Last update: March 2005

Due to time constraints and the explosion of articles about searching the web, this blog will no longer be updated.

myGoogle Search Aims To Refine Google Results
Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"myGoogle Search is NOT from Google, and somehow I suspect the letter asking for a name change will be coming from the lawyers at the Googleplex. But the idea is in the right spirit. Do a Google search, then tick the results you DON'T like to automatically bring back more that match what you DO want. The site's How To Use page has more explaining the concept, with examples."

New Travel Search: Take a Trip with Kayak
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Kayak, a new travel search meta site that I've mentioned several times on the SEW Blog, has just launched a beta version. Kayak, simultaneously searches more than 60 site for air fares, hotels, and car rental pricing info."

Web 2.0 Search Wrap-Up
Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"O'Reilly's put out its official wrap-up of various things discussed that were search-related at its Web 2.0 conference: Search: The Current and Next Big Thing."

Publisher Reactions To Google Print; What About Authors?
Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"New Google Service May Strain Old Ties in Bookselling from the New York Times today has some nice quotes on how publishers are reacting to the expansion of the Google Print service."

Search and Cluster the CIA WMD Report with Clusty
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"The folks over at Clusty (aka Vivisimo) have just released a search/cluster version of the CIA WMD report that was released on Wednesday. In July, Vivisimo made a search and cluster version of the 9/11 Commission Final Report available."

Roll Your Own Yahoo Specialty Search Engine
Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Nice from Tara Calishain: Searchroller For Yahoo. Want to make a subject-specific search engine that brings back results from only certain web sites? This workaround she's created makes it easy via Yahoo."

Brin on Personal Search and SEO
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Sergey Brin let's [sic] us know that Google is working on a personal search application similar to My Jeeves and My Yahoo Search."

Searching for Digital Books
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Here are a three specialized databases that do a good job providing info about and/or access to thousands of digitized books and texts."

Search Through US Presidental Debate Transcripts
Danny Sullivan, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Want to search the transcripts of the US presidential and vice presidential debates? A new service from askSam makes it possible."

Google: A Behind-the-Scenes Look (and other Lectures)
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Greg Linden from Findory alerts us to a presentation by Jeff Dean from Google. It took place earlier this week at the University of Washington in Seattle."

Fagan's "Switch Bookmarklets
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"About two month's ago Chris called Michael Fagan a 'search craftsman' when reviewing Fagan's wonderful URLInfo service. I wholeheartedly agree with Chris description of Michael. I've been a fan of his 'craftsmanship' for a long time. Yesterday, Fagan released yet another new and useful tool for web searchers. This time around it's a new set of bookmarklets, what he calls Switch Bookmarklets that allow you to, 'quickly switch from search results from one tool to those from another'. Switch Bookmarklets are available for many general and specialized search engines. For example, run a search on Google and by simply clicking the bookmarklet check the results for the same query at Teoma. Run a search at Daypop and quickly review the results at Technorati. Hundreds of combinations are possible."

Searcher Habits
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"An interesting AP story: Experts: Web searches for sex declining, e-commerce increasing that reports on some research findings published in a new book titled, Web Search: Public Searching of the Web by noted information scientists, Dr. Amanda Spink (University of Pittsburgh) and Dr. Bernard J. Jansen (Penn. State University). By the way, their web sites link to plenty of interesting material."

Some Google Print Follow-Ups
Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Watch Blog
"A look at how existing electronic copies of books won't be included in Google Print, including no comment from Google on rumored plans of Project Ocean to digitize the Stanford Library. Also an update on progress with Amazon's Search Inside The Book, more tips on searching the full text of books outside of Google and Amazon and examples of how Google Print results now appear in OneBox display."

Problems With Searching By Date
Gary Price, Search Engine Watch Blog
"The FirstMonday article Internet time and the reliability of search engines examines how search engines are undependable for social science research, since page dates are unreliable. In this blog post, a longer look at the issue of dates when it comes to searching."

A Closer Look At Privacy & Desktop Search
By Danny Sullivan, Editor, SearchEngineWatch
"The anticipated popularity of Google's new desktop search tool means that soon it will be commonplace for everyone to search their computers as easily, comprehensively and quickly as they search the web. After all, several of Google's competitors already are working on desktop search offerings of their own. So even if you don't use Google's tool, chances are, you'll use someone else's.

In short, a new era of search is being ushered in. With it comes some new issues about search privacy. We've already seen how people are sometimes shocked to discover that personal information about themselves is out on the web and made easily accessible through search. Our Search Engines & Legal Issues page recounts many such examples."

Search Memories
By Mike Grehan, SearchEngineWatch
"Veterans of AltaVista, Excite and Infoseek reminisce about the early days of web search, and opine about Google, then and now."

Yahoo Announces Size Increase to Image Database
Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Word from Yahoo this afternoon that they're announcing a size increase, what they're calling an upgrade, to Yahoo Image Search database. According to the company, the database now includes an index of more than 1 billion images."

A New Mobile Phone Search Service
By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
"UpSnap turns your cell phone in to a search tool, offering free directory assistance lookups using SMS text messaging."

Yahoo Adds Local, Web and Image Search To Mobile Lineup
By Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch Blog
"Yahoo has added local search, web search, and image search to their already large set of mobile services (news alerts, games, IM, etc.) delivered to your wireless web browser."

Seeking Better Web Searches
By Javed Mostafa
Scientific American
January 24, 2005

Deluged with superfluous responses to online queries, users will soon benefit from improved search engines that deliver customized results.

"In less than a decade, Internet search engines have completely changed how people gather information. No longer must we run to a library to look up something; rather we can pull up relevant documents with just a few clicks on a keyboard. Now that 'Googling' has become synonymous with doing research, online search engines are poised for a series of upgrades that promise to further enhance how we find what we need."

Google and Yahoo Are Extending Search Ability to TV Programs

By SAUL HANSELL
New York Times
January 25, 2005

"Google and Yahoo are introducing services that will let users search through television programs based on words spoken on the air. The services will look for keywords in the closed captioning information that is encoded in many programs, mainly as an aid to deaf viewers."

Advanced Search Techniques using Natural Language Processing

by Tony Rose, FreePint Newsletter 172

"Most readers will, no doubt, be familiar with Google and other
Internet search engines: type in a few key words to describe your
information need, hit return and within a second or two you are
presented with a list of links to documents that you hope will be
relevant to your query. Evidently, a proportion of them will indeed be
relevant (we refer to this measure as the 'precision' of the search
engine) and, if you are lucky, you may also find that all the known
relevant documents will be in the list somewhere (we call this measure
'recall'). Of course, on the web we can never really calculate a true
recall figure, as there is simply no way of ever knowing just how many
relevant documents there are out there. But for a fixed collection
such as a library or corporate database, the recall figure can be a
very important measure of a retrieval system's effectiveness."

New Personalized Features at RocketNews

"RocketNews, the news and blog search engine (about 11,000 sources) is online with a new look (layout and color scheme) and some new features. Today, RocketNews launches the My RocketNews Portal where your five most-recent queries are saved and viewable on your MyRocketNews homepage." SearchEngineWatch Blog

Mobissimo Officially Launches

"A press release this morning alerting us to the news that travel search engine, Mobissimo has officially launched. We've blogged about this travel metasearch tool (it simultaneously queries more than 80 travel sites) several times and also linked to this Business Week profile." SearchEngineWatch Blog

My Yahoo! on Your Desktop

Yahoo! Search blog

"When we first launched My Yahoo! in the summer of 1996, it didn't take long before we wanted to do even more with it. Back then, not everyone spent hours a day in their browser, so later that year we launched the My Yahoo! News Ticker to deliver the same personalized news, weather, sports scores and stock quotes directly to the desktop. (gosh, that was over 8 years ago)
Well, now the new My Yahoo! is here and it allows people to stay up to date with any of the millions of RSS feeds out there--from craigslist to Jeremy's Blog to The New York Times. And again we asked ourselves the same question: how can we make it easy for users to get their information on the desktop?

Answer: The Return of My Yahoo Ticker - this time with all the new good stuff."

What Happened to Google's Ten-Word Query Limit?

ResearchBuzz
January 19, 2005

"Google now has a 32-word limit.... It looks like Google News may continue to have a limit. You can type in more than ten query words, and Google will not give you an error message, it just won't count the extra words."

Yahoo Provides Access To Library Records

"Via the Yahoo Search Blog, news that a special version of the Yahoo Toolbar now allows you to search across two million library holdings through a cooperative project with OCLC, the Online Computer Library Center." SearchEngineWatch Blog

Handy Invisible Web Chart

by Gary Price, SearchEngineWatch

"David Whelan at Forbes has put together a handy chart that does a nice job expaining the Invisible Web. It's based on the book that Chris and I wrote more three years ago."

Popularity Doesn't Always Equal Usefulness (or Importance) of a Search Tool

"Some numbers from Hitwise were released the other day about the traffic smaller web engines tools have been getting some press attention." SearchEngineWatch Blog

Searching for Quick Answers To Odd Questions

By Mary Ellen Bates, Guest Writer, SearchEngineWatch

"Looking for an obscure fact, and need the answer right now? Forget search engines: Specialized search tools can help you track down offbeat information in a flash."

Tuning up your Skills in the Web Search Garage

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"Every now and then a book comes along that's a must-read for every serious searcher, and Tara Calishain's Web Search Garage falls squarely into that category. I'm not given to hyperbole, but it's no exaggeration for me to call Tara Calishain one of the world's foremost experts on web search. She not only sports the technical chops, she also has an insatiable curiosity and proclivity for experimenting with search tools to push them to the limits. And in Web Search Garage, Tara gives us an inside look at her own search 'workshop,' providing an intimate glimpse of an artisan practicing her craft."

Firefox, Google and Web Search

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"Mozilla Firefox has Google, Yahoo and other search tools baked in, but they are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to search capabilities available with this innovative new web browser that launched its first official version today."

Mozilla Firefox: The Searcher's Browser

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"Firefox has emerged as the first browser in years to seriously challenge Internet Explorer - with good reason. Firefox has superior security and anti-scumware features, it works on Windows, Linux, MacOS X and other operating systems, and it's free. Best of all, Firefox offers lots of goodies for searchers, both through a built-in Google search toolbar, as well as dozens of free extensions created by an active open-source developer community."

John Battelle's Searchblog: Can We Please Bury the Netscape Metaphor?

"Thanks to the pending launch of MSFT's search technology, today the press is full of easy comparisons - 'Is Google the Next Netscape?' is a typical headline. The mainstream press has just woken up to the 'Microsoft is going to crush its competition' meme, and it's tiring to see this easy thinking splayed all over the mediasphere."

Microsoft Unveils its New Search Engine - At Last

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"After months of speculation and two 'preview' releases, Microsoft has taken the wraps off of its new MSN search engine, the first major competitor to join the big leagues of web search in nearly a year."

Puns Galore

"There are subject indexes for everything else. Why not puns? Puns Galore allows you to search or browse for puns under a variety of topics, including Shaggy Dog Stories, Groaners, and Tom Swifties. If you have a strong constitution you can also ask for a random pun, though I hope for your sake you don't get the one about the horse which hunted moose. There's also a brief list of humor sites and a couple of available mailing lists. Worth a look." ResearchBuzz

An Exceptionally "EEVL" Search Resource

By Gary Price, News Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"One of the most respected engineering gateways on the web has just released four new databases providing free access to hundreds of online scientific and technical journals."

Microsoft Blogger Scoble Sticks With Google -- Though MSN Deserves A Break

"He might work for Microsoft, but blogvangelist Robert Scoble says he's sticking with Google over his company's own search engine for now. Two reasons -- too many ads above the fold and disappointment with the results of a search on 'microsoft blog.' See his Just a little search comparison entry for more." SearchEngineWatch

Shopping Search Update 2004, Part 1

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch

"Here's a look at new and interesting developments at the major shopping search and comparison sites that happened during 2004. Today: BizRate/Shopzilla, Froogle, and MSN Shopping. Tomorrow: NexTag, PriceGrabber, Shopping.com/Dealtime and Yahoo Shopping."

MSNBC - Google's Two Revolutions

Google's Two Revolutions
The goal is to have everything at your fingertips, instantly available to anyone who wants to see it.
By Steven Levy
Newsweek
Dec. 27 / Jan. 3 issue

"If it weren't for the war, and the terrorism and the election, 2004 might well be remembered as the Year of Search. Maybe it will anyway. If we get through these rocky times with civilization's underpinnings intact, our descendants, swimming in total information, might be required to memorize the date of last August's Google IPO as a cultural milestone. Except that in the post-Google era, memorization will be obsolete, because even the most obscure fact will be instantly retrievable."

Yahoo! Video Search

"Yahoo! Video Search allows you to search millions of videos from across the Web. To start using Video Search, type a specific description in the Yahoo! Video Search query box. For example, if you want videos of University Lectures, type 'University Lectures' in the box and click the 'Search' button. To limit your search to videos of a certain size or file type, use Advanced Video Search.

Your results pages will show you 20 thumbnails (reduced versions) per page. Click the thumbnail to see details on the video file, along with the web page where the video is located in its original context.

Please Note: The videos you find in your Yahoo! Video Search results may be protected by copyright or other intellectual property rights. Yahoo! cannot advise you as to your use of these videos. If you have questions related to your use of a video, we suggest that you to contact the site owner directly."

Most Effective Search Engines Yet Invented...
From The Krafty Librarian
December 10, 2004

"So here is a link to a wonderful article from William R. Brody, the president of The Johns Hopkins University, praising librarians as 'the most effective search engines yet invented.' It is a great article and he ends it with, 'Today's technology is spectacular -- but it can't always trump a skilled human. Have you hugged your librarian today?'

:) We all need a hug."

Keeping Up With Search Engines
Poynter Online
By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor

"Use blogs as a guide.

I am having a really tough time keeping up with all the developments in the world of search engines. It feels like major new features (or what some claim are major new features) are added every day. One way to track these developments is to read the blogs that cover search engines well. Here are the ones I glance at once a week."

Security hole found in Google desktop search
InfoWorld
December 20, 2004
By Scarlet Pruitt, IDG News Service

"Flaw found in beta version could allow third parties to access users' search result summaries
Researchers at Rice University have discovered what they say is a flaw in the beta version of Google's Desktop Search product that could allow third parties to access users' search result summaries, providing a sneak peek at part of the content of personal files."

Google's latest tool offers both promise and peril
newsobserver.com | Business
By PAUL GILSTER

"There's a lot to be said about Google's new Desktop Search program, not all of it good. Technology is always like this: A startling and effective tool -- like e-mail -- changes our lives, but then creates colossal problems, like spam. The new Google program is marvelous, and dangerous."

Speegle Search Engine Talks to You
ResearchBuzz
November 05, 2004

"You know, of all the search engine innovations I dream of at night having search results read back to me in a Scots accent was right up there. Okay, no it wasn't. But what an interesting idea. Speegle is worth a visit just for the novelty. And while I didn't find the Web search especially useful, there's another feature I liked very much."

Oxford-Google digitisation agreement

From Bodleian Library:

"After more than a year of discussions and negotiations, the University of Oxford has concluded a mass-digitisation agreement with Google, Inc., of Mountain View, California, which should lead, over the next three years in the first instance, to the digitisation of more than 1 million of the Bodleian Library's printed books, and their worldwide availability on the Internet, through Google's popular search services and the Oxford website.

Because of copyright restrictions and intellectual property issues, the agreement between Google and Oxford covers only 'public domain' materials (i.e. printed books for which the copyright has expired - principally, books published before 1920), and it will involve the establishment in Oxford, by Google, of a digital scanning and processing unit which, when fully operational, should be capable of producing as many as 10,000 electronic books per week."

Yad Vashem Launches Online Database Of 3 Million Holocaust Victims' Names
from ResourceShelf

"Facts About The Database
Two-thirds of the names in the Database were obtained from the more than two million Pages of Testimony submitted to Yad Vashem over the past 50 years, nearly all of which have now been digitized. Other names have been gleaned from additional computerized lists, including deportation, camp and ghetto records. With a click, users can view and print Pages of Testimony, or a screen containing a victim's personal story, based on information from archival sources available in the Database. Each such 'mini-biography' further links to information about the particular victim, such as the places he/she lived and died, related historical events and more.
See Also: Additional Background About the Database"

Google Scholar Offers Access To Academic Information
By Danny Sullivan, Editor, SearchEngineWatch
November 18, 2004

"Google has launched a new Google Scholar search service, providing the ability to search for scholarly literature located from across the web."

Big News: "Google Scholar" is Born
ResourceShelf
November 18, 2004
By Shirl Kennedy and Gary Price

"The world of online 'scholarly' research is changing today as Google introduces Google Scholar. This specialized new interface -- which will NOT be linked from Google's main search page -- will allow users to search a treasure chest of 'scholarly material.'"

NoodleQuest - Search Strategies Wizard

NoodleQuest is a wizard that helps to develop the optimum Web-based search strategy. Just answer a few questions about your research topic and NoodleQuest will reveal and explain some of the best search strategies you can use.

HONmedia - Medical images

"HONmedia is an unique repository of over 6'800 medical images and videos, pertaining to 1,700 topics and themes. This peerless database has been created manually by HON and new image links are constantly being added from the world-wide Web."

Tips from Tara: Research help from a Web heroine

By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor
Poynter Online

"Last week, I wrote about Gary Price, Web hero. This week, it's Tara Calishain, Web heroine. From her base in Raleigh, N.C., she has helped make sense of the Internet for thousands of her fans. If you aren't a fan yet, it's time to become one. 'I really, really love helping people use the Web better,' she says. Her enthusiasm is infectious whether you are reading her words online or talking to her on the phone."

Documents Galore: Reports, studies and more

By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor
Poynter Online

"Gary Price is a Web hero. He's a mild-mannered librarian who helps tame the Internet for the rest of us. In a 2003 column, I praised his ResourceShelf.com as 'the best way I know of to keep abreast of useful new online resources.'

Price and two of his fellow librarians have now created a way for journalists, researchers, and others to specifically track important documents: DocuTicker.com. Each day, reports and studies from government agencies, think tanks, nonprofits, academics, etc., are linked in blog format by Price, Steven Cohen, and Shirl Kennedy."

A Virtual Resource Shelf: New resources, speech transcripts and more

By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor
Poynter Online

"One problem with writing a column about websites is that some sites change their addresses, or worse, go to that big cybergraveyard in the sky. I am often forced to ask the wonderful editor of this column, Julie Moos, to update an old column for me. Here I am needing help again - with a column I wrote in Sept. 2001 about the Speech & Transcript Center based at George Washington University.

Turns out the site is no longer hosted by GWU because its creator, Gary Price, in now on his own. That useful site is now available at his personal site -- with special attention being paid to transcripts dealing with Gulf War II."

A Virtual Resource Shelf: "New resources, speech transcripts and more
By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor
Poynter Online

" One problem with writing a column about websites is that some sites change their addresses, or worse, go to that big cybergraveyard in the sky. I am often forced to ask the wonderful editor of this column, Julie Moos, to update an old column for me. Here I am needing help again - with a column I wrote in Sept. 2001 about the Speech & Transcript Center based at George Washington University.

Turns out the site is no longer hosted by GWU because its creator, Gary Price, in now on his own. That useful site is now available at his personal site -- -- with special attention being paid to transcripts dealing with Gulf War II."

Documents Galore: Reports, studies and more

By Sree Sreenivasan, Columbia Professor & Poynter Visiting Professor
Poynter Online

"Gary Price is a Web hero. He's a mild-mannered librarian who helps tame the Internet for the rest of us. In a 2003 column, I praised his ResourceShelf.com as 'the best way I know of to keep abreast of useful new online resources.'

Price and two of his fellow librarians have now created a way for journalists, researchers, and others to specifically track important documents: DocuTicker.com. Each day, reports and studies from government agencies, think tanks, nonprofits, academics, etc., are linked in blog format by Price, Steven Cohen, and Shirl Kennedy."

OmniMedicalSearch.com - New Medical Metasearch Engine

"OmniMedicalSearch.com, a medical metasearch engine, is open for beta testing. Targeted for both the general public and medical professionals, OmniMedicalSearch.com covers 25 databases including authoritative medical search engines, image libraries and the latest health and medical news."

Via Search Engine Report #93

Searching for The New York Times

Wired
July 14, 2004
By Adam L. Penenberg, assistant professor, New York University, and the assistant director of the Business and Economic Reporting program in the department of journalism.

"'How can the mighty New York Times, which considers itself America's paper of record, be the paper of record in cyberspace when its articles barely show up on Google,' the story asks. The answer is easy. Because the New York Times pulls much of its content behind password protection after about a week. If the page is no longer accessible, people can no longer link to it (which helps with search ranking), and the actual content of the story is lost.

The NYT apparently doesn't care, figuring that the money it makes off of archive sales and database searches is more important than Google traffic. Plus, not mentioned is the fact that many stories will show up within Google News for up to a month through a special crawling deal that's been arranged with Google."

Via SearchEngineWatch

Need to find a NYT article? Don't forget your public or academic library databases! With your library card or university ID, you can search library databases from your home or office. Ask @ your library's Circulation Desk.

Behind the Scenes at Yahoo Labs

By Gary Price, News Editor, SearchEngineWatch
June 24, 2004

"Dr. Gary Flake is Principal Scientist & Head of Yahoo! Research Labs. In this wide-ranging interview, he talks about the daily work of researchers at Yahoo Labs, and what they're doing to make search better."

Part 2

Part 3

A Visual Search Engine for Music

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
July 12, 2004

"Want to find music similar to what you already enjoy? Musicplasma creates intriguing music maps revealing connections between musicians, styles and musical epochs."

The Current Time, Around the World

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
July 19, 2004

"Need to know what time it is in Ouagadougou? Wondering if your colleague on the other side of the planet is awake or asleep? No need to search for it: Timeticker displays the current time for dozens of countries throughout the world."

Meet The Crawlers

By Christine Churchill, SearchEngineWatch
July 21, 2004

"Representatives of Yahoo, Google, Ask Jeeves and Looksmart offer an inside glimpse of recent developments at the major search engines."

A special report from the Search Engine Strategies 2004 Conference, March 1-4, New York City.

The Future of Search

By Andrew Goodman, SearchEngineWatch
July 22, 2004

"Representatives from the world's biggest search engine companies sat down with Danny Sullivan and several hundred of his closest friends to talk about the future of search and information retrieval. The imperative to avoid giving away deep company secrets meant that audience members had to listen extra closely and read between the lines at times."

A special report from the Search Engine Strategies 2004 Conference, March 1-4, New York City.

Major Search Engines and Directories

By Danny Sullivan, Editor, SearchEngineWatch
April 28, 2004

"In the search engine list below, Search Engine Watch provides a guide to the major search engines of the web. Why are these considered to be 'major' search engines? Because they are either well-known or well-used."

Yahoo! Search Starts to Blog

By Zachary Rodgers, ClickZ News
August 19, 2004

"Now Yahoo has a blog, one totally devoted to search and feeling more blog like in informal nature than rival Google's blog. A blogroll and amazingly, comment ability, adds to this. More about the blog here, Yahoo! Search Starts to Blog."
Search Engine Report #94

Tune in to Search Engine Radio for the latest on Search:

Search Engine Radio Talk Show - Tuesdays at 9 AM PDT

"Search Engine Radio is the only Internet talk radio show 100% dedicated to Search. From the best strategies for optimizing your site, to the best software tips for tracking pay-per-click campaigns, to the latest news about Google, tune in to SEORadio.com to keep up on everything about Search."

Tune in to Search Engine Radio for the latest on Search:

Search Engine Radio Talk Show - Tuesdays at 9 AM PDT

"Search Engine Radio is the only Internet talk radio show 100% dedicated to Search. From the best strategies for optimizing your site, to the best software tips for tracking pay-per-click campaigns, to the latest news about Google, tune in to SEORadio.com to keep up on everything about Search."

Recall Toolbar - Search Within The Places You've Been

"Search through the content of web pages you've already visited using this toolbar for Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer already has built in search capabilities like this (push the History button, the use search in the window that appears). This looks to provide a nicer, more search engine-like interface, however."
Search Engine Report #94

Creative Commons RDF-enhanced search

"Want to find material you can use through a Creative Commons license? This new search engine, powered by technology from Nutch, lets you scan the web to do just that."
Search Engine Report #94

Four Things Yahoo Can Do That Google Can't

ResearchBuzz.com
Aug. 17, 2004

"Unlike Google, Yahoo lets you see all links to a particular domain rather than a URL, lets you filter out your own site when doing reverse link lookups, lets you search for more than 10 words in a query and lets you search for RSS/Atom/web feeds. Learn more in the PDF file from Tara Calishain."

Topix Upgrades News, Adds Email Alerts

By Gary Price, News Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 2, 2004

"Topix.net, one of the most useful news aggregators and search tools on the open web, has enhanced its service with a number of new features."

Yahoo Offers Anti-Spyware App

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 10, 2004

"Tired of those unwelcome pests that invade your computer without permission? Banish intrusive spyware and tracking cookies with Yahoo's newly upgraded toolbar."

Capturing Your Personal Web

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 11, 2004

"Forget bookmarks: Web content managers allow you to create your own personal, searchable cache of web pages."

Another Expanded Whois Service

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 12, 2004

"Doing in-depth investigation of a web site? Whois.sc offers a wealth of detail about the people and technology behind just about any web site on the planet."

Lycos Introduces People, Discussion Search Tools

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 23, 2004

"In a bid to differentiate itself from Google and the other major search players, Lycos has rolled out two search tools aimed at helping people connect with other people."

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About URL

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
August 24, 2004

"A new tool from search craftsman Michael Fagan uncovers a hidden wealth of information about virtually any web page."

Amazon's a9 Launches

SearchEngineWatch Blog

"The press is buzzing today with news of the launch of Amazon's a9 search product. Battelle offers an overview. You'll also find stories in the NY Times, News.com, and the SF Chronicle."

Google "Enhances" Local Search

SearchEngineWatch Blog

"Word from the Googleplex today that they've added some new features to Google Local."

Nextaris: An Integrated Web Research Dashboard

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 9, 2004

"Nextaris pulls together all of the tools you need to find, save, and share information with others in a single online location."

Search Engines 201

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 13, 2004

"Want to dive deep -- really deep -- into the technical literature about search engines? Here's a road map to some of the best web information retrieval resources available online."

Delving Deep Inside the Searcher's Mind

By Heather Lloyd-Martin
September 14, 2004

"Which search engines do searchers prefer and why? How do users use search engines to find the information they want? And how do searchers perceive paid versus free listings? New research offers insights into the workings of the searcher's mind."

A special report from the Search Engine Strategies conference, August 2-5, 2004, San Jose, CA.

Swiss Army Knife Meets the Kitchen Sink

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 15, 2004

"Looking for a search toolbar, an RSS reader, online bookmark manager or web research manager? Look no further: Pluck incorporates all of these features into a single, elegant search tool."

Ask Jeeves Serves It Your Way

By Gary Price, News Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 21, 2004

"It's a busy day at Ask Jeeves with the announcement of several new services and enhancements, including the launch of a new personalized search tool and a major upgrade of the company's Teoma search engine."

Is Google News Biased?

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 27, 2004

"Respected online journalism observer J.D. Lasica has penned a thought-provoking piece in the Online Journalism review comparing Google News with Yahoo News. Balancing Act: How News Portals Serve Up Political Stories compares Google News, which uses computer algorithms to identify top stories, and Yahoo News which favors old-fashioned human editors. Lasica wonders, do Google's automated search results display a conservative bias?"

Reducing Information Overkill

By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor & Gary Price, News Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 30, 2004

"Vivisimo has launched Clusty, a meta search engine with an impressive array of tools that helps you quickly find relevant results from a variety of information sources."

Yahoo Introduces Personal Search

Danny Sullivan, SearchDay, Oct. 5, 2004

"Yahoo has enhanced its My Yahoo service with personalization features including search history, the ability to save pages to a 'personal web' and block URLs from appearing in search results. This article is from Chris, who finds personalization at Yahoo is nicely done but underpowered compared to some other similar services and more a good start than a must-use application, in his view.

I'm much more positive and explain why in My Yahoo Search Offers Personal Search Features -- plus
note that Google has no future plans for search memory-style tools to announce at this time. I hope they get them soon, because I'm finding them compelling."

SearchEngineWatch Blog Opens
By Danny Sullivan, Editor, SearchEngineWatch
September 16, 2004

"Our Search Engine Watch Blog is now live, and we hope you'll enjoy this new way for us to communicate about search engines."

A Google-like Portal of the World's Leading Scientists
By Chris Sherman, Associate Editor, SearchEngineWatch
July 28, 2003

"ISIHighlyCited.com calls itself 'an expert gateway to the most highly influential scientists and scholars worldwide,' using similar techniques to Google's PageRank to identify these intellectual leaders. This free search tool makes it easy to identify individuals, departments and laboratories that have made fundamental contributions to the advancement of science and technology over the past several decades."

Why I love... the Wayback Machine
The Guardian

"Since 1996, it has been quietly storing hundreds then thousands then millions then billions of pages of internet content, in order to provide a permanent record of the web as it used to be."

Feedster's New Blog Search Enhances RSS Search Service

"Feedster, Inc., is a rapidly growing Internet RSS search engine that provides easy access to relevant and up-to-date information for both consumers and web service developers. Today, the Company announced its ability to segment search results by source type. The first example of the resulting specialty search engines is found at blogs.Feedster.com."

MSN Does Not Steal Google Results to Seed New Index
Search Engine News Journal
11/15/2004

"Columnist Barry Schwartz is the Editor of Search Engine Roundtable and President of RustyBrick, Inc., a Web services firm specializing in customized online technology that helps companies decrease costs and increase sales."

Free Range Librarian: Tara Calishain's Web Search Garage

"I had a review copy of Tara Calishain's "Web Search Garage," but it vanished in a September household move. And sad I was until her book resurfaced, because I know when Tara's name is on a book that I'm going to like it, and it is all that and then some: fun to read; full of good tips, advice and strategy; accessible, pertinent, and not a bit intimidating. In addition to being a good book for librarians, this is a book I'd feel comfortable recommending to library users looking for a "good book" on searching the Internet. I picked up a few good tips myself. Buy at least two copies and keep one out of circ, in the back where staff can use it. A good book to recommend to patrons for their personal libraries."
Karen Schneider

New and Developing Search Engines
Ariadne Issue 41
October 2004

"Phil Bradley looks at both existing search engines and new ones to bring you up to date on what is happening in the world of Internet search engines."

MSN Search's Beta Blunder
BusinessWeek online
NOVEMBER 12, 2004
NEWS ANALYSIS:TECHNOLOGY
By Jay Greene

Oops -- Microsoft's debut of the first public version of its $100 million search engine didn't quite go according to plan

"Nov. 11 was supposed to be a big day for the folks running MSN Search. The new service, albeit a test version, was slated to launch and begin Microsoft's (MSFT ) big push into the lucrative and competitive world of Internet search technology. But the day didn't start off too well. The site -- http://beta.search.msn.com -- went down almost as soon as it went up."

Google's index nearly doubles.

November 10, 2004

Google updated their blog today to indicate over eight billion pages crawled, cached and indexed.

The New York Times > Technology > Circuits > State of the Art: Google Takes On Your Desktop

October 21, 2004
By DAVID POGUE

"Google showed the world what great searching could look like: incredibly fast, blessedly simple, attractively designed. Unfortunately, it could only search the Web. To search your own files, you had to turn, reluctantly, back to Windows and its dog-slow mutt.

No longer. Last week, Google took the wraps off its latest invention: Google Desktop Search. As the name implies, it's software that applies the famous Google search technology to the stuff on your own hard drive. It's free, it's available right now for Windows XP and 2000 (desktop.google.com), and it's terrific."

The New York Times > Reuters > Technology > Yahoo Unveils Mobile Search, Google Rivalry Rages: October 27, 2004

Mary Ellen Bates - Tip of the Month: Specialized Search Engines June/July 2004