FAST: We're in talks with Yahoo

[heini]

Knut Magne Risvik from FAST yesterday confirmed - yes, we are in close talks with Yahoo.
Itkanalen.com [itkanalen.com]

Risvik doesn't even deny possible partnerships with MSN...

[backus]

Excellent news!

[Rumbas]

Heini you beat me by a second ;)

This is in deed interesting news. July 1st is almost like Christmas.

[agerhart]

Very good news! This will be an interesting summer! Although it will reduce traffic at first seeing the change from Google

[Travoli]

Yes it certainly will be interesting. It would be nice to have another SE to optimize for again.

[Napoleon]

Well... it's only my opinion, so don't shout... but I for one am not happy. I don't rate the FAST index at all and see it as vastly inferior to Google. Not a good day.

[caine]

I think it is excellant news, and luckily enough, i have always considered fast a target on equal status with google, from the point of SEO, and do equally well with fast.

i wonder how much googles serps will go down and how much fast will rise !

[Macguru]

heini,

Sorry for this stupid question but here it goes : What are Fast's technologic advantages over Google to better serve big boys like Y! and MSN? Could they be more flexible on revenue models? Can you please give us a little more info?

[eljefe3]

I also wonder if the $$ works out better for yahoo then sticking with google. With google's rise in popularity, they can probably dictate their terms to yahoo and might be too high a price to pay for Y!

On the flip side, it is good if google doesn't dominate all the major traffic drivers. Fast's results are much better than any other standing SE except for google, so this should be good for us all if this actually happens.

[lazerzubb]

If i understod right from a conversation with people from fast, they have ability to expand there index very much, also they can spider the web very agressive (up to 150 million pages per day). I do belive Google serves better results for english queries, i don't think FAST have got the link-pop all figured out, even though i know they want link-pop to count less. Yahoo is a worldwide portal with many different sites in different languages, i think that is one point where FAST is better than Google. FAST is very good at presenting good serp's for different languages, their spider also recognise many different languages.
Also as you know, Google have taken over some of the traffic from Yahoo, and since FAST doesn't want to be a "destination site" like Google wants Google.com to be i think the people will stay at Yahoo and not switch to Google.com as many people do today.

[caine]

I don't think their is a great deal of difference in relevancy of serps between google and fast, and becuase of Googles, high pr incoming unrelated links, makes it even possibly less relevant.

Another thing is Fast's, advanced search is second to none.

[NFFC]

Yahoo do have a history of playing companies off against each other so I wouldn't get too excited. Having said that good luck to the fast team!

>I don't rate the FAST index at all and see it as vastly inferior to Google.

Napoleon, try these;

to be or not to be [google.com] Google

to be or not to be [alltheweb.com] Alltheweb

[vitaplease]

hey NFFC,

I had never seen that display of "indexed 1 hour ago" in Alltheweb... looks better than Google's Fresh.

To give Google credit in your comparison I guess you should add " " marks to the query. But then normal average surfers would never do that and would not be helped.

[chiyo]

Well would yahoo be able to have their own way of parsing default queries i guess (as phrase, ANd, OR, popular terms AND etc) and Googles SERPs actually seem better than FAST when you add the quotes to the google query.

That said, I must say, update by update, FAST seems to be improving and Google either staying still or going backwards on relevancy, FWIS (from where I sit!)

[agerhart]

>>>Google either staying still or going backwards on relevancy

While Fast is getting better, although there traffic share still seems awful small, I would hardly say that Google's relevancy is getting worse.

[seth_wilde]

"Could they be more flexible on revenue models?"

Although I'm not sure about Fast, other SE's that offer PFI services (like INK) actually pay big players like Y! to use their database (figuring they'll make their money from PFI subscriptions)...

Becuase google doesn't offer PFI services, to make money they charge Y! millions (If I remember correctly it's around 6) to use their database.

If Yahoo can find a partner that pays them and offers quality results... Yahoo could be much better off financially...

[lazerzubb]

I just can't see that FAST is paying Yahoo, that's not how the operate (not the way i know anyway)

If you have sites which is not in English, you will see a bigger share of users comming from FAST. Fast is very strong in Europe - US not so strong that's what they want to change.

[Macguru]

Since Y! recently inked another 3 years with Overture, chances are slim that google could share the adwords programs pie with them.

For AOL, it seems they found a complete package deal with Google.

Also is Fast well prepared to face such traffic?

[EliteWeb]

I'm all up for seeing another search engine get a little play. Yes I think since Google has its name now they will charge more or FAST came to Y! saying we're cheaper and better and this is why...

I love google's results. I rarely even hit up another Search Engine.

[Brett_Tabke]

>" yes, we are in close talks with Yahoo."

The way I heard it from the rumor mill, the ink is already dry. ...but there is always a buzz in these deals...

[satanclaus]

I don't believe Google's relevancy is getting worse but I don't really see it improving much. To me when things stay the same for too long they seem to lose their luster.

I'm excited over the prospect of seeing FAST take over at Yahoo. Even if they can't handle the traffic it will be fun to watch.

[DrCool]

I think Fast would be a great way for Yahoo to go. It would give us another major player to deal with. If someone gets hit with a PR0 it wouldn't kill them as much if they are ranking well in Fast. I also think that a large portion of Yahoo's users wouldn't even be aware of the switch.

[Abrexa_UK]

Well, this Fast forum is going to get a lot busier with people trying to squeeze traffic from Yahoo. Are we going to start seeing the same dance frenzy that we get for Google?

Aren't we due an update from Fast in the near future anyway? They finished the last major crawl on the 7th or 8th I think.

This should also make it quite clear just how much influence the Google results had on Yahoo results (if any). Will we see a major reshuffle in the Yahoo search results, as Yahoo remove any Google influence?

Plus the board name will need to be changed to "Fast - Lycos - Fast.yahoo.com" or something similar :)

[JFord]

I for one am horrified by this news. I have a client who was doing wonderfully in FAST for a highly competitive kw phrase, #1 as a matter of fact, up until the last FAST dance, then we dropped clean off the map. Still hanging in there for another phrase, but I find that serps aren't as relevant with FAST as with Google(i.e. dog vitamins in the #12 spot in a search for pain relief balm). Well I guess it's back to school so that I can now start learning how to optimize for FAST.

[heini]

FAST is capable of serving state of the art websearch. They have the index, the freshness, the international scope, the relevancy. Basically only Google and FAST are competing in the same league today.
That rules out INK, who were the third competitor.

Google's incentive for partners is adwords. Yahoo is bound to Overture/Espotting. So that ruled Google out.

FAST has proven to be a perfect backdrop to PPC listings.
I would be surprised if in some way Yahoo would not be participating from FAST PFI too.

Mind you - FAST is also a candidate for MSN. If that happened, the world of websearch ultimately would be altered.

[littleman]

Hey, it is nice to see fast have a shot at the bigtime. I could live with Fast, or Google in Yahoo.

This will be a devastating blow to inktomi, many of it's investors were banking on the yahoo deal.

[NeoN]

What I do not like about Fast.. is that their SERPs look completely different from Google ( at least for my area). Almost no same sites..
That means hard to beat 2 in 1 shot. :(

Thank you

[lazerzubb]

OK, forgot that you didn't speak Norwegian, i don't either but i tried to translate the text as good as i could:

Article:

FAST have gone to bed with Yahoo, and it's starting to get intimate - We are in constant dialog.

FAST is one of the three companies that is negotiating in the final
decisions made who Yahoo will select.
FAST is also negotiating with Microsofts MSN, says Imarkedet.

We absolutly have a close dialog. Yahoo wants to decide who will be there new search engine partners from the first of July (01-07) says Search Engine chief Knut Magne Risvik, he means
that there is Google, Inktomi and FAST that is in the final round.

Yahoo have spoken, and said that Google is becoming more of a competitor, this could be an
advantage for us, says Risvik

At the same time Microsofts MSN is also looking for a new SE partner.

But here the decision will be made in the third quarter, or the fourth, says Risvik.
Norwegian

[nell]

>>The way I heard it, the ink is already dry.

Is that a reference to INKtomi?

If so, they've been dry for a long time.

[Brett_Tabke]

If it happens, that would be so good to have another top SE with some traffic.