Why Rupert Murdoch gets it wrong and other search engine news headlines.

This week’s main story is the news that Microsoft is considering a deal with Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp to give Bing exclusive access to the content of Wall Street Journal and other News Corp publications.

Murdoch & Co will then exclude Google from indexing their sites.They can easily do so. All they have to do is to add a text string to their robots.txt file.

Still, this would be so stupid that we find it hard to understand what kind of advisers Rupert Murdoch is employing.

Rupert Murdoch is angry because Google publishes links to his content for free? Really! This is what web search is about. We certainly don’t expect Google to pay us for being included in the Google index!

Rupert Murdoch is angry because Google channels a lot of traffic to his sites for free? The man has clearly not left the 20th century. He is still living in the age of ink and paper.

What would happen if News Corp makes such a deal with Microsoft?

Well, first there would be a huge drop in the number of visitors to Rupert Murdoch’s sites. Bing has only 10 percent of the US market and cannot replace the traffic generated by Google.

Google would not suffer a bit. Most searchers will continue to go to Google for news. Sure, there will be no links to the Wall Street Journal. Instead there will be links to blogs and new sites citing the Wall Street Journal, and to all of Rupert Murdoch’s competitors. These sites are now offering their dinner to Mammon, hoping and praying that Murdoch will go ahead and do what he threatens to do.

Microsoft is apparently also planning to get US TV channel Fox to opt out of Google’s index. The fact that Microsoft thinks this is a good idea, says a lot about how desperate that company has become. They clearly no longer believe they can beat Google by honest means. They are again trying to divide the Web into sections owned by the big multinationals. It won’t work!

More headlines from this week’s search engine scene:

• Twitter to charge for reading tweets next year

  Subscription service only in Japan at first, but sure to spread (tehcradar Nov 28 2009)

• I think my site has been hacked!

  Has your site ever dropped suddenly from the index or disappeared mysteriously from search results? (Google Webmaster Central Nov 26 2009)

• Google becoming part of our learning process

  Researchers at Penn State University found that instead of looking for new information, search engines are primarily used to fact check information that you already know. (techradar Nov 27 2009)

• Hard facts about comment spam

  Some webmasters abuse other sites by exploiting their comment fields, posting tons of links that point back to the poster’s site in an attempt to boost their site’s ranking. (Google Webmaster Central Nov 25 2009)

• Hulu Is Still Free, and Bigger than Ever. Next Year, Though…

  But it will be very interesting to see what happens to these numbers next year if Hulu does move ahead with some sort of pay service. (All Things Digital Nov 25 2009)

• Banned Google AdWords Accounts Will Likely Never Be Unsuspended

  The bans result in the advertiser not being able to set up new accounts and Google is stricter about who they ban. (SE Roundtable Nov 25 2009)

• Google Drops “Search within results” Search Box?

  Back in March 2008, Google began testing search boxes in the search results (SE Roundtable Nov 25 2009)

• Check the Redesigned Google (With Always-Visible Sidebar) Yourself

  Find yourself as new participant of Google’s latest and more all-encompassing prototype test – the one with a new logo, buttons, and always-visible left-hand pane in results. (Blogoscoped Nov 25 2009)

• How Google’s New Ad Formats Depart from Google’s Old Philosophy

  I’m sure some in the SEO community will be afraid that more and more paid screen real estate will make it harder to drive organic traffic, and to some extent that’s true. (Traffick Nov 24 2009)

• Thankful Yet? Online Ad Revenue Improving, but Slooooowly.

  Internet advertising increased a bit–1.7 percent, precisely–over the past three months. (All Things Digital Nov 24 2009)

• Google’s new search ad formats

  Google Blog: Some of them include visual elements. For example, if you’re curious about the movies that are playing this holiday season, you might see an ad with a video that lets you watch a trailer. (Nov 24 2009)

• Google Tweaks Product Search Just in Time for the Holidays

  New gallery view: Instead of viewing in a vertical list, view products horizontally in rows (SE Watch Nov 24 2009)

• Google Chrome OS and Android ‘will likely converge’

  Sergey Brin planning OS tie-up? (techradar Nov 23 2009)

• Google Buys Teracent, Machine Learning Display Ad Technology

  Google announced they have purchased Teracent, a company that uses machine learning to show the different display ad creatives based on dozens of factors. (SE Land Nov 23 2009)

• Google Maps Pornography : Google Can’t Keep Up

  Nude and seductive images being displayed both in the UK and US for certain business listings. (SE Roundtable Nov 23 2009)

• AOL offers up sneak peak of re-brand

  Aol. is all about fish, rock and, er, lots of squiggles (techradar Nov 23 2009)

• Thoughts On A “Killer” Bing-News Corp Deal & The Myth Of An “OPEC For News”

  It’s back, the prospect that Microsoft might try to make Rupert Murdoch happy by offering a “get listed with Bing” exclusive deal. (Danny Sullivan Nov 23 2009)

• Shaking My Head at Steve Ballmer…

  Microsoft may pay online publishers to de-index their sites from Google. (Nathania Johnson Nov 23 2009)

• Why Google Wave Sucks, And Why You Will Use It Anyway

  The ambitious group collaboration and micro-messaging platform started rolling out in beta via an initial batch of 100,000 invitations two months ago. (techcrunch Nov 26 2009)

• Google’s book-scanning deal is not sealed yet

  A revised settlement satisfies some objections, but questions over copyright and antitrust laws remain. (LA Times Nov 28 2009)

• Turkish engineers developing internet search engine

  Turkish engineers are working on developing an internet search engine and aiming to launch it in 2010, the head of the country’s telecommunications watchdog said on Saturday. (Alt Search Engines Nov 28 2009)

• The Economist and Its Wobbly Approach to Online Revenue

  Google has traffic. Bing.com does not have traffic. Traditional content will not close the gap between Microsoft and Google. (Beyond Search Nov 27 2009)

• Microsoft opens a new front in its battle with Google

  Rupert Murdoch has long criticised Google for “stealing” his newspapers’ stories by displaying links to them on Google’s own news site. (The Economist Nov 26 2009)

• Google’s ineptitude with Obama image, and it’s not what you think

  The offensive image only appear with safe search on (P Bradley Nov 24 2009)

• Google Gmail Now Lets Users Add Attachments While Offline

  Google’s Gmail application has enabled offline access since January, connecting with Google Gears to let users access their e-mail messages and contacts through a Web browser without a Web connection. (Google Watch Nov 24 2009)

• Shopping Search Engine Milo Lands $4 Million

  Milo, the free Web site that enables shoppers to search online and buy local, today announced that the company has raised $4 million in Series A financing. (Alt Search Engines Nov 24 2009)

• More thoughts on Google Images

  Google’s concept of images and SafeSearch is fundamentally flawed. (P Bradley Nov 25 2009)

• The Michelle Obama Google Bomb

  Top-ranked result for U.S. first lady Michelle Obama on Google Image Search showed a picture of the woman altered to have the features of a chimpanzee (Google Watch Nov 25 2009)

• Shots Of Facebook’s Upcoming Redesign In The Wild, With A New Emphasis On Search

  Search now has much more prominent placement, appearing just above (and almost as an extension of) your News Feed. (techcrunch Nov 27 2009)

• Will a Lack of Editors Affect Wikipedia Accuracy?

  Wikipedia lost over 49,000 editors in the first three months of 2009 alone. (WebProNews Nov 28 2009)

Videos of the week

We give away some free advertising space to Google this week. Here’s a sweet little search engine love story:

Google has put up several such search stories over at YouTube.

All right, just one more!