Google Caffeine Real-Time, Fresh, Fast,

Matt Cutts discusses the new Caffeine Sandbox with Michael MacDonald at Search Engine Strategies Show in San Jose. Good stuff to pay attention to, since Cutts suggests that "power users" might notice differences in the rankings between the current default search and Caffeine.

Here's a suggestion I'd like to make for your testing if you do decide to check it out - play with the "Filter by Date" option in the left rail which appears on the current page if you click "options" on Google's current results page. For that matter, I'd like to suggest that many of the "options" may find their way into the standard results you get from that new SandBox.

I think they may have already released many of the tweaks in that recently released UI, but found few people using them in that form. So rather than requiring everyone to make choices (or maybe making some of the most "popular" choices already ranked from testing) the Caffeine option may represent choices made based on testing so far.

Now they want to see if you like those choices once they are baked into the default product. That's my take based on reviews and my own testing. Your mileage may vary and I may be way off base, but it's a good story.

More WebProNews Videos

Ubiquity FireFox Browser Add-in Productivity Video

I don't go off-topic much on this blog, but I've just got to share this productivity tool. I'm sure it can do some cool search-related stuff, so I'll play with it and report what I find. The video below describes an amazing browser add-in called "Ubiquity" from Mozilla Labs. The Post title links to a Ubiquity tutorial. The tool is amazingly easy to use and if you have the basic skills to add commands to the already included set built in, you'll find it a really incredible time saver.

It's almost magical how well it works. My favorite use in this video is being able to insert a map, along with a Yelp review, embed quickly and easily in your email! Watch that in the following video and be prepared to be impressed at what a browser add-in can do.

Ubiquity for Firefox from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

Video: Powerset Search Engine Beta Test

Powerset Demo Video from officialpowerset on Vimeo.

First thing I noticed is that the thing is down - I can't get any queries to load. Could be a bad day because Microsoft is rumored to be considering acquisition of Powerset and the news caused enough interest to overload their servers tonight. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt unless it continues to happen. Meanwhile, enjoy the video and give it a try yourself. I'd be interested in hearing comments on how it worked for you.

The blog post from nearly 4am this morning suggests that it was a late night at Powerset labs - and it appears they have a few more late nights overcoming whatever is causing the server response times that make me give up and go away. But that blog post also shows that they get marketing because they suggest that bloggers go look at their press coverage news page (which they mistakenly call a "Social Media News Release" - nope) and links to del.icio.us, Flickr, and a help page.

Actually, I just got it to load on a final test before giving up for the night. The results didn't impress for the searches I tried. They did suggest that I search for something that interests me. So I guess I didn't try something that can be found at Wikipedia or Freebase - which they are currently drawing on for the beta results. Now it's locking up again and not returning results. Well, looks promising if it starts working as advertised in that video. ;-)

Update, saw a twitter post from Powerset they had hit the pages of SlashDot and that was causing the overload. Well OK, I'll excuse the slow server times.

Google News Showing AP & Reuters Video's Inline

Google News showing news video from Reuters and Associated Press video (posted at YouTube) in both search results and on home page.

Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!

This was apparently announced without fanfare on the Google News Blog back on the 21st of August of 2007. Barry Schwartz blogged about it at SearchEngineLand that same day. Did nobody care about this? I hadn't heard about it until I noticed the little tiny word "video" next to a "+" sign to expand it tonight - over 8 months later. Hmmm. I'm on Google News daily and hadn't seen this before and hadn't heard anyone talking about it.

Clicking through takes you to the AP or Reuters channels at YouTube.

Testing this "How To Video" widget.

more cool how to videos

SMX West: Dangerous Place for Rand Fishkin

Mike McDonald is mistaken for SEO Superstar Rand Fishkin, taken hostage and beaten for SEO "insider" information. When the bad guys realize it's not Fishkin, they release McDonald to have a friendly beer and hear him tell web nerd jokes. The closing graphic says, "Getting answers shouldn't be this hard ... SMX West ... Get all the coverage at WebProNews."

Creativity runs high at WPN and serves as great link bait and wonderful content for blogs that never get tired of discussing exactly the minutia that McDonald jokes about in the end.

Unfortunately, now we're going to be flooded with videos from others trying to top this great one from the WebProNews team. I'll wager Barry Schwartz makes a list of all the competing SEO video linkbait for SERoundtable before long and we'll hear at SES San Jose this summer about the link counts and ranking increases of the top seo video link bait.

Looking forward to the conference myself - maybe if I use a little smarter kidnappers next time, they'll actually get Fishkin, damnit!