[Sigia-l] "Best Bets" the Yahoo way

[Cho, Jason]

>> there are two core concepts in web search: pay for placement and pay 
>> for inclusion.
>You mean as framed by Yahoo? There's no law that says you must ask for
>money for inclusion. Google doesn't.

I would restate: two core web search business models are PFP and PFI. A
third is pay-per-click, in which the ranking algorithm is independent of
payment, but the advertiser is only charged if the user actually selects
their link.

>When $100 million or more annually is at stake, as projected, how can
>the user be sure that that is the case?

>dollars given to congressional reps

How can anyone be *sure* of anything :-) ? At that point it's no longer
a question of usability or information architecture, it's a matter of 1)
media literacy and 2) philosophy. Does Ted Turner's well-known disdain
for the Pope make CNN "unusable" for reporting on the recent Catholic
Church scandals? Do human constructs socialized into our subconscious
preclude the attainment of objective knowledge, or even certainty that
an objective universe exists. Etc. etc.

Querying a search engine is not like conducting scientific research.
Operating a search engine is not like operating a utility or public
service. A search engine has no authority or credibility except that
which consumers assign, and a competitor perceived as more "pure" can
market itself as such. If the public cares, there's nothing to spare
Yahoo or Google the fate of AltaVista or Lycos.

As an aside, the Yahoo Directory is not PFI, it is PFR. The $299 does
not guarantee placement in the directory, only an "express" review by
one of their staffers.
--
Jason Cho
jcho at icmarc.org