Microsoft Corp. (www.microsoft.com), the world's largest software maker, announced on November 12 that its widely anticipated search engine, which launched in test mode on November 11, encountered some glitches on its first day. The new search engine, Microsoft's first assault on Google Inc.'s leading position in the market, returned "temporarily unavailable" messages to some users looking for answers to queries at its Web site at http://beta.search.msn.com. Microsoft said in an emailed statement that in the process of making the new MSN Search Beta globally available, Microsoft experienced technical difficulties that rendered it unavailable for some consumers for periods of time. Microsoft said that it had expected such problems with MSN Search during its beta, and that there will be additional times when Microsoft limits service availability for maintenance purposes.
Silicon.com (http://software.silicon.com) announced on November 12 that Google (www.google.com) and Mozilla (www.mozilla.org) are cosier than ever with Firefox's latest release (www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/). The search engine giant is newly featured, centre-stage, on the default home page of Mozilla's open-source browser Firefox 1.0, which was made available for free download on November 9, and which, according to the president of the Mozilla Foundation Mitchell Baker, has been downloaded by an estimated 2.5 million people in only two days. Google is hosting the Firefox start page because, according to Baker, the company's technical infrastructure is more capable of supporting high volumes of traffic. In earlier versions of Firefox, Google has been a resident on the upper right-hand box of the browser and it is the same in version 1.0. Firefox users can use a pull-down menu from the search box to navigate the web with Yahoo, Amazon.com and they can change the default from Google to other search engines such as Ask Jeeves. Baker said that Mozilla has assembled a set of different search partners including Yahoo. She would not say whether there is a financial relationship between Mozilla and Google.
Australian-based Search Engine Marketing specialist ineedhits.com (www.ineedhits.com) announced on November 11 that it has retained the services of San Francisco-based Bandwidth Capital and Australian-based Atrico (www.atrico.com.au) to explore and present strategic options. ineedhits.com, whose partners include Yahoo, Overture, Kanoodle, WhatUSeek, Net Applications and ExactSeek, also plans to enrich its customer experience through launching an entirely new Web-based user- and subscriber-friendly interface before the end of the year, plus the addition of new products.
PC Pro (www.pcpro.co.uk) announced on November 11 that the search engine giant Google (www.google.com) has doubled the size of its index of the Web. The search engine can now trawl through eight billion pages to find the information that the users request.
EINfinder.com (www.EINfinder.com) announced on November 10 access to its database of nearly 5 million Federal Employer Identification Numbers through its EIN Finder search engine. EINs, also known as Federal IDs or Tax IDs, are 9-digit numbers assigned by the IRS to all businesses in the United States. They are included on all federal business tax filings, and are used in a number of private industries for compliance purposes.
The New York Times (www.nytimes.com) announced on November 10 that the software giant Microsoft (www.microsoft.com) is planning to introduce its long-awaited Internet search engine on November 11. Word of the introduction of the service, which will compete with the search engine giants Google and Yahoo, was leaked on November 9 after the company began phoning reporters offering briefings for November 10. A company spokeswoman declined comment on the announcement.
Vivisimo (http://vivisimo.com), the developer of clustering, search and meta-search software for organizing search results, announced on November 9 the industry’s first clustering toolbar for Mozilla Firefox. The quick, free and easy download is available at http://clusty.com and offers Firefox users a number of industry-first features and unique benefits, including ClustyClips and Mini-Mode.
Marcel Media (www.marcelmedia.com), a Chicago-based interactive marketing agency specializing in results-driven online marketing, web design and search engine placement campaigns, announced on November 9 a suite of services designed to help Chicago area companies drive qualified leads, gain web traffic and win new customers by assuring top level listings on search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN. The company’s services include search engine marketing, which assures businesses top-level search engine placement using bid-based cost per click services like Overture and Google AdWords; search engine optimization, which improves placement on search engines by refining existing website code, copy and more; and website building and enhancement, ensuring higher conversion rates from online users to potential new clients.
Search Engine Optimization, Inc. (www.seoinc.com), a professional search engine optimization firm specializing in achieving high rankings for its clients on the Internet's major search engines, unveiled on November 8 a first-of-its-kind toolbar that provides instant access to detailed information on backward links to any website for all the major search engines, giving marketing professionals a powerful new aid in their efforts to maximize company Web rankings. The SEO Inc. Toolbar Lite, available now as a free download at www.seoinc.com, enables users to research inbound links for Yahoo, Google, AOL, Alta Vista and MSN. Users can determine the total number of inbound links to their own URLs or those of competitors in real time, plus the number of links used individually by each search engine in ranking a given site. This eliminates the time and effort involved in researching each search engine separately while also enabling users to conserve screen real estate that otherwise would be occupied by multiple proprietary toolbars.
