Search Engine Optimisation Web Log (BLOG)
Editor: Matt Paines

| This News Blog is dedicated to bringing news, information and innovations targeting the Search Engine Optimisation industry

Ask Jeeves to leave paid inclusion
Ask Jeeves currently offers a paid inclusion program through IneedHits/Overture Site match. Web site owners pay the search engines to get pages included in the search engine index. The program offers to revisit the paid pages on a regular basis. As of the 30th September Ask Jeeves have announced they will not be accepting any further submissions using this program.

PR Backlink update
Over night Google updated its PR and Backlink index. To view the 10 datacentres activity try our DANCER tool, its free.

Hacker attacks major Search Engines.
Well known web sites which rely on Akamai for its DNS (Domain name system) service, which include Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and many others of a like kind were hit by a major hacker on Tuesday. The attack made some of the web sites slothful and unreachable. Akamai have said that it is not clear who exactly carried out the attack. According to Akamai Technologies the attack began at 1.45pm BST and lasted for approximately two hours. All major companies have advanced technologies, which fight off hackers. "Cyber-security" is a concern for many organisations, including governments. If all or even part of the Internet was knocked out, businesses around the world could be paralysed. Other web sites, which were affected, include AltaVista, FedEx and Lycos.
L.P

Microsoft introduce filters.
Filters are used to reduce the effectiveness of spam. Spam pages are pages that have little reason for existence, their sole purpose is to fool search engines in to thinking the web page has a relevance to a subject that the site doesn't deserve. Google has been using filters for quite some time, Florida and Austin being Googles most well known.
Until now Microsoft have been very quiet on the subject. They have been conducting a research project to which they have just revealed the results. In a sample of 1000 million web pages, they found that eight per cent were spam pages. It is expected that Microsoft will be introducing a series of filters in the not too distant future.

PR Backlink update
Last night Google updated its PR and Backlink index. Interestingly 3 of the 10 Datacentres have been in error for most of last week, whilst most of the servers have settled to being reasonably constant these three have still not recovered. (to view for yourself, download our DANCER tool)

Micosoft Google search wars.
In February we speculated that Microsoft's introduction of its new operating system, Longhorn, which is rumored to be combining their file and text search tools with a new Internet search tool, a real Google killer. In response Google have been developing their own desktop tool which will provide file and text searching with their infamous web search technology.

XSEO move to new offices.
It's finally happened, after what seems like an eternity we have finally taken up residence in our new premises.

WebProNews finds Dancer.
Garrett French of WebProNews has written an article in his highly acclaimed newsletter about the merits of watching the Google Datacentres, the
XSEO Dancer has been highlighted as a tool which allows the SEO community, all of which being borderline algoholics, to monitor Googles datacentre updates.

Another update!
Activity in the news groups is escalating, with speculation regarding another imminent Google update. The most significant qualification for this speculation is an inconsistency in the number of BackLinks being reported, and those that are actually visible.

Search Engine Optimising and Accessibility.
The subject of accessibility is not new, consideration for compliance has had to be given by architects and businesses for some years. However recently it has become apparent that the need for compliance has stretched to the virtual world of the internet.

Google PR update.
There have been significant shifts in the Google "dance servers" in the past 4 days (to view for yourself, download our DANCER tool). Overnight, both PR and backward links were updated. The last update was 3 weeks ago, the update prior to that was 5 weeks earlier. This could be a sign of things to come..

Search engine referrals Googlestill top.
Published stats by WebSideStory have revealed that Google's percentage of US search referrals is up from 35.99% last year to 40.91% this year. Yahoo!'s percentage of referrals has fallen from 30.95% to 27.40%. MSN, meanwhile, has climbed from 17.83% to 19.57%. Referrals generated from other search engines have fallen from 15.23% to 12.12%.

SEO News Archives
News Jan-Mar 05News Nov-Dec 04News Sept-Oct 04News July-Aug 04News Apr-Jun 04News Jan-Mar 04News 03