Yahoo Patent Filing Sheds Light On PageRank

Yahoo Patent Filing Sheds Light On PageRank

By Jason Lee Miller - Wed, 01/16/2008 - 12:50pm.

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, SEO, Google, SEM

About the author:
Jason Lee Miller is a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology.

Comments

Submitted by Bill Ross (WPN reader) on Tue, 05/13/2008 - 11:46am.

hmmmm

I think this could be a good starting point for yahoo to pull itself out of the hell it has slipped into. Although "page rank" means very little if the incoming links are not engineered properly.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Sun, 05/04/2008 - 3:42pm.

I prefer google better, it

I prefer google better, it gives me better top ten exposure for all of my search keywords, yahoo give me different results.

Submitted by ferhat (WPN reader) on Thu, 05/01/2008 - 3:43pm.

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Submitted by Hyena Cialis (WPN reader) on Mon, 03/31/2008 - 1:12am.

Yahoo vs Goo gle

Goo gle is better than Yahoo right now...

But when Yahoo merge with Microsoft...

Goo gle will become extinct!

Submitted by Page Rank Info (WPN reader) on Fri, 03/28/2008 - 11:30pm.

Page Rank Info

Well the page rank algorithm is changing constantly. So, it doesn't matter if YAHOO says that it isn't that good. Because nobody cares what yahoo thinks because their search engine SUCKS!! lol.

Submitted by web design ireland (WPN reader) on Sun, 03/16/2008 - 8:06pm.

google tops

while yahoo has some good features site explorer for one, if your running an online business you have to focuses your attention on big G , the multitude of apps available from your google account far out weigh anything yahoo offers,and as the big player in the search game if your not focusing there your not doing yourself any favours

Submitted by Sharon (WPN reader) on Fri, 02/08/2008 - 4:04pm.

Google vs Yahoo

...I'd take Google any day.

Submitted by Danny (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/25/2008 - 3:12pm.

We love Yahoo

Yahoo has been around a lot longer then Johnny come lately Google. Google does well in searches but now Yahoo just made an adjustment and is above Google. Yahoo has far better News, e-mail, social aspects, video IM messenger, yellow page look up, travel and hundreds of other things that Google does not have. Google will not know how to handle their first problem when it comes up. Yahoo has been through it and will once again rise up and beat google and leave sorry google in the dust.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Mon, 01/21/2008 - 8:37pm.

search engine

What make a compitition better, make a search and result better.

what about msn. visit optimization page in 123ecommerce.net, the secret is not easy to catch.

Submitted by Lana (WPN reader) on Mon, 01/21/2008 - 5:10am.

Yahoo Google comparison

I think Yahoo is a far better search engine. It always delivers consistent relevant results. The question here really should be...Can Google ever catch up with Yahoo and become a major portal? Yahoo is the number 1 site on the internet, and it has been for a long long time! I don't think Yahoo has anything to worry about.

Submitted by Seth (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 1:22pm.

Yahoo already caught Google long ago

Yahoo delivers higher quality search results already. Google's results are great if you are looking for the site that bought their way on to Google. If you are not willing to play their game then good luck. Hat's off to Google for "monetizing" the web. But I have a nice little business and I only rank on Yahoo. I stopped trying to rank on Google a long time ago. #1 on Yahoo and #9 on Google. The 8 sites above are usually never relevant and most of them are indian scraper sites of my site with a bazillion links from other scraper sites. Goooooogle s s s s sucks.

Submitted by Marvin (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 12:49pm.

Competition is a Good Thing

Regarless of what one thinks of Google or Yahoo, competition is the only way to keep the game going forward. Google is often critized for being a bully when it comes to page rank. One can argue the case either way and still not have a commonly agreed point of view.

It can be tough for those of us who have to contend with getting or keeping page rank, regarless of who you favor. One thing is pretty much certain, what ever happens between Google and Yahoo will keep the SEO community busy for some time to come.

It also important to note that the search engine game is an open field where anyone can play. If someone comes along with a better mouse trap the world will quickly beat a path to their door.

Submitted by Rick Horvath (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 9:43am.

Why Google Anyway?

I realy hate to Google, always have. Most site owners thing that by ranking high in Google they have a great site. Just getting ranked anywhere is a task nowadays. But more importantly is getting people over to your site, be it through Google, Yahoo!, Ask or even MSN pathetic attempt at a search engine.

The programming behind a search engine is not magic. What search engines should really do is delete all the old and irrelevant sites from years back. There's so much junk returned, most are just link sites of no importance.

I say hats off to Yahoo! Don't let Google bother you.

Their site is much more than a search engine, the way it should be.

ps - please read here for more info about Google's bad business practices:

www.noodleware.com/adsense/

Submitted by Jaspert (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 6:36am.

Another point of view

If you are not lazy Yahoo is interesting because you get much more results, especially from people who don't care so much about how they'r ranked, more social.. On the other hand when you have a well ranked Site Google will be more satisfying as your site will be in the first 10 instead of the first 100 in Yahoo !

I am not an engineer neither a businessman, (plus I write broken english).. But I can tell you : You take all that ranking stuff to serious! That is because you are all trying to sell the same stuff..

The competition can be won once and for all if you do your very own thing. Sit back, relax and find your own way, it is right in front of you, the easy one

Take me as an example: I am a painter and I paint on the cobblestones of Paris..This way I have no competitor at all, I am just the best contemporary art cobblestones of Paris rock painter ever in the entire universe !jaspert.free.fr

Thanks,

Stephane

Submitted by Shane Carter (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 7:22pm.

Selling Out

First Yahoo and then Google became the peoples champions against the might of Microsoft, offering equality in the search results. Each in turn has attended to the making of a profit, which is fair and to be expected but in doing do has forgotten the spirit of the search. Results were once mixed with junk that made good reading and encouraged scrutiny to gain the best results. Complaints meant they focused on giving people the quick answer through businesses that would pay for sponsorship or improved listing positioning, and in doing so removed the cognitive design of the human mind. Lazy surfers love the easy approach yet fail to realise that their actions have played firmly into the hands of big business at the expence of the smaller or more localised traders. I am not saying that sponsored listings should be stopped, far from it, but something certainly does need to be done to put the fun of the search back into the system, afterall it is the surfers that matter most - not the companies tempting with large cheques.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 4:49pm.

Yahoo vs. Google????

Yahoo is so far behind as it is. You can even PUT THE NAME of a .COM website in there...and IT STILL WON'T SHOW UP ANYWHERE. As I read on this blog...Yahoo is useless...both for businesses and users who are searching for them.

Submitted by Jason Brown (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 3:46pm.

Yahoo

A good thing about constant changes to the algorithms is that those who stay on top of the trends are rewarded.

Submitted by ByREV (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 3:20pm.

Live is better

Yahoo crawl sites with 5-10 boots and google with only 1 :) maybe this is the "secret" ;) Yahoo is not good. Not for me !

and for video or images content, live.com is the king.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 2:00pm.

Yahoo vs. Google

Google's algorhythm isn't the biggest reason they are competing so well against Yahoo. Google has a HUGE advantage in that they don't charge you for inclusion in their directory. Yahoo didn't used to when they started out, but then they got greedy. And that's when Google took over.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 1:42pm.

Yahoo is CLUELESS

I believe Yahoo is clueless. They have changed the system so many times they forgot what is most important - relevant search results !!!!
Most of the keywords deliver nothing but junk. The index quality is pale in comprising to Google. Yahoo will never catch

http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=720144
On 12/13/07 we had no choice but to stop all our ad campaigns and our client's campaigns on Yahoo Ads. As well as notify our colleagues and ask them to start an investigation on this issue. We believe Yahoo company is involved in committing fraud against its own advertisers. We have documented several occasions where we have bid and started to pay for a keyword. Immediately the page rank that was #10 under the same term has disappeared or dropped down dramatically to position #30. This appears to be be done purposely in order to drain the yahoo ads account funds faster. Ultimately creating major revenue for the company. Basically if you have a good rank on the term and you decide to buy the term to appear in sponsored links also, you are guaranteed to loose your great rank and other ranks. Our site had ranked always 5-12 under term auditions since the year 2000. Since we signed up with yahoo ads and bid on some terms we lost ranks. The damage that was caused from by this drop has been estimated in well over 100,000 dollars because we have lost traffic. In fact we only spent about $500 on ads monthly and lost $10000 monthly because of that. So is it really worth it ? On another note Yahoo is involved in commiting fraud against its own advertisers.

Submitted by Advanced Internet Marketing (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 1:42pm.

Paid Inclusion Skews Results

In my opinion, the quality of Yahoo!'s search algorithm is irrelevant as long as they continue to skew their results so heavily toward their paid inclusion program.

Submitted by Tag Directory (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 1:30pm.

Where is the competition of Google?...

The domination of Google in the Search Engine field would deserve a heavy weight response from the competition and - why not? - a more accurate evaluation of every internal and external link.

Submitted by jobsearch (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:53pm.

Can Yahoo Catch Google? - I Dont Think So!

It would be really great if yahoo could take a serious slice of the search engine market and actually manage to produce some relevant results. The problem is that although Yahoo doesnt like to think it has a problem with SPAM sites it does. You only need to look at any search term and the vast majority of the results after the first page are sub domains starting with the keyword. Whatever floors that Google may have (and there are quite a few) they still produce fairly acurate relevant results (although they do have a tendency of throwing out good sites as well as bad ones in their attempt to beat spam).

Submitted by Fubar (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 1:47pm.

Attending to their own policies...

In my experience as a paid advertiser on almost all of the existing search engines, I realize the massive benefits I receive when the search engines actually follow their own policies. For instance, Google and Yahoo both have a "double serving policy" or a policy that keeps one company from creating multiple identities through different looking websites and advertising on the same keywords. In the data industry, there is a large group of websites created by the same company who blanket the paid results, which ends up devaluing the search results for visitors because they are selling the same product in the end. Google has been proactive in finding links between these websites, knocking them off one by one when they find another link, but Yahoo (who has the exact same policy) has very reluctantly listened to my complaints and has continually avoided doing anything about the situation. Once Yahoo takes their paid advertisers seriously and starts to follow their own policies, then and only then will they be moving closer to being a class-act search engine like Google.

Submitted by Wendy (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:45pm.

Yahoo

I like Yahoo better, it gives me better top ten exposure for all of my search keywords, google is taking forever.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:41pm.

Would that mean the rich get richer?

surely if they will be adding a measure of user frequency that would mean the rich will get richer all the time and the poor poorer – imagine trying to get a new site included, you would never be able to compete against older sites regardless of content or links.

Submitted by Logan (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:40pm.

They won't catch up.

Even if yahoo's search is more accurate they won't catch up. People are used to googling things. It has become "the search engine." Too many programs have google search bars interwoven in their pages.

Submitted by Self Taught SEO (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:36pm.

Yahoo! is Doing What Goolge Has Already Done

In some instances I like Yahoo! seach results over Google search results, but for some reason I still use Google search heavily and put more focus on ranking in Google. This is because Google has leveraged itself as a search company or THE search company, while Yahoo! is more of a portal -- news, email, chat, groups, social, etc. with search just being another portal widget.

Anyway, with that said, I believe Yahoo! is light years behind Google when it comes to search technology, and if they are attempting to counter act on Google PageRank technology then they already taking the wrong approach, because they plan to create a PageRank algorithm which is the complete opposit of Google technology. This is wrong for many reasons, but the main reason is because Google is a powerful company who employs top engineers, this mean everything Yahoo! is about to try has either already been done or been tested and most likely proven to be a failure, since Google themselves is not coding their algo in this type of way.

Instead Yahoo! should trail and follow exactly how Google PageRank work and improve upon that, otherwise they will be just trying what already has been done and will continue to be lightyears behind Google if they keep trying to go against the grain. Plus, Yahoo! like to share their data to the public so they need to take into consideration the fact if they provide PageRank in a certain manner it may make it easily exploited for SEO. I applaud Yahoo! efforts, but I think they should rethink their strategy and go about this the right way.

Submitted by Reedy-Web (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:24pm.

Simply put...

Google is more widely known and used. It's simpler. I personally feel that no matter what Yahoo may do, it will never match or beat Google's traffic and popularity. I feel it will take a newcomer, a new name to gather attraction and attention. Yahoo looks like a news site and Google looks like a search site, so most people will go to Google to search. It's human nature. - Thank you.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:02pm.

Google vs Yahoo

cmon, gimme a break. Google is a household word because of good advertisement, but their search results have never been better than Yahoo and as a multi-BILLION dollar industry leader that literally DESTROYS small businesses online aspirations and achievements with no accountability whatsoever whenever they change their holy algorithm, Google will be the cause of future legislation to prevent Google-like activities: Using small business owners as lab rats in their algorithmic science experiments.

Submitted by miharb (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:36pm.

secret of google rank

Hi! if yahoo want to rank better than google, so they have to be back time and establish the strategie for internet. at the time google take advance of all other shearch engine. they establish the way and the algorithme of search, they keep it secret, they do it more complicated, so the other can't bid.

Submitted by Valdis Krebs (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 11:51am.

Room for improvement

Google's PageRank is not perfect, but is it "good enough"? People tend to be very happy with simple "good enough" solutions, that they have gotten used to. Like Windows, Google may be hard to dislodge, even by a better solution. Yet, with Duncan Watts on Yahoo's research staff, you can expect some new thinking and application/creation of various social network analysis algorithms to refine link weight and link patterns. Duncan has a rep for creative work and shaking up existing paradigms. I am happy to see these two titans battle it out for algorithmic supremacy!

Submitted by Tim_Myth (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 11:29am.

Two things:

First of all, it is time that human behavior played a part in the ranking of results. Think in terms of real world businesses. If I'm a tour guide, I'd pay very close attention to what tourists were looking for and how long they spent at each location in the pursuit of their desire. For example, if they are looking for "low priced consumer goods", and spend 3 seconds at a "Joe's Crab Shack", I can pretty safely assume "Joe's Crab Shack" is not a place one would find "low priced consumer goods". If they spend 30 minutes at "S-Mart", then I can start assuming that "S-Mart" is a probable location of "low priced consumer goods". Or another example, if a tourist wants "cheap beer" and "live music", and they spend 10 minutes at "Joe's Crab Shack" but then spend 2 hours at "Juke Joint Jezebels", then I would start to assume that "Juke Joint Jezebels" is a better place to find "cheap beer" and "live music". The number of billboards saying 'Eat at Joe's' should have little or no effect on my assumptions even though it may have a huge effect on the number of people who visit "Joe's Crab Shack". This is how Google started out. Back in the day, guys in the know put up links to sites they liked. The more links a site had, the more we could assume that it was worthwhile. In those days, the site owners who placed links were the tour guides. It was up to them to filter the good, bad, and ugly. Now, we can't be so trusting of site owners because enough of them are on the take, that they direct us to businesses that maybe aren't as useful but have paid a fee for the link. So, time to quit polling the tour guides and be your own tour guide. In other words, if you can't trust website owners, you can do one of two things, try to develop algorithms that determine a site's trustworthiness or you can ignore the links on the site entirely and pay attention to what really counts: end-users. Second, Yahoo needs to realize that Search is more of a cultural arms race than a technological race. Let's face it, Google returns good results and so does Yahoo. Improving results won't mean much in and of itself. You must also win hearts and minds through product placement. Preinstall toolbars on new PCs, pay studios to use Yahoo screenshots in movies, cross promote with Doritos, etc. Create the image that Yahoo is cool. Yahoo is smart! Yahoo is not a bloated corporation that is fighting The Man by becoming The Man. Yahoo is doing its own thing because volition is what counts. Yeah, or something like that. :D

Submitted by sell to rent back (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 11:55am.

SEO changes human review

Hi I have been building websites and seo for 7 years now and have recently built http://www.sellhouserentback.co.uk I really believe Yahoo are ready to take google on in terms of search relevance by not just counting links to rank a site. I believe human reviews are being undertaken by google who have employed some 200 part time people to manually view the top 10 pages of listings. The web is coming of age now where only the properly built sites with relevant links into it and traffic that benefits the end user are ranking well. This is good as it will through out the cheap skate spammers and companies fro the top 10. When this is the case professional seo people will be able to charge the right money and get some value in the work that they do as it is specialized and not readily available.

Submitted by Frederick E. Smith (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 11:22am.

Yahoo's ability to create algorithms

Don't use google, so can't say what they Yahoo folks might be able to improve, but if their ability to keep spammers out of the Yahoo Chat Rooms is any indication, they've lost before they've even begun. The current system of random password access to chat rooms was compromised within an hour of implementation. And the lack of ability to create private chat rooms for users ensures the users will be continually harassed by spam. Yahoo should concentrate on improving its basic services before branching out into the competitive business market. Eliminate spam, then you'll have something to brag about.

Submitted by Seth (WPN reader) on Fri, 01/18/2008 - 1:28pm.

Yahoo needs to eliminate spam?

You are telling Yahoo to eliminate spam? What about Google? My friend Google IS the biggest spammer known to man!

Submitted by Peter (IMC) (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:45pm.

What do you mean, you don't use Google?

You don't use Google????

Submitted by Guest Tfourl (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:50am.

SEO

Google seems to be good about finding my name and site and then redirecting to another url of their determination. While MSN and Yahoo! can at least find me in another domain and direct me to the proper url MSN Yahoo!, Google, whchever. So I hope Yahoo! is successful in their research. I also hope they don't plan to charge for it. Enjoyed the topic...

Submitted by OPTW (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:39am.

Sounds good but...

The ideas that Yahoo are proposing sound good enough but are somewhat hard to implement. For example, if a link is weighted based on how often it is followed doesn't that mean that links that are high in the SERPs are harder to catch? When launching a new website your links will have very little weight. This may result in more sites being purchased for their links rather then then content.

Submitted by Ina Stanley (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:38am.

Yahoo has more than search to worry about...

I have been a member of Yahoo! for years, since I was teen. While I absolutely adore what they've done with Yahoo! Mail, and can't speak highly of much else. In my opinion, Yahoo! has much more to worry about than beating Google at the search game. According to one of WebProWorld's latest and most popular forum posts, Yahoo! sucks in the customer service and tech support departments when it comes to actually getting a website listed in the directory or search results. My story is a bit different. Their Small Business website builder & tools also suck, as well as customer service and tech support for that. I had used Yahoo! previously for my own business website, a site which I had coded from the ground up and worked several long months and sleepless nights on. In the middle of my services, I had to switch credit cards (finally got approved for a business credit card), but Yahoo! never seemed to register the change. The took my site down, and took almost 4 months to get back to me, only to say that it was my fault I hadn't paid the bill, and that they're system would have registered if I'd changed the information legitimately. Then another response said that if I could provide a valid credit card and pay for the months during which there had been no payment (unfair, as my site wasn't even up during this time), that they'd unsuspend my account and my website would return. Though I was upset, I did just that. Months later, I still had no website (though my domain, registered through Yahoo!, still seemed to be unavailable) but was being consistently charged. The final word was that my website had been dismantled and no longer existed in their database, and that I couldn't re-register my domain until it expired. Even if Yahoo! had the best results out there, it wouldn't change how crappy their service & support is. It's all a part of the business guys, you can't just focus on one aspect and expect to come out on top! I'm a big fan of Google's search results. It is rare that I ever find anything irrelevant, which is more than I can say for both Yahoo! and MSN (especially MSN). I'll believe this whole thing when I see it. Right now, Google's results just seem more valid, they seem to be indexing sites faster and offering much more than just text results with a few videos thrown in. Good luck to Yahoo!, but they've got some large shoes to fill if they're serious about beating Google!

Submitted by Guest TfourL (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:55am.

coustomer support?

Either I'm misssinng something been hacked or jacked cause Google is way behinnd in coustomer support. Especially in the area of "Groups". I would rank Google third in groups support with Yahoo! being number 1 and MSN a real close Number 2...But hey I don't know everything perhaps you can refut me. Regards, TfourL

Submitted by Peter (IMC) (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 12:43pm.

customer support?

Well,... I don't know much about the additional services of the others. I just know that with Google and adwords, adsense and the like: All you have to do is send a message using the forms they give and you get replied really fast and generally your problem is solved.

That Yahoo site builder crap is so incredible complicated (maybe not difficult but it is complicated) and the resulting website will never rank anywhere.

Google is the number 1 for me as customer support starts already with the product. And nobody can beat google at the quality of their products. Somehow they just manage to keep things so simple it's never a challenge to learn how to use it.

Take for example Google sketchup... I love that software. I have used AutoCad, which is the best Cad Software as far as I know. But you do need to learn how to use it. Ofcourse AutoCad has many more features than the simple Google Sketchup software, but still. I can build great house designs in Google sketchup.

Google just understands users like nobody.

Submitted by Peter (IMC) (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:27am.

Why just compare to PageRank

How simple are these Yahoo guys? Almost all the stuff described in the article above is already incorporated into the Google algorithms. And also in most Yahoo algorithms I guess. Weighting anchor text more heavily? These Yahoo Guys should hire some SEO's... :) Anchor text is like the second most important factor in Google (after titles) and in some cases even the most important factor. The complaints about Pagerank are selective. If you ignore all the other Google algorithms then Yahoo would be right. and even more focus on personalized search? Just imagine,... A teenager saying: Mom,.. I found this very good website with some great clothes. Just search for "whatever keyword" in Yahoo and you'll find it in the top 5.... So mom does the search, but doesn't find it because Yahoo thinks she's too old for teenage clothing. Google doesn't seem to be that much interested in real personalization. Yahoo shouldn't either!

Submitted by Peter (IMC) (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:13am.

Better or More of the Same doesn't resolve anything

I don't get it. Why do people try to be better than Google? Does anyone really believe you can make search results better than the Google search results? If you claim that you actually believe that what ever Google is showing now, are the wrong results. Does anyone seriously believe that the Google search results are wrong? Don't talk about a specific keyword where 1 result was bad. That is completely rediculous. If you want to claim to have better algorithms than Google, then you need to come up with algorithms that put completely different websites in the top results. And then you need to be really sure that everybody is going to agree that those sites are better than the ones Google came up with. I guess it is already clear. Nobody can say that the Google results are wrong. Sure you can come up with some examples where it could be better, but in general,.... the Google results are just fine. So if you want to do something against Google, you have no freaking chance in the world if you try it by being better at what they do. Even if you were better, the differences are so small nobody is going to care. So if you want to be better than Google, you need to be different from Google. Not in your algorithms, but in your search logic and more importantly, in your presentation. But all the big ones are just trying really hard to copy Google. Yahoo and MSN, they look just like Google,... just sad. But at the same time,... not so strange they just can't compete.

Submitted by Andrew K H Tan (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:33am.

Human Expected Results Appear In Google

As matter of fact I love Google so much cos it allows website owner to submit for free. So much for DMOZ, Yahoo Human edited industry biased editors. And talk about MSN it's not much of an WAN search engine rather than a search engine algo to search out the files on your PC. Let's take thing in a joke if I was a navigator in the vast World Wide Web. With Google I get to park my browser and have to click walk a little further to reach my destination. With Yahoo I get to park my browser in a jumbo parking lot and maze click into million shop lots to get into oblivion. With MSN I get to fly my browser into the Bermuda Triangle and don't know where is everything. With DMOZ I already know those URL why use a search ? dummy editors ? LOL

Submitted by chris (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:07am.

Yahoo better already

I think Google has simply been coasting on hype for awhile now. I actually find google to be one the worst in returning relevant results. Even I tend to use it often just because we get calls from new clients who can't find themselves in google. I then continue to use until I relaize I'm getting crappy results and then switch back to yahoo.

Submitted by Macouno (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 10:07am.

Google

Google is so big and engrained as a search engine that it is next to impossible to compete against it. The future lies with behaviour? google is already there with context sensitive ads, behavioural suggesting and direct response analysis. Neural networks applied to search engines? google got there and got the t-shirt. Wake up Yahoo and tried to focus on what makes you distinct, not extinct.

Submitted by Guest (WPN reader) on Thu, 01/17/2008 - 3:35pm.

Yahoo vs Google

well google may be big but I am not overly impressed. I submitted a new site that was picked up by a lot of major search engines including Yahoo but despite submission has never been crawled by Google. So I say jump on it Yahoo!

Yahoo Patent Filing Sheds Light On PageRank

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