Harry - 1:41 pm on Sep 7, 2005 (gmt 0)

--To be honest, it looks like it favours poorly optimised, poorly linked in sites, over big sites that you'd expect to see at the top of the SERPs.--

MSN Dude, Don't heed this. Your objective is to deliver the best and most relevant pages to your customers. I don't believe you are in business to please the whims of professional optimizers and their customers.

There is no reason why a poorly linked site without optimization should rank below another one. The value of the site is more important that what container and tricks were used to publish it.

As for constructive suggestions, I would say, talk back to people and try to answer their queries when they contact you. I have sent sticky notes to you and the team at MSN Search, and you never replied. If you start responding to Webmasters, then you'll gain their trust and they will do the promotion for you.

It's another way of tackling the problem of making MSN better, by using real PR - i.e., public relations and customer service, as opposed as using an algorithm and technology. If you can improve on this and do it better than Google, you will gain something over which one cannot put a dollar sign easily - good will.