Google is still #1, Ask.com Fails Test

There has been a lot of talk these days about new search company's taking on Google and trying to take some of their traffic away. Ask.com created an aggressive multi-million dollar ad campaign claiming they have a better algorithm for searches. In the SF Bay area, the highways have been littered with billboards that say “The Algorithm Killed Jeeves.” TV commercials paint Google as an evil information monopoly with Ask.com being an underground savior.

According to a new study this month by Hitwise, Google is still king of the search with 64.13% of the traffic. Yahoo followed with 21.26% and MSN with 9.15%. Ask.com came in 4th with 3.48% While is data shows where people are searching it doesn't say who is best.

To find out who is best, I use the "Pytlovany Test". Having a unique last name I've found it to be a good keyword to find out who has the best search bots and methodology. A search on "Pytlovany" on most search engines will usually find a number of references to me and my family and not much else.

Google not only returns the most results, but the topics that show up first are relevant and timely. Currently, the first result is this Blog which makes sense since it's updated regularly. It probably doesn't hurt that my Blog is hosted by Google. I haven't looked at all the results but they claim to find over 9000 references. This number includes non-English web pages.

Yahoo returns about 1200 hits and seems to like my LinkedIn profile. Bits from Bill is listed 4th and other results are all very relevant to anyone searching on Pytlovany.

MSN or Live Search returns over 1800 hits with this Blog at the top and nicely spreads out the results with other family members and their pages.

Ask.com returned less than a thousand sites but the results were the most annoying. On the top of their list is a link to the "Pytlovany Surname Resource Center". This is a genealogy page created to attract search traffic by listing every name they can find. It has no meaning to anyone searching and should not be included.

These days a lot of content is stolen and copied to adware sites so even the Pytlovany name isn’t safe . I decided to look more carefully at the first 5 pages of results to see how accurate the search was. I was pretty happy with what I found. Most sites listed references to myself and family members.

The only failure was to Ask.com. In the first 50 sites returned, 8 were bogus genealogy sites, surname databases, and others looking to get my attention instead of providing results. I admit, I wasn’t a fan of Ask.com and their Toolbar/Zwinky stuff but my test doesn’t lie. It will be interesting to see if spending millions of dollars promoting their poor technology will calculate into more users.

Google Online Security

I was pleased to read in Donna’s SecurityFlash that Google has a new blog dedicated to Online Security. I expect we’ll be seeing regular posts so I have added Google Online Security to the list of “Blogs I Read”.

“Online security is an important topic for Google, our users, and anyone who uses the Internet. The related issues are complex and dynamic and we've been looking for a way to foster discussion on the topic and keep users informed. Thus, we've started this blog where we hope to periodically provide updates on recent trends, interesting findings, and efforts related to online security. Among the issues we'll tackle is malware, which is the subject of our inaugural post.”

Click to Read the Introductory Post.

I’m glad that Google is using their own Blogger software for this new initiative. Perhaps it will mean less down time for BlogSpot users.

Back Up Plans and Hard Drive Crash Stats

I wanted to post something useful today but I’m having a lazy day. I didn’t feel like doing a lot of research and writing so I’m going to use this time to preach the bible of regular backups. It’s something that can’t be stressed enough.

Seriously, the number one support Email I receive looks something like this…

5/1/2007 Jeff wrote: “I recently had a total system crash and need to know how to reinstall the "Pro" version, which I previously paid for. “

4/29/2007 Cheryl wrote: “I have plus but when my computer crashed I lost the code and info. Can you please send it to me?”

4/28/2007 Linda wrote: “I WOULD LIKE TO REINSTALL MY WP PLUS. I HAVE MY COD NUMBER. I AM NOT SURE HOW TO DO IT. MY COMPUTER CRASHED AND I LOST EVERTHING”

Do you have an actual backup plan? Have you backed up your critical data recently? Your music? Photos? Address Book? Custom settings?

If not stop reading my Blog and do it now!

If you have or you’re done you can read the research Google did at http://209.85.163.132/papers/disk_failures.pdf