission considers that there are no competition concerns in this growing market where numerous players, including Google, are present," it said in a statement.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup October 6WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Steve Jobs 1955-2011Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor.
Google's Purchase Of ITA Software Approved By Federal JudgeU.S. District Judge Robert Wilkins in Washington today approved a consent decree between Google and the Justice Department that allows the acquisition as long as Google makes travel data available to search-engine rivals and lets the government review any complaints it's acting unfairly. Wilkins said he found the agreement to be in 'the public interest.'
Senior Google Execs Not Using Google+Strong management support would seem to be key for a new product's success. After all, if the company behind it doesn't demonstrate an interest or confidence in the product, why should anyone else?
Amazon Invites California Affiliates to ReturnOnly Californian Associates whose accounts were closed by Amazon as a result of the now-repealed earlier law (AB X28 1) are eligible to re-enroll.
Adobe Acquires TypekitIf you're one of our customers, this announcement means things will only get better. Typekit will remain a standalone product, as well as become a vital part of Adobe's Creative Cloud. Our team will stay together, and we're excited to start working on even easier ways to integrate web fonts into your workflow.
The Best Way to Keep All Spiders/Bots Out Of A SiteWebmasterWorld Members discuss the issue of stopping bots from crawling a site, and keeping them out. It seems it's tougher than you might think.
Google Starts Experimenting To Make Ads Look More Like 'Circulars'The online search giant is working with advertisers such as Best Buy Co. and Macy's Inc. to create Web-based circulars, similar to the ad inserts included in newspapers. The new service will be available starting tomorrow, Mountain View, California-based Google said.
Google "Trusted Store" (pilot) Rating Service for Ecommerce SitesToday we're announcing the launch of Google Trusted Stores, a new pilot program that helps shoppers identify online merchants that offer a great shopping experience.br]The Google Trusted Store badge is awarded to e-commerce sites that demonstrate a track record of on-time shipping and excellent customer service. When visiting a qualifying store, shoppers can hover over the Google Trusted Store badge and see metrics on the store's shipping and customer service performance.
New Panda Related Update - September 27When asked if an iteration of Panda was implemented this week, a Google spokesperson told us, "yes." She also provided the following statement: "We're continuing to iterate on our Panda algorithm as part of our commitment to returning high-quality sites to Google users. This most recent update is one of the roughly 500 changes we make to our ranking algorithms each year."
Google Analytics Real-TimeToday we're very excited to bring real time data to Google Analytics with the launch of Google Analytics Real-Time: a set of new reports that show what's happening on your site as it happens.
Chrome poised to take No. 2 browser spot from FirefoxGoogle's Chrome is on the brink of replacing Firefox as the second-most-popular browser, according to one Web statistics firm.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup September 29WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
Yandex Invests $15 Million In Blekko, and $15 Million From OthersYandex, the most popular search engine in Russia, is expressing its affinity with a $15 million investment in Blekko and a commitment to share some of its computing power and other technology with its new U.S. partner. Blekko is getting an additional $15 million from another group consisting mostly of its earlier investors, U.S. Venture Partners, CMEA Capital and PivotNorth Capital.
Amazon Introduces Silk Web BrowserToday in New York, Amazon introduced Silk, an all-new web browser powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and available exclusively on the just announced Kindle Fire. You might be asking, 'A browser? Do we really need another one?'
Larry Page Says Google Biggest Threat Is Google"There are only companies that have good fast decisions. As companies get bigger, they slow down decision making, and that's a big problem."
Retailers Find Consumers Using Tablets Are More Likely to BuyRetailers have found an interesting characteristic of consumers who browse their websites using tablets: They're much more likely to pull the trigger on purchases than other online shoppers.That discovery is making retailers focus on tablets ahead of the all-important holiday season ...Tablets still account for only a small percentage of overall e-commerce, but they are punching above their weight.
Microsoft Takes Down Kelihos BotnetKelihos, also known by some as 'Waledac 2.0' given its suspected ties to the first botnet Microsoft took down, is not as massive as the Rustock spambot. However, this takedown represents a significant advance in Microsoft's fight against botnets nonetheless.
Facebook Cookies Tracking Your Moves Causing AngerFacebook's cookies appear to be gathering more information about your web surfing than many would like. After much discussion, Facebook is moving to change the cookie status.
AdWords Gambling Ads Being Allowed In Specific CountriesA Google AdSense discussion over the announcement of gambling ads now being enabled in certain countries.
WebmasterWorld Weekly Roundup September 22WebmasterWorld's weekly roundup of hot topics and discussions you may have missed in the last few days. (-Subscription required)
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Link Buying: The Dilemma of Reporting A CompetitorShould you report someone buying links, or should you just focus on your own promotion? And, is it really a shady practice or just good honest advertising? (-Subscription required)
Getting A Successful Start With Social Media MarketingWebmasterWorld Supporters discuss the issues, pitfalls, and the benefits of getting involved in social media marketing activity. (-subscription required)
DMOZ Game PlanThe state of DMOZ: "I need to figure out how to get a few new websites into DMOZ. About 5 years ago I created a random site and submitted it to DMOZ and was accepted. Since that time I've not touched the site but it has enjoyed #1 rankings ever since. Many of my other sites have not seen anything close to that success. Only thing I can think to attribute it to - is DMOZ. So a few questions: 1. Is it just me or is DMOZ still *very* important? 2. Is DMOZ still being maintained? 3. Should I submit brand new sites, or wait for them to age and rank in the SEs a bit first? 4. Any other strategy I should adhere to? 5. Anything else out there working these days like DMOZ (did)?" (-subscription required)
Celebrities Don't Always Appear To Help Advertising EffectivenessAs the most significant event in advertising grows nearer, it will be interesting to see how many brands enlist the endorsement services of celebrities during the Super Bowl.After all, popular wisdom asserts that getting a celebrity endorsement is a tried-and-true, simple-to-implement way to maximize advertising effectiveness. Sure, it's expensive, but celebrities always yield stronger ties with viewers and, ultimately, greater sales, right?Wrong. Over the course of last year, time and time again we observed incredibly low effectiveness scores of TV ads starring celebrities. From Tiger Woods to Donald Trump, we found that with rare exception, celebrity endorsements were largely ineffective and failed to yield the benefits popular wisdom promises. (-subscription required)
