[Sigia-l] Messing with search results

[Listera]

As an indication of how far search results from popular search engines are
going to be commercialized and "pre-selected" (to use a popular term around
here :-), have a look at the musing of Yahoo's new vice president of search,
whose motto is "Being in wrong place at the wrong time has a cost for you --
you don't convert a sale" :

The first step, is understanding the user's request. For example, should a
query for "windows" return pages from Microsoft or Anderson? Yahoo!, which
has suddenly gotten very serious about paid search after paying $235 million
for Inktomi, is looking to address dilemmas like this using a combination of
techniques. 

"We might present a 50-50 mix and see over time what users pick," Cadogan
said. "If users are consistently choosing Microsoft, the operating system
choices might gradually float to the top of the results page," Cadogan said.

Other synonyms that could fall into the windows category include china and
mouse. Subsequently, search engines must determine if the searcher needs of
a product or service, or if they are involved in pure research.

Along similar lines, Cadogan is considering adding various content to the
results mix. Because the user who keyed in the search is probably younger,
Yahoo! might add images to appeal to the demographic. There would be little
value in trying to add images to a query for a dry subject such as Peruvian
election results [1], Cadogan said.

Search Seeks Economic/User Balance
<http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article.php/2105261>

Ziya
Nullius in Verba 

[1] What's with people mindlessly picking on Peru these days?