Australian Ether

Yahoo! Australia Home Page updated

2005-03-14T23:29:00.000+11:00

Yahoo! Australia & NZ Dunno if I've been asleep.. (and clearly from the number of posts from me lately I have been..) but did Yahoo! update their homepage recently? Me thinks yes. Plus an interesting article about Yahoo!'s new API and the Re-branding of their advertising arm Overture.

Yahoo! follows up with its own Desktop Search

2004-12-19T23:19:00.000+11:00

Yahoo! Partners with X1 for Desktop Search Clickz give a good wrap up of the potential Yahoo! offering and the specter of MSN's own desktop tool. PS: Apologies for the break in programming. A combination of computer issues, holidays and work has kept me tied up. Will be posting more of the silly season!

Google attacks the Desktop

2004-10-25T23:03:00.000+10:00

Google Desktop Search Launched Danny wraps up the latest release of Google's Desktop Search.... but beware the privacy implication campers...

Speech Search next on the Google Agenda

2004-10-14T20:09:00.000+10:00

Google begins work on speech search In conjunction with a newly opened R&D office in Bangalore, India, Google hinted its direction toward speech and multi media search. Multimedia search has been around for years under the popular Singing Fish brand. I'm positive a different way to find your favorite sound bytes will be smiled upon by the searching audience!

Yahoo! Gets Personal

2004-10-06T19:12:00.000+10:00

My Yahoo! Search Hot on the heels of personal search rivals Ask Jeeves and A9, Yahoo on has released a beta version its personalised search offering allowing the punters to keep a "Personal Web". MyYahoo!Search boasts some interesting features allowing you to save and share the results you like, block the ones you don't and keep them all for the next time you want information on the subject at

Aussie SEM Firm gets gobbled by 24/7

2004-09-09T23:27:00.000+10:00

24/7 Real Media Announces Acquisition of Decide Interactive One of the larger Australian SEM companies, Decide Interactive was acquired recently in a trend that will see more consolidation as agencies adopt SEM as part of the overall interactive strategies. With a good client list and some interesting technology, 24/7 is now placed well to move forward in search and have bought themselves a

Yahoo! AU Snatches OptusNet from Sensis

2004-08-23T23:25:00.000+10:00

Yahoo Search to power requests for OptusNet OptusNet was another major publisher/portal to sign on with Yahoo! this time at the expense of Sensis. According to the article, OptusNet, Australia's second largest telco, decided to end the three-year relationship to take advantage of Yahoo!s "relevant, timely and comprehensive search results".

Google IPO draws near

2004-08-15T15:50:00.000+10:00

with investors getting cautious With bidding starting next week, the financial community's exuberance is waning for the much anticipated IPO. With Google settling a patent dispute with Yahoo/Overture just days before IPO, and share counting blunders abound, the internet company may be scrambling to reach the high price they have set for themselves. The auction system is in their favor of

Yahoo! Australia Gets Local

2004-08-05T21:11:00.000+10:00

Yahoo! Australia & NZ Local Search Yahoo! made a surprise entrance into the local market alongside their US cousins with a search service allowing Australians to find local business more easily. Sensis of course are the other main player in AU vying for the local search market, leveraging off their Yellow Pages database. Check them out and see what you think!

Telstra unveils search engine

2004-07-19T21:06:00.000+10:00

To a grilling from Aussie webmasters A lenthy discussion on why www.sensis.com.au didn't quite hit the sweet spot with Australian webmasters.

Seth Godin takes a swing at SEO

2004-07-10T23:50:00.000+10:00

Seth's Blog: The problem with search engine optimization The so-called "Marketing Guru" stumbles over the benefits of SEO and succeeds at over-simplifying what can be a very effective marketing technique. Danny Sullivan provides and excellent parallel to the PR industry in a forum post The point made is: Don't ignore SEO, but dont rely on it too heavily either - it can be a very effective part

New Yahoo! and MSN Search

2004-07-05T02:15:00.000+10:00

Yahoo! Search Yahoo! recently released a version of what may be soon live across the Yahoo network, which some interesting new features and cosmetic changes. MSN also reveals a look at their new search engine, tipped to be released in the very near future on MSN and NineMSN. Click here to check out the search.ninemsn

The Search Merchants

2004-06-27T16:04:00.000+10:00

The search merchants - theage.com.au An article which bashes new search engine Mooter a little, but goes further into explaining the competitive market that exists here in Australian amongst the search brands. With Sensis unveiling a look at their attempt at a search solution, competition has never looked so good in Australian and this should create a some good innovation for years to come.

Sensis reveal a sneak peek at a new search engine

2004-06-24T21:47:00.000+10:00

Sensis.com.au - Australia's own information source. After the acquisition of Looksmart assets and some soul searching in the search arena, Sensis has revealed a look at a new generation search engine with a focus on local search. The site offers 3 modes of searching including worldwide, Australian or within Australia. This last mode is represented by a second search box where you can type a

Search Engine Watch Launches Forums

2004-06-14T14:52:00.000+10:00

Search Engine Watch Forums I have been a long time reader of Danny Sullivan's Search Engine Watch and have often wondered why he hasn't launched a forum before now. Looks like I'll be lurking around there as you can often find some very good advice from forum posts. Another good Asia and Pacific focused forum can be found at WebmasterWorld.

Overture snaps up anothery, just like the othery

2004-06-09T16:06:00.000+10:00

Australian IT - Overture's good News As Overture completes another syndication deal in the Australian market, you would be forgiven for wondering where the competition is. In a relatively short period of time the article mentions Overture Australia has gained 85% reach to the Australian audience with potentially more to come. However, as we all know, reach does not equal market share, and even

Mooter now displaying Overture Ads

2004-05-30T23:26:00.000+10:00

Mooter - Web Search Just a quick note to add to the big ninemsn/Overture news. Mooter is now showing Overture ads. It also looks like they dumbed down thier logo too. Its kinda furry now but loads much more quickly.

Overture woos Ninemsn

2004-05-18T23:24:00.000+10:00

Australian IT - Overture snares Ninemsn, f2 Overture signed two major deals recently while simultaneously striking a blow to competitors Looksmart and Google. The coveted ninemsn.com.au syndication is now in Overtures hands as of May 21 while the smaller f2 syndication was ripped from Google's possession in the same breath. The new distribution now gives Overture 70% reach in the Australian

Google launches its own Blog

2004-05-12T08:52:00.000+10:00

Google's Very Own Blog Looks like Google has begun their own blog to let people see a little more of what goes on inside the Googleplex and other global offices. It looks as though it may be a way of giving Google's point of view about all the press it seems to attract. Should make interesting reading....

Full Details of the Google IPO

2004-05-10T15:34:00.000+10:00

Form S-1 Not really worth mentioning now, but in case you have been asleep at the keyboard, Google has announced an IPO. The link will take you to the SEC website that lists all the fine print and the much reported letter from the founders.

LookSmart Acquires Net Nanny

2004-05-03T10:33:00.000+10:00

LookSmart Acquires Net Nanny Interesting move from the troubled search business Looksmart with the announcement of the acquisition of Net Nanny. The technology will allow Looksmart to further enhance their search offering to make content safer for children. The content filtering of todays search engines have come under fire many times in the past and Looksmart are set to position themselves as

Alien Mastermind Destroys Community Centre

2004-04-27T12:22:00.000+10:00

Andy Sleeman's Tri Squad Noticed this disturbing news appear at a syndication of a local newspaper. It appears aliens disguised as cuddly animals may be heading up an expeditionary force right here on Earth. I will try to confirm these reports ASAP.

GMail against the law?

2004-04-17T23:46:00.000+10:00

Google's spam plan forwarded to lawyers - www.smh.com.au A little follow up on the GMail saga. This article outlines the local Australian laws that would be breached if GMail goes ahead in its current form. Although the privacy outcry is mounting, personally i would like to have relevant text ads rather than any other type of advertising... just a thought.

The power of search

2004-04-13T09:59:00.000+10:00

The power of search - smh.com.au Good article by the SMH regarding the search phenomenon in Australia with a wide variety of industry experts chipping in some advice on trends and where the search industry is heading. It outlines the significant challenge Google faces from competitors, the demands of the public and the rigors of becoming a verb. More and more, search engines will focus on

Google goes after Hotmail and Yahoo Mail...or do they?

2004-04-01T21:12:00.000+10:00

Google Gmail Well its April Fool's day and everyone is speculating whether Google's new email offering is in fact a joke or a real launch of a beta email service. The service boasts a gig of space with full search capabilities for those hard to find emails. Also, the free service will be another platform for their popular text based advertising : Adwords. This process will require all email to

Google puts on a new dress

2004-03-29T22:47:00.000+10:00

Google Google recently release a new look and feel with many cosmetic changes to their worldwide network of sites. To sum it all up I have noticed the following: The tab navigation has been replaced by standard links Color of the results count line changed and definition link moved to the right Adwords have lost their colour and the interest bar is history Search terms are now highlighted in

Google Launches Local Search

2004-03-19T23:21:00.000+11:00

Google Local Search So Google is the first to bring a local search product out of the lab, and its potential is being talked about all over the net. Advertisers will be champing at the bit to get a shot at the searcher who qualifies themselves with their postcode (or zip) then further qualifies themselves with a search term. Google seems to have licensed some Yellowpages type data to get

Promoting your website?

2004-03-12T09:33:00.000+11:00

ADD/Blast Web Promotion System I have notice quite a few Australian sites using this system lately. I'm keen to find out how good their services are so I have gone thru the motions of signing up with their directory. I'll be glad to write a follow up article to let you all know how the process went. Stay tuned...

Telstra snaps up Trading Post

2004-03-08T11:35:00.000+11:00

Telstra buys Trading Post classifieds for $636m - BusinessNews - www.smh.com.au Another massive move by Testra/Sensis to extend their advertising reach to the Australian market. The Trading Post deal heralds another potential syndication partner for the Looklistings product Sensis recently acquired. Current possible syndication partners now stand at: White Pages Yellow Pages Looksmart

New / Free - Yahoo Site Submission

2004-03-05T15:44:00.000+11:00

Yahoo! Submit Your Site Double whammy from Yahoo this week, with the release of SiteMatch and a free submit url to pacify all the pundits of paid search. SiteMatch is a product handled by Overture which takes over from the single url submission products handled by Altavista, Fast and Inktomi. You can get in on the action by visiting PositionTech or Ineedhits

IT professionals still grinding it out.

2004-03-02T20:48:00.000+11:00

Time to accept the grim reality of IT - Perspectives - smh.com.au An opinion piece from the SMH drew my attention today with some gloomy figures for those of us in the IT industry in Australia. The article makes the following points: IT industry at more than 10 per cent, around twice the national average of 5.7 per cent. The IT unemployment rate has increased among the under 25s (up from 4.7

WebAdvantage.net

2004-02-29T18:01:00.000+11:00

Web Ad.vantage e-Marketing Came across this site the other day and thought it worthy of a quick mention. Although it doesn't specifically address Australian issues, it has a great tips section which should be useful to most Australian marketers. The tip archive is a regularly updated treasure trove of information relevant to online marketing professionals anywhere in the world and well worth

Fairfax off the menu, Trading Post in!

2004-02-26T19:07:00.000+11:00

Telstra looks at Trading Post as a buy - www.smh.com.au After the proposed Sensis / Fairfax merger was scuttled, Telstra seems to still be on the acquisition trail. Sensis is now apparently conducting due diligence on national classifieds publisher Trading Post Australia, with a price tag estimated at $200 million. I can't help but tie this back to the more recent articles about the coming

Sensis searches for results (in a leisurely kinda way)

2004-02-17T16:10:00.000+11:00

Sensis searches for results - www.theage.com.au The first articles have begun to surface about the future Sensis search product. Is it too harsh to call it a blatant attempt at beating up interest in, what only can be described as vaporware - considering the dead body of Looksmart Australia is still warm? The timeframe put in this article is 6-9 months before the new search brand is launched.

Australian Search Market - MSN vs Yahoo vs Google vs Sensis

2004-02-05T14:44:00.000+11:00

Microsoft set to take on Google This article outlines the most recent happenings in the Australian Search Market, focusing on the expected battle between Microsoft and Google. The article also has an interesting slant which highlights the current vulnerabilities of Sensis and how they are addressing their search gap, for example with the acquisition of the LookSmart assets. The weapons in this

Yahoo! has flicked the switch to Overture

2004-01-30T23:19:00.000+11:00

Yahoo! Search for 'web hosting' Was searching for 'web hosting' and noticed Overture paid listings are now showing instead of LookSmart above Yahoo Australia's web search results. Same goes for Anzwers and Altavista Australia. Fairly good news for Overture as they take off to a smooth start in Oz, mostly at the expense of the recently acquired LookSmart.

www.reeffutures.org

2004-01-24T14:57:00.000+11:00

:::::::: www.reeffutures.org :::::::: Noticed this website from reading an article in the Age. Reef Futures is a website that is dedicated to monitoring the health of the Great Barrier Reef. Its a joint venture by CRC Reef Research Centre and the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). The site seems to be still in development, however, they have some good initial information on coral

Sensis buys Looksmart Australia

2004-01-21T23:16:00.000+11:00

Sensis buys Looksmart's Australian arm - smh.com.au Some very exciting search marketing news today with the purchase of Looksmart Australia by Telstra subsidiary - Sensis. The move should considerably boost Looksmarts market share in Australia after losing Yahoo this month and potentially losing ninemsn in the future as the specter of the Overture/MSN deal closes in on the lucrative contract.

One month of Google Adsense

2004-01-14T18:00:00.000+11:00

Jim O'Halloran's Weblog: One month of Google Adsense First time I've actually seen someone talk openly about AdSense! I thought it was against their TOS to talk about the earnings, however, the comments reads very favourably. High clickthru rates, average monthly earning is not too bad at all for blog content. Overture have recently announced a move to separate bidding between contextual and

Xbox - when good times go BAD.

2004-01-13T09:33:00.000+11:00

Xbox: A gift that brought grief to one teenager - smh.com.au The recent experience of a Melbourne family suggests Microsoft's Goodwill and brand equity are at an all time low... But is it true that the Microsoft marketing department is undisputed king of the double entendre and keep the fine print producers in business? Take a read and you be the judge. Quote of the article: "I refuse to be a

Steve Waugh graces the SCG one last time

2004-01-03T10:16:00.000+11:00

Baggy Green covers Waugh's final Test in Sydney Steve Waugh has begun his final test at the SCG. Baggy Green is doing a splendid job of coverage providing live scores as they are delivered. You may need to become a member (which takes about 5 minutes to complete) but the refreshing webpage has been keeping me up to date as I work on my other projects. I've had the the scorecard url bookmarked

Yahoo reveal the most popular search terms of 2003

2003-12-30T17:31:00.000+11:00

Top Yahoo! Searches 2003 Yahoo today announced the top search terms as typed in by their users for the year ending 2003. Interestingly enough, all top 10 searches revolved around entertainment, with KaZaA taking out top spot. Yahoo then goes on to breakdown some verticals such as: Top News Searches Top Reality TV Searches Celebrity Searches Movie Searches Iraq Related Searches The list goes

Christmas shopping - the easy (online) way

2003-12-26T23:54:00.000+11:00

Christmas shoppers move online to splash the cash This is a great little piece about the rise of EzyDvd. From its first bricks and mortar shopfront in 2001 to the top Aussie DVD retailer in Australia. There are some other quality DVD online retailers if you need some choice including: dvdorchard and DStore's DVD section The results EzyDvd talks about in this article shows an encouraging trend

More on Froogling...

2003-12-19T09:35:00.000+11:00

Google Enhances Froogle, Offers New Ad and Search Features Chris Sherman wraps up the latest Froogle moves in this article. Predictably, soon after my last entry, Google has placed links from the home page of Google and the 'shameless self promotion' area at the foot of the search results to begin the promotion of the shopping search engine. I haven't seen anymore 'product suggestions' on the

Is Google becoming a SuperAffiliate?

2003-12-10T10:33:00.000+11:00

Google AU Search: canon digital camera Did a search the other day for 'canon digital cameras'. I noticed that instead of the News section where Google normally places links to Google News content, I saw links to ...you guessed it... the up-and-coming shopping search engine: Froogle. Now we all knew that Froogle [froogle.google.com] would come out of Beta soon, and it looks like, with the

Is Australia SMS crazy?

2003-12-05T10:07:00.000+11:00

Herald Sun: We're just so :) with SMS This article by the Herald Sun outlines some big Australian SMS usage statistics. 70 per cent of Australians own a mobile Pre-paid deals are booming - accounting for three-quarters of all new contracts. Almost 4 billion SMSs were sent last financial year Each subscriber averages 294 SMS a year. SMS represents 9% of mobile call revenue Also, as an

Scroogle - Enter your search terms and weep

2003-11-27T10:32:00.000+11:00

Scroogle Had to laugh at this one, its a search engine that allows you to see the top ranked sites that are really underperforming due to Google ranking changes. After all the panic that was set off due to Google's latest index update, this website comes as some comic relief for those webmasters who take their rankings a little too seriously.

Open source undermines Windows empire in Vic

2003-11-26T12:26:00.000+11:00

Open source group poised to white-ant Microsoft Deliverance is at hand. The populace are restless. The pillars of MS are crumbling... Open Source Victoria, recently received a grant from the Victorian Government to bolster the push for more open source software on the desktop. For example, you will soon have a choice whether to use Microsoft Office, Star Office (produced by Sun Microsystems)

England 20 Australia 17

2003-11-23T11:29:00.000+11:00

Rugby World Cup 2003 - RugbyHeaven Well, my throat is still hoarse from cheering on the Aussies in a match that seemed to be scripted by a Hollywood studio. After Elton Flatley even it up for Australia at the full time whistle, the Rugby World Cup final kicked into overdrive as the two exhausted teams picked themselves up to do battle for another 20 minutes. Again the scoring see-sawed until

We didn't talk to Google - Honest!?

2003-11-18T17:20:00.000+11:00

USATODAY.com This article refutes the Australian IT article (paraphrased from the Washington Post) regarding Microsoft attempting to merge with Google. Hmmmm... now who to believe... Bill Gates or the Post? Tough Call.

Destra brings Sanity to online music.

2003-11-14T19:35:00.000+11:00

Australian IT - Sanity prevails in online music An interesting strategic alliance formed this week with the news of high profile Australian retailer Sanity, joining forces with Destra with a view to distribute more music online. In a bold move to further legitimise the online music download activities of thousands of Australian music lovers, the partnership will hopefully be a boon for the

Is Microsoft drooling over Google?

2003-11-07T11:52:00.000+11:00

Google rebuffs Microsoft offers Microsoft launched a takeover bid on search competitor Google early this month as reported by the Australian IT. The merger overture by Microsoft really does prove the value of Google's acclaimed search technology and brand equity in a turbulent industry experiencing growing pains. The search market itself has seen expansion and lately a massive consolidation as

A Mooter a day keeps Google away.

2003-10-22T19:56:00.000+10:00

Mooter - Web Search The cheeky motto of a new Australian search engine on the block was featured in a Herald Sun article today. Having performed a couple of searches, I drew an instant parallel to the way Vivisimo use their clustering technology to create unique search results. Mooter attempts to display results in a similar fashion to how the brain works when searching for information and

BigPond email stalls

2003-10-15T21:38:00.000+10:00

Australian IT - BigPond email still delayed Sheesh, Telstra must be running it thin. I mean, a 20% increase maxed out their servers? Who in their right minds runs their servers at 80% capacity? It really is a shame when our home grown monopoly drops the ball so severely. It just makes us look bad as a 1st world country. Hell, I bet thats even an indicator on the assessment form for nation

Microsoft dumps LookSmart

2003-10-08T21:22:00.000+10:00

Microsoft dumps LookSmart - Business - www.theage.com.au Looksmart has been reeling ever since Microsoft announced the end of their relationship to the world yesterday, with their share price dropping by almost 60%. Despite trying to woo syndication partners with announcements of up and coming keyword bidding technologies, Microsoft were unimpressed. The spurned Looksmart will suffer a hit to

Once More Into The Breach...

2003-10-06T22:06:00.000+10:00

IT job ads continue to rise: Olivier: ZDNet Australia: News & Tech And so the IT market finally lifts its battered body out of the murky depths of dot com flotsam and jetsam. The Oliver Internet Job Index continues to see a increase in IT Job ads in Australia, and all I can say is: Halleluliah Brothers and Sisters! According to Oliver, the biggest indication that the tech-crash death throes

LookSmart Gets Adwordy

2003-10-02T22:14:00.000+10:00

LookSmart Australia - Web Hosting Search Was poking around Looksmart AU the other day and noticed they have expanded their Looklisting Advertising product which will give them more inventory moving forward, especially for red hot search terms like "web hosting". Although its not a blatant a copy as some I have seen, search engines everywhere are seeing the benefits of placing their ads down

Tuganz - Keepin' it real

2003-09-24T21:46:00.000+10:00

The Tivoli User Group Australia & New Zealand Tivoli produce software for monitoring enterprise IT systems, although I haven't heard much talk in the tech circles about them for some time. I did some searching and of course found the usual marketing guff over at IBM, but found a more down to earth user group right here in Oz. Tuganz allows fellow Tivoli users to communicate, share ideas, tips

the ageless project

2003-09-22T21:25:00.000+10:00

The ageless project is a site dedicated to researching the demographics of bloggers (non-commercial ones anyhow). The result so far seems to be a wide variety of folks with some date of births dating back to the '30's (!!) Makes me wonder what my mother has been doing all this time...you hear that Mom? Get with the program ! :o)

PeaceBlogs.org

2003-09-22T20:53:00.000+10:00

PeaceBlogs.org: Strength in Numbers I couldn't help but throw a link to the guys over at Peace Blogs and add my vote in opposition to the war in Iraq. This link gives you a run down of other blogs in Australia and Oceania in general who oppose the war and believe that it was based on lies and half-truths with little regard for the Iraqi people.

Blog City

2003-09-18T16:52:00.001+10:00

Weblogs.Com: Recently Changed Weblogs After reading some articles on Microdoc News, I took a trip over to WebLogs.com. The site diplays the last 3 hours of blog activity on the internet. I decided to sign up and see how this crazy site worked. Although you can ping the site from a form, there is an even easier way if you are with Blogger :) There is an option in your Blogspot control panel

MicroDoc News....on the trail of the missing Google index.

2003-09-14T12:55:00.000+10:00

Five Billion Google Listings: What are in those 2 billion more documents? Perhaps Microdoc should check out this article by Danny Sullivan about Google's Supplemental Index . It seems Google is running another index especially for hard to match queries. This is most likely to achieve greater performance with serving results. For example if Google's main index only returns 20 results for your

Overture to play Down Under

2003-08-27T21:03:00.000+10:00

Overture to focus on sales and marketing in AU: ZDNet Australia Search marketing on the internet is going to get a little hotter with the introduction of the Yahoo! owned Overture Services right here in the flat brown land. Should give Google a little competition as they have been operating Adwords here for a year, so they have a nice head start with little real competition from Looksmart who

Net Nasties to get swatted

2003-08-20T20:06:00.000+10:00

Net harassment to earn two-year jail term - smh.com.au Now this is interesting news. The Government finally plays catch up with policing online content. Personally, if they lean on the racist/hate/kiddie porn guys it'll be a brighter day for a lot of us. Of course - lets hope they dont get bored and start clamping free speech huh?

I recently cruzed the Holden website...

2003-08-14T20:08:00.000+10:00

Holden - Drive On Was looking a some of the cars in the Holden range today (as if i could afford it...yeah right) and the Cruze's really took my fancy. This website has a cool "build your own" function which allows you to choose every kind of feature i could think of including colour, trim, abs brakes, transmission etc. It also has garoovy fly throughs of each of their product line. Good stuff

A blog is born!

2003-08-14T19:36:00.000+10:00

Well, I've finally taken the plunge and created a blog. I thought I'd never stoop this low into geekdom (or high - depending on your perspective), but here it is. My rants and observations for all to see. Lets see where this bad boy takes us.....