Google engineer Matt Cutts wrote an extensive post describing Google’s response to a website that had undoubtedly been hacked. If you are at all curious as to what would happen to your website rankings on Google should it be hacked please read this post – it is an excellent read and comforting in my book. Read more…

Now this is a coup that must have PayPal shaking. Google has announced that it will be extending its waiver of fees past the end of 2006 to December 31st, 2007! Unfortunately, however, there are reports that companies with affiliate programs have switched to this affordable system way too soon.

The problem is that Google Checkout requires serious tweaking before affiliate codes are passed along and properly recorded. And when I say “serious tweaking” I mean that even Commission Junction (CJ) has been reported to having some difficulty with the switchover; I smell some unfriendly programming! As a result, if companies with affiliate programs switch to Google Checkout too soon they may be alienating their bread and butter – affiliate sales. Read more…

Back in March of 2004 we reported on a man arrested for trying to extort Google. Last month, in order to protect its trade secrets Google has dropped its case against Michael Anthony Bradley. Bradley had attempted to extort $150,000 from Google by threatening the generation of millions of fraudulent clicks by using his ‘Google Clique’ software.

The case would result in the exposure of Google trade secrets and the risk of this information finding its way into the hands of potential future fraudsters. These “anti-fraud” secrets being exposed could cause a decline in advertiser confidence in Google’s system and has caused Google to reconsider the case.

This decision does mean that Bradley will get away with his extortion attempt, but may also be the best move for Google’s future with paid search. Not only would revealing their secrets open things up for future fraud attempts, but it would also expose their system to competitors.

On Monday Ask launched a local search service that strongly competes with other existing services offered by the big 3.

AskCity allows users to search for businesses, events, movies, and maps with directions. This service has integrated a number of those owned by parent company IAC/InterActiveCorp including CitySearch, ReserveAmerica, ServiceMagic, Ticketmaster and TicketWeb. Ask has also incorporated services from IAC partners.

Many of the new services from AskCity are also similiar to those offered by Google, MSN and Yahoo; however, the big three have to sign partnerships with other companies in order to provide these services.

In the big scheme of things local search is still in its infant stages, but as the internet continues to grow and evolve the world of local search will continue to grow as more and more people allow the internet into their lives.

GigaOmniMedia Inc. has launched a new website called NewTeeVee.com that is designed to cover the massive growth of the online video industry.

Liz Gannes, the editor of NewTeeVee.com introduces the site in her first post with the following paragraph: “We aim to cover online video from end to end and front to back. We’ll point you to hot startups, hot videos, hot pipes — tracing the talent, money, code, and data across the network. We’ll combine the signature GigaOM skepticism with a healthy sense of wonder for all the cool stuff that’s going on out there. And lots and lots of pictures and video.”

GigaOM.com is named after Om Malik; a highly respected technology writer who has written for the likes of Red Herring and Business 2.0 among others. His GigaOM network has a host of quality information resources that I refer to regularly for intelligent insight into emerging and existing technologies. If NewTeeVee.com maintains the quality of content I have come to expect from other Om Malik sites then I expect it will be well worth the read for anyone interested in keeping tabs on the emerging video sector. In addition, if you have any invested interest in online video perhaps it would be worthwhile to look into advertising; after all it is a new website so perhaps the price will be right!

Here is a great peek at what the world appears to be searching for: Yahoo!’s top searches of 2006.

My favorite listing happens to be the “Top News” where the average searcher’s priorities are inexplicably out of order. For example, the search “North Korea nuke” is the 7th most popular search and “Anna Nicole’s son dies” merits a second ranking; what a warped world we live in!

Jim Hedger, our favourite SEO columnist and the first-ever employee of StepForth is having me on his talk radio show this Thursday at 2:00 Pacific at www.webmasterradio.fm. I hope you will listen in as Jim and I discuss the latest SEO news and our experiences in this rapidly growing industry. Until then!

QUESTION: I have just started my own design company and although very well trained in both designing and programming, earning two associate degrees in this field, not one professor ever said anything about making your websites search engine friendly. I recently designed a website for my sister and i cannot even get her site to show up in any search engine. I have several keywords at the top including a description as well. one problem may be that the index page is sort of a splash page except it is just a handler that detects whether or not the user has flash installed and whether or not they have the bandwidth to view the flash page accurately. it then redirects them to a new page based on the feedback. therefore, there is no real content on the index page. Another possible problem is that she is mentioned on hundreds of other websites. do you have any suggestions for me? Any advice would help. — Laura P. Read more…