Microsoft is full of jerks and Live Search blows!!!

I submit the following example, a little bit close to home perhaps but I was just about furious when I did a little experiment earlier today. First, a smidgen of back story to set the tone for this curious anomaly.

My desk sports a triple screen display, 3x 19 inch Hanns-G monitors on a horizontal span. That makes my desktop area something like 3840x1024 pixels. My job necessitates keeping up a MINIMUM of one firefox window, one Remote desktop session to our server for our CRM software as well as keeping track of email, instant messages (also work related) and any programs or windows I happen to need for experimenting or testing.

For a long time I thought two screens was enough. I was wrong.

Today, a client called in with an issue that was happening through IE but not Firefox and I wanted to see if it would affect my own experience. So I slapped up IE, took a look and out of habit I decided to check on the blog. I didn't have it bookmarked or anything so I just typed 'at the risk of being too cynical' ***That's the title of the blog*** and the live search came up totally and utterly empty.

What in the black bedeviled hills of hell? The exact same phrase from Google always pops up an entry as the first result. So, in the spirit of experimentation I tried the same thing through Firefox. End result?

Google Search:


MSFT Search:


Great scraping lolbutter what am I to think of this. I know that Google and MSFT are blood rivals in the search/ads world but still. Now I was really interested so I tried a phrase that would likely turn up the blog no matter what simply due to its unique quality.

This time the phrase was "Gigacalorie Project"

Google:

MSFT:

Oh come on you freaks that's not even fair. I was so pissed that I checked every single one of the 198 search results and does my little blog appear anywhere? Hell no.

Finally I tried a phrase that is unmistakeably and permanently tied to this blog.

Keippernicus:

No screen shot because it only turns up links to A: Youtube, B: Sites where I have made comments under the name "Keippernicus"

Now mudslinging is fine and dandy but I find this a little short-sighted even for Microsoft. I get that they are interested in keeping their ad revenue stream going but hiding access to their own user's personal blogs? Really?

Guess what, MSFT. You just lost the game.

Regarding Content Quality

It's always nice to get email directly from Google: Consider the thoughtful personal email from my dear friend Kim Scott, one of the sweetest ladies on the WWW.

Dear [Seth],

We understand that the recent economic turmoil has created a lot of
uncertainty in the lives of AdSense publishers. During these difficult
times, we're continuing to invest in innovations that improve publisher
monetization and advertiser value in the content network.

We're focusing on further developing our product offerings and boosting
ad performance for publishers. We recently announced advancements in
AdSense for search and experiments to make ads more effective. We're
bringing DoubleClick technologies to AdSense publishers, and we'll
continue to launch new products and features. We're also continuing to
improve our offerings for AdWords advertisers, making it easier for
them to target the Google content network. Features for advertisers,
such as the new display ad builder, are designed to improve ad
performance on AdSense publisher sites.

We'll keep driving technological progress, but our best asset will
always be our publisher partners. The strength of AdSense lies in the
value of the content you bring to users and the quality of the sites
you bring to advertisers. Our success is tied to yours. We look forward
to partnering with you for the long term, and remain dedicated to
helping you succeed.

Sincerely,

Kim Scott

Director AdSense Online Sales & Operations

Did you catch that, lemme quote for you, just for emphasis. "The strength of AdSense lies in the value of the content you bring to user"

So let me take this advice to heart and offer up some sincerely excellent content, just for you Mrs. Kim Malone Scott.

Original Content. Apply filter "Yarrrrrrrrrrrrrr" and we get:



(This is why I have 30 dollars of ad revenue for the year.) Thanks Kim!

Behold the awesome power of google!!!

As you may or may not know from my last post there's a new blog on the tubes. Some might call it presumptive, some might call it lame.

Some might draw inferences about my mental state or sexual preferences but others will just experience the scrotum slapping awesomeness that is...

Brute Finesse

Now a curious component of the new blog was the adsense integration aspect. The actual setup was a snap, someone was kind enough to create a plugin for easy access to adsense and yahoo ads.

However the curious increase in web traffic via my grass roots campaign to tell everyone about the new blog must have trigged some alarms deep in the bowels of google's impressive computational infrastructure.

I logged into my ad account and noticed that in one weekend I had earned QUADRUPLE what this blog had earned in six months. I blame myself. Anyway what impressed me was one of google's identity verification systems.

Basically they had my phone number on file and needed me to dial in a verification code for them. They were even kind enough to provide an option for when to call. This was before work started on monday so I obliged and clicked 'now'

Boy did they mean it. No sooner had my right index finger popped off my mouse the phone rang. It wasn't instantaneous but that kind of response time is why I think robot customer service will put me out of the job someday soon.

Its good to know that at least one company, arguably THE company, is kicking ass and taking names with the kind of precision we should all expect out of our economy. When I read about the sheer magnitude of computation that google wields to such great effect i can only nod my head in approval.

If they ever merge with newegg.com I suspect that the density of awesome would bring a swift end to the world. An awesome end, but a swift one.

Kudos google, and no I don't have a botnet to spam ad clicks or generate new traffic, just the interest and support of my family and friends. And one day, the world!