DMOZ, also known as the open directory project, is the largest human edited directory in the world and one of the most ‘trusted’ link directories on the internet.

However, in recent years it’s been steadily falling in popularity and the search engines no longer regard it as highly as they once did. More importantly for users, search engines have become progressively smarter and more sophisticated, which means that human edited directories like DMOZ aren’t as important.

Earlier today, an advertisement for Firefox appeared on Google’s homepage. While that isn’t really too remarkable, the ad featured an “optimized for Google” tagline, which is interesting. To complicate matters, an ad for an “optimized for Google” version of IE7 has appeared among certain Google search results, as well.

Editorial links are…well, editorial links.

Optimizing a website for misspelled words is often recommended by many people within the search engine optimization SEO community.

Back in November, Google’s business product manager for trust and safety, Shuman Ghosemajumder, declared that click fraud at Google was “on average is in the single digits, quarter over quarter.”

Dodge Caravan Peanut Butter & Jams Kids Concerts C’mon, you were wondering too. I wanted to make a lyre joke but remembered some people have zero sense of humor.

Defying the third-party firms that sell themselves to customers amid claims of greater incidents of click fraud, as much as 20 or 30 percent, a Google executive claimed the actual rate is only about 2 percent.

Last week’s Search Engine Strategies conference was jam packed with information, networking, some fun and a little business too. What I like about conferences in Chicago is that it’s only an hour flight from Minneapolis, so I can leave on the last day of the conference and get home at a decent time. These days with a growing family and the biz, I need all the productive time I can get.

I’m often sent media releases about new search engines or software that all claim to be a first in the industry for something.

Keith Patterson is the CEO and visionary behind Itensil, Inc., a web 2.0 software firm that develops web 2.0 user interface technology and provides a hosted service called Itensil Team Activity Manager.

Stacy Williams is a long time search marketer in Atlanta and I’ve known her and partner/husband Matt for about 3 years.

Working a booth at a trade show is surely the worst possible way to assess the direction and state of an industry.

I’ve casually known Laura Thieme of BizResearch for about 2 years but for some reason our paths crossed repeatedly at the recent Chicago Search Engine Strategies conference.

After I wrote about a HTTP compression module in ASP.NET 2.0 one of my colleagues pointed out that the Deflate compression is faster than GZip.

As a 28 year-old writing professional, instant messaging is a foregone conclusion to the scope of my work. Every moment of my working day is spent logged in to the IM client that we employ to communicate with each other here in the office, as well as to get quick quotes and information from sources.

A new Google service has been spotted; it might issue tests and exams to students. The service could quiz potential job candidates, as well. Or it could do something else entirely, or even die before it ever makes it out of the developmental stage, but screenshots of Google Online Assessments have proven that the service is, in fact, real.

What was pretty much a non-issue less than a year ago has the Federal Trade Commission scratching its head and asking for guidance – finally. The FTC announced it would be hosting a public workshop on “Broadband Connectivity Competition Policy” in Washington, DC in February.

About twenty advertisers are taking part in a new beta test of Google Audio Ads, ClickZ writes.

As expected, shopping online continues to rise year over year, up four percent in total. Nielsen//NetRatings reports that from the end of October this year through the first week of December, the metrics company’s Holiday eShopping Index grew by 43 percent.

Of all the humbug things to do at Christmas. A seller on eBay taught his kids a lesson last year (one they’ll be describing to a therapist one day) by putting an empty Nintendo GameCube box under the tree, wrapped up in sadism, and is encouraging others to do the same to fix their spoiled kids. This year, he’s selling a Wii box. The starting bid is $1.29, plus $20 for shipping the rocks that come with.

For those who remember reading Jon Udell in InfoWorld back when everyone in tech read big, ad-laden trade journals, he’s leaping off the fading flower of print for the emerald green fields of the Internet.

An AP-AOL study reveals some surprising, and not so surprising, data about instant messaging.

I’ve arrived home from Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2006. We snuck out of the hotel at 8:20 am while it was still quiet and empty of the hordes of people from what appeared to be two conferences going on there.

SEO Question: I rank #3 in Google for one of my core keywords and yet I am nowhere in it for Yahoo!. Why?