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Yahoo Patent Filing Sheds Light On PageRank


Finds fault with Google's Secret Sauce

As complex as Google's PageRank may be, search experts at Yahoo seem to think it's not complex enough. Based on patent filings, Yahoo is dabbling in ranking algorithms that incorporate more user behavior data in advance of the company's next run at toppling Google's haloed relevance.

Yahoo Patent Filing Sheds Light On PageRank

Seeing will be believing when it happens, of course, as Google is highly secretive about how its search engine calculates PageRank. If history is any indication, they're already way ahead on behavioral factoring.

Nonetheless, Yahoo can afford the best search engineers in the business (if they can get them before Google does, anyway) and the patent filings shed some light on how PageRank is currently calculated and ways it might be improved in the future.

Bill Slawski, Director of Search Marketing at KeyRelevance, goes into painstaking detail of Yahoo's user data challenges at his SEObytheSea blog. Patent language, especially when dealing with algorithms, can be confusing and dense, so we'll just highlight a few interesting points and leave the lexicographical deciphering to you.

Some Yahoo assumptions about PageRank and flaws associated:

  • Internal and external links are often weighed equally even though internal links can be less reliable and more self-promotional. Some links, like disclaimer links, are rarely followed.
  • PageRank ignores that webpages are often purchased and repurposed, decay or become less valuable over time at variable rates.
  • Current calculations, like TrustRank, are engineered more to combat webspam than to reflect actual user behavior.
  • Sometimes PageRank deals with links in bulk, aggregating according host or domain, also known as blocked PageRank.

What Yahoo plans to do about it:

  • Measure link weight – influenced by the frequency with which users follow a link
  • Note when links are ignored and users leave (teleport) to another page of their choosing
  • Calculate the probability that a user stops and reads a webpage rather than views it and moves on.
  • Incorporate user data into the algorithm – "User Sensitive PageRank could reflect "the navigational behavior of the user population with regard to documents, pages, sites, and domains visited, and links selected."
  • Personalize PageRank based on demographic information – age, gender, income, user location)
  • Emphasize recent information
  • Weigh anchor text more heavily – the patent filing calls anchor text "one of the most useful features used in ranking retrieved Web search results"


   


 

News Tags: Search, Yahoo, Google, SEO, SEM
About the author:
Jason Lee Miller is a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology.

115 Comments

Pagerank

Do people care about page rank anymore?

Yahoo

Nonetheless, Yahoo can afford the best search engineers in the business (if they can get them before Google does, anyway) and the patent filings shed some light on how PageRank is currently calculated and ways it might be improved in the future.

No way!

I can not agree on the issue of yahoo! There is great difference between yahoo and googles visitors and i do not think that yahoo will play much role in next few years!
Matty from buy home cotton candy machine

Hills washing lines thinks yahoo isnt serious

What is yahoo? we get very minimal traffic from them as compared with google even though we rank well on both. Who care what yahoo thinks or does, it all over for them in my mind.

article

There absolutely no way Yahoo can beat Google on this one, trust me. But nice article, thanks!

Yahoo relevant?

Can the Yahoo search become relevant? I don't know. The momentum is so strong with Google I wonder if there is anything Yahoo can do to turn the tide.

We all root for the underdog at a movie but in real life we shop at Walmart and search with Google.

Rick

Yahoo hoo

Who is yahoo? Only google registers with me. I cant see yahoo going the distance. Eva heard the term, " Just Google it". Case closed.

Sydney clotheslines doesnt use yahoo

At Sydney clotheslines we dont care what yahoo does as we dont think they turn us any profit. Google make us lots of money but Yahoo barely registers. We are in Australia so i imagine that we have more google users than yahoo ones compared to nations like the usa. Yahoo are a thing of the past in Australia and their search results are terrible. In Australia anyway.

Relevant anymore?

Is this releavant anymore? just curious

I guess

Well I guess it is all pretty actual now because PageRank is patented technology and google is based on that

its relevant

at least to the article writer it is.

I support it much

When there are competitors in a business, there will be no monopoly. If yahoo can make it true the soonest, it will surely be a happy news for bloggers who have need fed up with Google's PageRank update

good news

Highly Recommend!

Google eyed!

Thanks guys. Another great article on our big bro! The future is always an unknown but at least you guys can guide us a little heads up with news from the present status quo.

indonesian spammer.

What is with the "I very much visit more your site much good, I like to spam your site very much thankyou" spammer from Indonesia?

Every comment is the same, on every page. lol, pretty funny and ironic really.

Could at least be original like the rest of us, haha.

Isn't this insane?

Because Google thinks that leaving addresses in blogs, however useless (of course, it's not the case of this one), instead of being adding useful contents to my website, I'm here make some dumb comment only to leave a signature.

Isn't this insane?

CM

http://viajar.clix.pt

Isn't this insane?

I have a question. Does leaving your website link on another's site increase your rating if the site is relevant to your site? Does relevance count here?

Isn't this insane?

I know what you mean. I do not, however, do not agree that the links that we leave are useless. It all depends upon where you leave them. One of my links is responsible for 90% of all of my sales.

thanks for your article.

thanks for your article. Very help me. I will more like visit to webpronews site. :) Fantastic

thanks ,,,,      

thanks ,,,,

 

 

 

Sounds great but...

Sometime there is still no sense in Yahoo results, especially in foreign languages. To be said that for me results indicate lower quality after recent updates. Perhaps they should keep things simple and focus to improve some basics.

Great article

I think in its basic stage the google PR algoritm looked something like the yahoo algorithm.

Yahoo Improvements

I have personally noticed improvements with Yahoo over the last couple of updates. Wonder if they can imporve their search to the point where they can compete?

Better Search Results

I think this needs to be implemented. They have the ability to track what links are actually clicked on - which is relevant. If they can tell if most users click back out rapidly, meaning it's a garbage webpage, then obviously that link should be ignored or devalued.

These types of systems can still be 'gamed', but it'll be harder to do - and that's a good thing.

 

 

 

thanks for that post there ;)

thanks for that post there ;)

Unlikely help

I have no idea how Yahoo can talk about the shortcomings of the Google pagerank algo when Yahoo has a difficult time even keeping search relevant imho.

Great info

This is definitly a eye opener when it comes to page rank

Yahoo Page Rank

I use Yahoo as my search of choice and only use Google when I need additional info.  I liked their plans for link weight especially in regards to internal links.  I like the idea of letting my customers help determine the ranking of my internal pages. 

www.ezgooglerank.com

Need backlinks? Need pagerank? Let a Google Tech Move your website to Number 1 on any search engine!  http://www.ezgooglerank.com

Yahoo??

Google is obviously dominating the search engine world. And, I really don't see how can somebody replace them. Just look in what are they involved... They are definitely not just a search engine anymore...

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