Now I think this is a bit silly, it feels as if though Google is taking over every aspect of the average man’s life. I can understand them dominating the advertising and search engine area of the internet, but a line should be drawn! Now they have released a new program entering into healthcare, Google Health, which allows you to input your details regarding your health and medication and get responses regarding diet and such.

It does seem to be a service that would benefit many people, but the problem lies with the fact that it is mostly automated responses from a computer, and not an actual physical analysis done by a doctor (one of the points stated by the U.S. Health Care System). Google responded by saying that people should benefit from as much information as they can, and this also solves the problem of having to move your medical history from one state to another. Furthermore, it seems that they are also getting support from the Bush administration since they support the push to electronically handling hospital/health records.

Here is a screenshot snagged from Blogoscoped:

Technorati Tags: Google, healthcare, Health, hospital

Search Engine Journal is reporting that Google might decide to remove their Google PageRank bar from their Google Toolbar.

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Possible Removal of Google PageRank?

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Considering that Microsoft already runs it’s own advertising service via adCenter, it was quite a surprise when they bought AdECN. However, AdECN is quite the catch, considering the features that they offer for their advertisers (and the publishers).

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Microsoft Acquires AdECN

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I decided to take a crack at Yahoo’s Overture PPC program today and stumbled across this page that talks about paid inclusion in Yahoo!’s Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Now this doesn’t seem like bribery at first, but…

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Yahoo! Search Marketing or Search Bribery?

Technorati Tags: Yahoo, Overture, PPC

I just thought this would be a great find for Google AdSense users, especially those that run websites in a language other than English. In fact, I saw an advertisement in Hindi in my gMail Account yesterday. I don’t know if it was a random coincidence or they somehow managed to get my ethnicity (even though I never displayed it on the internet).

Nevertheless, Search Engine Roundtable has posted up how you can change your primary language for your Google AdSense formats:

• Log in to your account at https://www.google.com/adsense
• Click the My Account tab
• Click the Login Information [edit] link
• Select a language from the Display Language drop-down list
• Click Save Settings

A prime example of a website that should definitely use this, would be Deepika News. They are an unbelievably popular Indian news site, with tons of traffic each day. However, they are displaying English advertisements. Even though many Indians can read English, the CTR for these ads must be horrible. But, if it was in Hindi, the official language of India, more readers would click on the ads. Just goes to show what can be done to monetize your website if it’s in a different language.

Technorati Tags: Google, AdSense, Hindi, gMail, Deepika, CTR

Most people think that well-established companies like eBay wouldn’t have disorganized pages in Search Engine Results Pages, but I guess this discovery by Aaron Wall can’t go unnoticed.

It seems that eBay has a huge amount of sub-domains, one for every category, search results and such. Well, having a huge amount of sub-domains for every category can lead even the strongest search engine awry. Google seems to have indexed numerous pages/auctions from different sub-domains for ‘titleist provx’ and displays all these results.

You can’t be sure if eBay did this on purpose or by accident, but this can lead to a lot more targeted search engine traffic to eBay when you think about it. A user might disregard the first eBay results in the SERPs but after seeing numerous listings, they are bound to check out a couple, and end up simply bidding on an item on eBay instead of purchasing one from another website found through the SERPs.

Technorati Tags: eBay, Google, SERP

Let me start by saying these rumors are most likely fake. Blogs like Search Engine Journal take the fact that just because the stock price rose by nearly 19% for Yahoo!, it dropped earlier this morning.

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Rumors of Microsoft buying Yahoo!

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Many of us are accustomed to seeing the natural blue sponsored advertisement box at the top of the natural listings on Google. But Google has changed their sponsored ad box to a yellow color.

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Google Layout with Yellow Ad Box

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Google seems like it isn’t interested in simply making money from advertisement revenue, but now it looks like they are offering searches over a toll-free phone number. You can call them at 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) for no charge.

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Google Search via Toll-Free Phone Number

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Google has entered the broadband wireless internet service and is offering free internet access via toilets! That’s right, Google plans on using the central sewer system of your water company to help you connect to their broadband service - Google TiSP (Toilet internet Service Provider).

This is only available in the U.S. and Canada at the moment (and is not available to people with septic sewers). Basically when you flush this fiber optic cable, it will find the nearest access node and one of the PHDs (Plumbing Hardware Dispatchers) will connect it. Their free service will contain contextual advertisements that will be trained to offer targetted ads for your needs.

You can check their installation instructions here, but if you would like a detailed diagram:

I should also mention that today is April 1st, 2007.

Technorati Tags: broadband

Google has added a new plus box in addition to the one-box displayed at the top of certain search results which promote their own services (Blogger, Google Images). This plus box is meant to provide more information for a specific listing related to stocks or map destinations. You can view an example of the plus box here for ‘Babbo Restaurant’.

I think it’s a good addition to their search results, especially since Google offers webmasters the chance to add a plus box for their website listings on Google. If you are a Local Business Owner on Google, you can simply submit your website information and your business location. Google will do the rest!

Technorati Tags: Google, Blogger

Google has definitely become a part of everyone’s lives - internet savvy and computer illeterate users use Google on at least a weekly, if not daily basis. However, many people use Google as a reference engine to check the background of someone’s history on the web. A documentary movie has now been created which revolves around this concept - Google Me: The Movie.

Jim Killeen entered his name into Google to see what kind of results would come up. Little did he know that there were numerous other Jim Killeens in the world which ranged from a priest to someone who starved himself for a cause. This movie is basically a documentary of one Jim Killeen going out to meet with others who share his name.

You can watch the trailer here.

Technorati Tags: Google, Jim Killeen