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I've noticed as of this weekend that their results pages have been displaying different pages for some queries I monitor to check engines.
Did any one else notice a shift, or did they just start including a new round of stuff via the paid route?
Cheers,
Han Solo
Based on some of the Hub/Authority research I've been tinkering with, Ink seems to have shifted in the importance they place on the pages with more hub characteristics, or more links pointing towards them.
Has anybody else noticed a shift? Or seen their number of referrals double over the weekend?
Thanks all,
Cheers,
Han Solo
Upon investigation into the inktomi results at msn.com, arguably one of the largest users of the Inktomi database, it appears that again, their database was corrupted. The results are showing very, very old data, and some of the data is even absurdly incorrect!
<the following is untrue>
After checking with technicians at Inktomis corporate headquaters, they confirmed something had happened to the database. A gentleman, who refused to be identified publically, said,
"I was working late, thinking about how far the stock price has fallen, and how my options aren't nearly as valuable. I remember thinking about how good google is, and their home page says they are hiring. Next thing I know, my coffee is all over the database server. Luckily, nobody saw me do it."
</untrue>
Any other theories? Or does the data look right to everybody else?
Cheers,
Han Solo
I did not need to click on that link, because I KNOW for certain that every page I have submitted has gone into a black hole there - except one lousy links page from one site.
Yes, its been changing..index page only showed up a few days ago, by URL only, then disappeared. Then the links page, and that disappears. I will take one page only, that they have refused to even look at, slap it into a /directory/ and see what happens with the little plastic card applied.
The links I've found are through advertisers, and there are a lot of redirects in the soup. Also appearing are links to the same site, over and over, for at most 8 in a row.
So, their DB is off line, again. Give me proof it's not, and I'll eat my shoe. Scratch that, I'll eat both shoes. And give you pictures.
Anybody remember how to get a hold of inktomi search support? I remember a while ago, there was this guy...and then we decided we shouldn't name the gentleman, because we didn't want him getting into trouble.
So, if anybody has any ideas on how to find out what's really going on, please post here. Do you think Jim Stob could enlighten us? He has a line into ink, and was helping on another topic...perhaps they would tell a business partner what's happening, but not I.
I just don't like it when I see all across the top ten paid redirects, just below the title and description.
Feel free to use sticky mail, if anybody doesn't want to post about contacting them.
Cheers,
Han Solo
Here's my current theory, which is a work in progress:
They have the permanent db, the paid db, and the free submit db.
They axed everything but the paid db, and are now in the process of "filling in some holes" around that data, so that only the stuff that is paid is replicated throughout their portal partner customers pages.
How could they get away with this? Easy. Every portal that uses ink database, always couples the results with something else...so nobody will notice that much difference in the query quality, and ink has greater chance of getting more sign ups on the current program.
"Gee, I just got dumped...guess I'd best pull out the ol credit card..."
And now we are seeing that happen.
Although, to tell you the truth, I feel like the noise I could make would echo into an abyss...
Cheers,
Han Solo
I've just had a few older sites do really well in MSN and AOL this week. They have nothing to do with the paid DB.
I haven't had much success getting new sites listed well in Inktomi for months. But it's pretty easy to keep veteran sites in there. You just have to make updates pretty often. Like rotate some links and do word replacements.
So I guess it is pretty much known that new sites are hard to get in without paying. But I think if you have a site that is getting nailed by Slurp a few times a week you can add in links to other sites to get them listed. I have no proof of this yet as I am still waiting to see the results from recent changes. I'll post later if I find anything.
Ciao,
Han solo
What i meant to post is wow, all of those paid redirects, bare for the eye to see, in the place of the url in the inktomi database...looks to me like they are experimenting with new ways of monetizing their searches.
Cheers,
Han Solo
ps...tried to correct that last one. didn't work.
-Scott
Will trying to create and submit a page with relevant results for surfers get buried under this abominable mess? [search.msn.com]
>all of those paid redirects
Is this what the paid program is turning into?
At least they've got only one #12 listing under that search term at HotBot with the same redirect, with a date of 1/6/2001. So it must be a paid listing, no other explanation.
Oh, that's bad! It's very, very bad!
<rant>
What gets me Marcia, is the big companies going after keywords like "crafts" and the like when they KNOW those are the bread and butter of very small time mom-n-pop sites.
Why don't they go pick on someone their own size already!
-Scott
<edit> And did you click on one of the links? The relevancy reminds me of some sort of porn site trick. Couldn't be any further from anything even remotely "craft-like". </edit>
</rant>
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