Friday, May 21, 2004

FindForward as RSS

You can now get FindForward search results (which are taken from Google using the Google Web API) as your own RSS feed. Simply go to FindForward, enter a term, and choose “Get RSS” from the menu.
You will be taken to a URL like the following:

http://www.findforward.com/?q=nigritude+ultramarine&t=get-rss

You can then include this URL to your own RSS reader or other application to stay updated on specific listings.

FindForward as RSS by Philipp Lenssen

Gmail Contest Finished

The Gmail contest at Dirson is over. If you tried your luck and wonder about some questions, here are the answers I found (too late):

1) The first person recruited by Google (aside from Sergey Brin and Larry Page) worked in a company during Summer 1992, 1993. Which was the name of this firm?

Craig Silverstein worked at Microsoft those years.

2) Google provides financial aids to student girls through a program called with the name of a Computer scientist, who was born in an American city. How many black and white images of this city can you find on the Google images search engine?

Anita Borg was born in Chicago for which there are 1470 black and white images in Google.

3) According to Google, the most popular searched word in May 2002 was the name of a woman. In her first movie, she performed with an actor who was the main character of the film. In which city was this actor born?

Natalie Portman had her first appearance in Leon alongside Jean Reno. He was born in Casablanca.

4) Google modifies its logo when an important event is commemorated. The person who designs these special logos was born in a city. If we search a ’german restaurant’ in this city by using the Local Service of Google, we find two restaurants in the same street. Which is the name of this street?

Korean Dennis Hwang designs the Google logos and was born in Knoxville. Search Google Local for “german restaurant” reveals two restaurants in Kingston Pike.

5) Google determines how important a page is on the web by ranking it with a numeric value. To obtain this number, Google uses an algorithm which is patented in the States. If we add 100,000 to the number of this patent, we find another one related to the blending of glass. Which is the last name of the Inventor?

That would be Richard Lionel Silas which we can find out by googling some patents.

6) One of the founders of Blogger (the blog system by Google), and its profile #1, owns a blog. On Dec 29, 2003, he lost a gadget on a mountain. If we search the name (3 words in the product name) of this gadget on the Google service to find online products, how much does the most expensive one cost?

Blogger Co-Founder Evan Williams lost his Pentax Optio S on a mountain as he tells in his blog. Froogle tells us the most expensive one is $399.95.

7) In December 2003, a famous person visited the Googleplex (browse our blog). Within the catalogs stored by Google, you can find a ’Christmas card’ signed by this person and with a message from him and his wife. What appeared on the cover of this Christmas card?

The famous person in 2003 was President Bill Clinton. Google Catalogs reveals the signed card contains the Green Room on the cover.

Gmail Contest Finished by Philipp Lenssen

Google Cash

There’s no easy money in this world? Maybe there is, if you believe in this get-rich scheme using AdWords which auctioned on eBay (though I wonder why this guy feels like selling his idea if he already makes so much Google cash):

“There are companies who offer money (from $0.10 up to $100.00) for every customer YOU bring on.

Sometimes companies want those customers to really MAKE a deal (buy a product,...), sometimes a simple LEAD is enough (for example: just guide people to their sites).

The GOOD NEWS is:

1) You don’t have to trace those companies: they are supplied to you by “Third Parties” (Commission Junction, Clickbank,...), internet companies who act between you and those companies; they also arrange the payments in a very strict way.

2) You also don’t have to convince people (“customers”) to go to those companies; you make a Google-Ad advertising those companies, people who are interested, click on your ad and are guided through to those companies immediately. So, the customers think that they act directly to an ad of those companies; they don’t know about your existence.

To make your Google Ad, you have to create something “catchy” by using the right keywords. It is those keywords that you have to “bid" for (starting from $0.05). And this is where your starting capital is needed for.”
-- Mg_antiques_ca, I AM MAKING $22,943 w/ GOOGLE ADS! Genuine, NO Website!, May 20, 2004

Google Cash by Philipp Lenssen

AdWords Censored

“[Don’t] expect Google Adwords to approve your internet campaign using their search engine and sponsored links service. In what is believed to be a stunning act of political censorship, the creators of the “Deck of Bush”, a satirical playing card deck listing “54 reasons NOT to re-elect the President” were informed Tuesday that their recently submitted ad word campaign did not meet Google’s guidelines and was being suspended. In an e-mail sent to the “Deck of Bush” creators, Google stated that their policy “does not permit the advertisement of websites that contain language that advocates against an individual, group, or organization”. They were also told that use of the search term keywords “George Bush”, “George W. Bush”, “President Bush”, “Bush Cards”, “Bush Decks” were all unacceptable”
– Google Adwords restricts controversial website from advertising political playing cards critical of President Bush, May 19, 2004

AdWords Censored by Philipp Lenssen

How Evil Is Google?

So how evil is Google really? The Gematriculator finds out using scientific text analysis of any website. We can thus see Google is 11% evil, 89% good (compare this to my blog, which is 17% evil, and Microsoft.com, which is 37% evil). Yahoo comes in a close second, being 86% good.

How Evil Is Google? by Philipp Lenssen

Keywords In URLs Matter

Usually people tell you keywords in a URL matter only because people use the URL itself as link text, and link text as we all know is valuable to Google (e.g. writing “go to www.justanexample.com” would contain the word justanexample, thus boost the site’s ranking for it).

But now my previous Google Grafitti experiment has been finished, and I have proof that keywords within a URL do count on their own – that is, without linking to the page using the keyphrase, and without the page itself containing the keyphrase.
Search Google for thisisanewterm and you find CNN.com rank in on number two. The random phrase thisisanewterm was not anywhere on the Web prior to my test, and I only connected it to CNN.com using link text “this” and link URL www.cnn.com/?-thisIsANewTerm-.

Keywords In URLs Matter by Philipp Lenssen

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