The Trademark Tango

The two U.S.-based trademark actions against Google (Geico, American Blinds) are being allowed to proceed to discovery. Discovery is a phase of litigation after the initial documents are filed that requires the parties to exchange information and, as the term…

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Dogpile's New Tricks

InfoSpace launched a new version of its Dogpile metasearch engine. The new site, which is cleaner, more prominently highlights the fact that it delivers results from Google, Yahoo! and Ask Jeeves and also suggests ("Different Engines, Different Results") that it…

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Search: The Middle Way

With apologies to Buddhism, new empirical data from Yahoo! Search Marketing suggest that search is a "middle path," between branding/awareness and direct response and probably most effective when combined with other advertising -- in particular display advertising. The study I…

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Backfence Goes Live

Backfence went live tonight in McLean and Reston, VA. I previously wrote about Backfence's "hyper-local" strategy. It's a very interesting strategy (comprehensive local site, relying heavily on user-generated content) and will be one to watch. There are those who will…

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Quality vs. Quantity Take 2

The Yellow Pages Association released the results of a study with comScore that supports the idea that despite lower traffic volumes, IYP users are more "ready to buy" and spend more than their Web search counterparts. We haven't independently looked…

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