Yahoo!'s FareChase travel site launched hotels today. Competing with AOL's recently launched Pinpoint Travel, this represents another meta-search play to provide consumers with a one-stop travel destination. FareChase is also integrated into Yahoo! Travel, Search and Shopping -- a variation…
Google will be featured in segments on the new Al Gore-backed cable network, now being called "Current." The press release positions it as "the first national network created by, for and with an 18-34 year-old audience." This is very very…
Google finally declared in its SEC 10-K filing that it was indeed a media company: "We began as a technology company and have evolved into a software, technology, Internet, advertising and media company all rolled into one." Google reported that…
According to data released by Nielsen//NetRatings, as reported in AdWeek, MSN's new broad consumer marketing campaign has seemed to drive some usage growth. According to Nielsen, MSN's search market share grew 1.4 percent from 12.8 percent to 14.2 percent in…
Search Engine Watch Editor Danny Sullivan has rounded up the range of April Fools search-related pranks for your amusement. There are some very clever and elaborate ones on the list, including: UnderGoos Google Gulp Yahoo SlackerAfter careful thought and review…
Yahoo! 360 formally launched earlier this week -- and everyone I try and invite has already been invited! That may be both good and bad for Yahoo! Google€™s Gmail -- the storage of which was just bumped to 2GB --…
I wanted to call attention to an interesting piece from Gord Hotchkiss in MediaPost. He writes: "[N]o one with enough market traction has taken up the task of aggregating [consumer ratings/opinion] information into an easy-to-digest rating system. There is no…
LookSmart announced the launch of five consumer-facing vertical content sites that will serve up LookSmart advertisers. They are: teenja.com for teens, gradewinner.com for "tweens," 24hourscholar.com for college students, and for parents there are parentsurf.com and gobelle.com. LookSmart predicts that search…
You've probably never heard of DiscoverOurTown.com. I hadn't until Howell R. Jones, VP of Marketing for the Mississippi-based directory, contacted me about their mobile offering. At first blush it's another city guide-type site that prompts the question: How do these…
ClickZ offers coverage of Google's statement at SES that "local" was bigger than the more established Froogle: "[Marissa] Mayer said the demand for Google's local search product was surprisingly high. In fact, it drew more traffic in December than Google's…
Indeed.com formally launches on the same day as Oodle, offering meta-search for Jobs. Here's the announcement. Indeed is one of several new meta-search job sites. Indeed and Oodle represent efforts to consolidate and integrate the consumer experience and away from…
Call it a search engine for classifieds. Started by a couple of the original folks at Excite, Oodle aims to be a comprehensive search engine for classifieds. That's right: Craigslist, eBay, CareerBuilder, Cars.com, newspaper sites -- everything. Right now, they're…
eBay, which bought 25 percent of Craigslist from a former employee in the third quarter of last year, has been busy expanding into classifieds, buying up classifieds sites outside the U.S. as part of a strategy to boost growth. eBay…
Topix.net, a news search/aggregation site, has announced a majority investment from The Tribune Co., Knight Ridder Digital and Gannett Co. These are the major companies behind Classified Ventures and sites like CareerBuilder and ShopLocal, among other online verticals. Under the…
Just got in to Newspapers'05 in Dallas, the newspaper industry's mega-show put on by the Newspaper Association of America (NAA). This show covers absolutely everything having to do with the industry -- except it appears blogs, social networking and RSS.…
John Battelle has some interesting speculation about the role of Jeeves in IAC post acquisition. In particular, he speculates about a potential merger of search and TV. I agree there are going to be some interesting things happening with TV…
The New York Times is reporting that Ask Jeeves is to be acquired by IAC for the equivalent of US$1.9 billion in stock. The deal, if completed, makes a certain amount of sense for both companies. Ask Jeeves has good…
Yesterday, after apparent leaks to the press, Yahoo! decided to announce its rumored blogging/social networking service (to launch at the end of the month) -- Yahoo! 360. According to AP reports, the service will offer multiple features and allow people…
Borrell Associates released a report last week that projected local online ad spending would increase by 46% and hit US$3.9 billion in 2005. The Kelsey Group€™s forthcoming forecast is somewhat more conservative (except in the paid search category). However, it…
Thanks to Justin Sanger of LocalLaunch for pointing out Marty Himmelstein's excellent article on Local Search/IYP. Himmelstein was something of a pioneer in Local Search and worked for Internet start-up Vicinity Corp. Before being acquired by Microsoft, Vicinity was a…
