__/ [ Kelsey Bjarnason ] on Monday 19 March 2007 02:28 \__
> A simple search (some will recall the genesis of this...) for the term
> "hot black body" (minus quotes).
>
> All three come up with links to various physics articles and a wikipedia
> page on the subject.
>
> Live search takes until the third item to deviate, listing "Hot Body -
> Swimwear> JETS BLACK LABEL".
>
> Yahoo bails on the second, with "Hot Body Special - Black is Beautiful -
> Rotten Tomatoes".
>
> Google, by contrast, had the entire first page (10 links) linking to
> relevant pages.
>
> On another search, this time for "short skits" - not skirts, skits - we
> have the following...
>
> Live wants to know if we're looking for short skirts, but comes up with a
> page of links to skits, not skirts.
>
> Yahoo wants to know if we we're looking for short skirts, assumes we are
> and promptly spews a handful of links to short skirts... then follows up
> with links to short skits.
>
> Google doesn't even ask; it just gives us links to short skits.
>
> One more: "spam". Ignoring sponsored links, Live's first two links are to
> pages about the food. Yahoo's first is, the second is about UCE. Google
> goes the other way; the first two links are to UCE, the third is to a page
> about the food.
>
> On the whole, looks like Google, not Yahoo or Live, is getting things
> right. Is it any wonder they're the search leader?
A couple of years ago, Google experimented with the idea of tracking clicks,
as means of optimising SEPRs, or even personalising results based on
individuals' profiles. They even filed a patent, for something which is
fairly trivial. They used a subset (an experiment), which they have now
extended to a fully-blown thing (see how they use URL redirections). That
may explain why they get many results just /right/. Microsoft needs momentum
here, which is why it pays businesses to provide "data". On top of that,
they intend to use IE7's phishing feature to collect information about all
the pages people visit. They can learn about the 'status' of pages, based on
Windows/IE users alone. This was mentioned quietly by an exec from Microsoft
at some conference. Don't be surprised when Microsoft pays people to have
IE7 installed (it's already banned in some places), or pays OEMs to
preinstall toolbars and links to Live services. The recent departure of the
most recent execs in this Division is an implication that prospects are
poor. But they keep fighting for survivial in this crucial transitory phase
toward the next wave of computing, which makes use of distributed data
(Web), rather than your desktop alone. I have not used a file manager in
about a week. Everyhing I need (data) is on the Web.
--
~~ Best wishes
Roy S. Schestowitz | The most satisfying eXPerience is UNIX
http://Schestowitz.com | Open Prospects ¦ PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
Tasks: 137 total, 1 running, 132 sleeping, 0 stopped, 4 zombie
http://iuron.com - knowledge engine, not a search engine
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