Search engines can drive a lot of visitors (read: potential buyers) to an e-commerce site. But if you think good text is all you need to score a high search-engine ranking, you haven't looked closely at search-engine results lately.

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hunt results are no longer limited to blue text links. Search engines now integrate feeds from specialized areas, such as news, pictures, and video, into many search query results. New tagging technology promises to make it easier for others to find and access multimedia and other specialized content on your Web site.

It's important for your connected business to take advantage of these developments in Web technology and search engines.

Universal or Blended Search

Universal search, which blends multimedia and news content with traditional search engine results, was a hot topic at last week's Search Engine Strategies conference in Toronto.

Everyone knows that being number one in a look into engine for a popular keyword, or search term, can attract thousands of clicks. But what constitutes number one in universal search these days? Is it the sponsored pay-per-click ad splashed over the top of the boy-servant, the first text link, the top news bond, or an eye-catching photo or video featured in the results?

All get their share of clicks. So the savvy Web site marketer should consider ways to make all components of a site's digital assets (theme, pictures, and video) rank highly.

Yahoo SearchMonkey

Masked by the disturbance of Microsoft's on-again, off-again takeover summon for its parent company, Yahoo's search engine is innovating behind the scenes.

Yahoo's new, and free, SearchMonkey tools for Web developers, recently out of beta testing, open up the search engine to user-developed content. The tools offer ways of highlighting your search-engine presence with added features, such as a photo or rating.

SearchMonkey offers several ways to accomplish this. If you've got some software development skills, you could create a small program in PHP, a common Web scripting language that is supported by most Web hosts. SearchMonkey also offers some sample apps, including one that works with LinkedIn listings to add résumé data to a search listing.

Semantic Web Markup

For many small-business owners, the easiest way to improve rankings may be to mark up existing Web pages with new, more descriptive tags that Yahoo will automatically pick up when it indexes pages. The use of tags is Yahoo's take on building a smarter, so-called Semantic Web, which permits easier, even automatic sharing of all types of data. Think of it as an extension of the current Web with a layer of electronic glue that helps other sites less ill access the data on your pages.

If you don't rank highly for a certain keyword, using SearchMonkey won't help. But if you make your listing stand out from the crowd by enhancing it–by adding a photo, for example–you may be able to get more visitors to click on your link.

SearchMonkey now works only on Yahoo's search engine listings. However, it's such a good creative that I would be surprised if Google doesn't come out with something similar to take advantage of the Semantic Web.

Optimizing Your Digital Assets

Since universal look into results go beyond straight text, how do you optimize your other digital assets, such as videos, for search engines? Some businesses have found that uploading a video clip to YouTube (at that time owned by means of Google) can pay off. You can tag each video so it can be found under relevant YouTube searches. Google includes links to some YouTube videos in its regular search results.

Uploading existing videos to YouTube is one thing. But is it necessity to invest time and money in creating new videos to have a complete presence in universal search?

The answer depends partly on what type of business your site is supporting. "A small business doesn't necessarily need to do videos," says Jill Whalen, CEO of High Rankings, a Boston-area search engine optimization (SEO) consulting firm. "There are for a like reason many things most business owners need to do to their Web sites in the van of they get to that stage. Do the basics of SEO first."

But, she adds, "perhaps for some local businesses there are opportunities in that place: A 'how-to' if you're a plumber or an electrician. You could make some videos which could show up in the local listings."

The News Route

News listings are also integrated into more pursuit results. Your business doesn't require a write-up in the New York Times to be deemed newsworthy. Issuing a news release and distributing it online may be enough to qualify for indexing as a news item, which could attract more visitor traffic.

The key lies in writing the news release for the Web, mentioning keywords related to your content, and including hot links to your site.

The Future of Universal examine

As again Internet users upgrade to broadband connections, search engines will move to embody even more multimedia content in their results to appeal to these high-speed users. Consider how you can spot your company's Web site to benefit from this sweep.

Semantic Web technology can enhance the value of the data on your Web site, by making it more easily shared by other communities and accessed by automatic tools. While a relatively small number of sites currently take advantage of the Semantic Web's opportunities, keep in mind that this emerging technology standard is supported by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and appears poised to be the next step in the evolution of the HTML Web.

Richard Morochove is an IT consultant and writer. Send him questions about using technology in your connected small to mid-size business via e-mail. PC World may edit your query and cannot guarantee that all questions will be answered.

SAN FRANCISCO - Yahoo Inc.’s leaders defended online search leader Google Inc. as a more desirable partner than Microsoft Corp. in a Wednesday letter that affirmed the Internet pioneer’s commitment to a strategy that has alienated shareholders.

Yahoo embraced its planned advertising partnership with Google amid reports that it had revived talks about a possible deal with Microsoft. The report, based information from unnamed people, surfaced despite Yahoo’s repeated rejection of the software maker since their tense mating dance began nearly five months ago.

Although Yahoo’s letter didn’t completely rule out a Microsoft deal, it stressed that laboring with Google remains the best option on the table.

The letter is part of Yahoo’s campaign to fend off an attempt to overthrow its board at its Aug. 1 occurring once a year meeting. The revolt was triggered by Yahoo’s repudiation of Microsoft’s takeover offer of $47.5 billion, or $33 per share.

The Redmond, Wash.-based software maker withdrew the bid after co-founder and Chief Executive Jerry Yang pushed for $37 a share — a price Yahoo’s stock hasn’t reached since January 2006.

Upset by the board’s handling of the Microsoft negotiations, activist investor Carl Icahn has nominated nine candidates to restore Yahoo’s current directors, including Yang. If Icahn prevails, he also plans to fire Yang as CEO.

Yahoo is urging shareholders to reject Icahn’s slate and give Yang another chance to prove the company is worth besides than $47.5 billion.

Icahn didn’t return a call seeking make comments Wednesday.

Under each agreement announced this month, Sunnyvale-based Yahoo will use Google’s higher technology to show ads alongside its seeking results in the United States. Yahoo estimates the partnership will boost its annual revenue about $800 million and help end the financial malaise that has battered the company’s stock.

“This carefully structured agreement strikes the fit strategic overplus, enhancing our financial results while advancing our strategic objectives,” Yang and Yahoo Chairman Roy Bostock wrote Wednesday.

After dropping its buyout greet last month, Microsoft returned with an alternative volunteer of $9 billion for Yahoo’s search engine and a 16 percent stake in Yahoo’s remaining operations. Microsoft maintains that could have helped boost Yahoo’s cash flow about $1 billion annually — much more than the $250 million to $450 million expected from the Google partnership.

But Yahoo disputed Microsoft’s estimates Wednesday, saying the deal wouldn’t have provided a “meaningful” improvement to Yahoo’s cash flow, and it would have precluded a sale to anyone else without the software maker’s approval.

The Google partnership allows for Yahoo to be sold, although the escape subordinate sentence includes a break-up fee of up to $250 million.

Microsoft didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday. The software maker has previously said it remains available to discuss a limited traffic with Yahoo while emphasizing it’s no longer interested in buying the company in its entirety.

Wednesday’s developments seemed to disappoint investors, whose hopes had been raised by the reports that Yahoo might abandon the Google partnership for a Microsoft deal. The reports were published on technology blogs and an online news site owned by CNet Networks Inc.

Yahoo shares shed 26 cents in Wednesday’s extended trading after dipping three cents to finish the regular session at $22.01 for a cumulative drop of 16 percent since the Google firm was announced.

Yahoo on Wednesday sent a literal sense to its shareholders justifying its deal with Google, saying it will enhance the company's profitability and provide more shareholder value than the offer put forth by Microsoft to invest in Yahoo's search business.

The deal with Google will generate US$250 million to $450 million in incremental operating cash flow for Yahoo in the first year, Yahoo Chairman Roy Bostock and CEO Jerry Yang wrote in the joint letter.

Microsoft's proposition to buy Yahoo's search commerce for $1 billion and invest another $8 billion required Yahoo to commit to a 10-year exclusive arrangement that "would have made us dependent on Microsoft for all of our search business," Bostock and Yang wrote.

It would also have given Microsoft a powerful role in determining Yahoo's future, including the right to veto the sale of Yahoo, they wrote.

Microsoft announced an unsolicited offer to buy Yahoo on Feb. 1 for $44.6 billion. Yahoo's board rejected that propound, saying it undervalued the company. Microsoft increased its offer to $47.5 billion, but on May 3, Microsoft abandoned talks in the rear of the two sides failed to agree on a price.

At the time, investors criticized Yang and Yahoo's board for allegedly not negotiating in good faith and failing to look out for shareholders' most excellent interests.

Since then, Microsoft has repeatedly denied an interest in acquiring all of Yahoo, but offered to buy Yahoo's search advertising business. Those negotiations fell through. Yahoo instead signed a deal with Google to outsource part of its search ad business.

Under the deal with Google, Yahoo will run sponsored search ads supplied by Google alongside Yahoo's search results. Google will emolument Yahoo a fee based on revenue from click-throughs generated by Google's ads on Yahoo.

NEW YORK (AP) — Kanye West defended himself from criticism over his delayed performance at Bonnaroo, saying on his blog that the flak he’s taken has left him “the most offended I’ve ever been.”

West’s performance at the Tennessee festive celebration was scheduled for 2:45 a.m. in the early morning of June 15. West didn’t take the stage until 4:25 a.m., angering much of the crowd who had stayed up late to see the rapper perform.

The delay was caused by problems setting up West’s elaborate stage set, which included an interplanetary landscape of a wavy black platform and a video screen above. Pearl Jam, who had performed on the main pipe stage earlier that evening, also went an hour over its scheduled time. While waiting for West’s concert to begin, many in the crowd pelted the stage with glow sticks and beer.

At the Bonnaroo Music & Arts festive celebration, which traditionally has favored jam bands, West’s delayed show became a kind of rallying point, leading to “Kanye sucks” chants and criticism from pedal steel guitarist Robert Randolph, who played later the same time.

Writing Tuesday on his blog at http://www.kanyeuniversity.com in almost all caps, West said he was offended that anyone would think he doesn’t trouble about his fans and blamed the delay on festival organizers.

“This Bonnaroo thing is the worst insult I’ve ever had in my life,” West wrote. “This is the most offended I’ve ever been … this is the maddest I ever will be.”

West was critical of the festival for not releasing a statement in his defense. The morning from the show, The Associated Press asked festival spokesman Ken Weinstein about the delay. Weinstein said it was simply a matter of unloading the Pearl Jam stage afterward its set (which went until about 1:15 a.m.) and loading the West stage.

Following his performance, West’s publicist didn’t reply to a request from The AP for West’s paint on the criticism.

In his blog posting, West said he and the festival organizers (Bonnaroo is put on by Superfly Productions and AC Entertainment) went back and forth for a month on how his stage could fit at the festival. He said it was clear he was “dealing with … idiots who didn’t really have the capacity to really push to action on this show properly.”

Weinstein on Wednesday relayed a statement on behalf of the festival that did not specifically address West’s complaints but read: “Our world-class event production team strives to accommodate the needs of every performer.”

West also blamed thrown bottles for malfunctions with his “Jane screen.” (In the concept concert, Jane is the HAL-like disembodied female robotic voice of his spaceship.) But the stage mob appeared to be having difficulty with the screen well before anything was thrown from the crowd.

West’s set was originally scheduled for 8:15 p.m. the night of June 14, but the rapper requested it be moved later in the evening so it was sufficiently dark in spite of his “glow-in-the-dark” completion. But because of the late start, midway through his performance the morning light began to show — revealing a substantially thinned-out audience.

“It broke my heart that I couldn’t give these fans `Stronger’ in its greatest form,” said West, referring to his hit song. “I’m sorry to everyone that I didn’t have the ability 2 give the performance I wanted to. I’m sorry.”

West concluded by by-word his elaborate stage cuts his payday in half and leaves him icing his knees.

“Call me what you want,” he said, “but never say I didn’t give my all!”

___

On the Net:

http://www.kanyeuniversity.com

http://www.bonnaroo.com

WASHINGTON - Lawmakers failed Wednesday to agree on setting a clear definition of illegal Internet gambling to go along with a ban on online betting passed in 2006.

The Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department have been unable to finalize rules to implement the ban because Congress didn’t clearly define online gambling when it passed legislation less than two years ago.

The House Financial Services Committee voted Wednesday on legislation to require treaty regulators to write a uniform definition of which types of gambling should and should not be allowed on the Internet, followed by new rules implementing the ban. The tie vote, 32-32, meant the legislation failed under committee rules.

Senate Republicans, pushed by then-Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, had attached the online gambling ban to an unrelated port security bill in a rush of year-end legislation in 2006.

Banks and other financial institutions have complained that they are being forced into a law enforcement role because the Internet gambling ban prohibits them from accepting payments to settle online wagers free from giving them a clear set of rules.

“The financial institutions are in the position of being told not process bets, except it’s not clear what is legal and what is illegal,” said Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the committee’s chairman. He said financial institutions had been given “a job that is undoable.”

The committee’s top Republican, Rep. Spencer Bachus of Alabama, argued that gambling is the fastest-growing addiction in the United States and having it online makes it accessible to children.

“The banks consider decided that this is a monetary burden,” Bachus said. “We have decided, on the other hand, that our children are worth protecting.”

Internet gambling before that time was considered mostly illegal in the U.S., but the games are played by many U.S. residents on sites hosted overseas in a business worth more than $15.5 billion a year. U.S. bettors be the subject of been estimated to provide at least half that income.

The 2006 congressional ban sought to outlaw Internet gambling by blocking payment methods for it, but didn’t offer a clear definition everyone could agree on, instead referring to existing federal and state laws which themselves provoke differing interpretations.

The measure that fell to defeat Wednesday was by Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y.

Federal Court Limits Employers’ Access to Employees’ E-Communications

The 9th Circuit courtyard upheld the workplace privacy rights of employees in its decision in Quon v. Arch Wireless. Sgt. Jeff Quon and 3 other officers sued Arch Wireless for sharing wireless passage records with their employer, the Ontario Police Department. The City contracted for text messaging service for employees, and later obtained records to investigate whether all communications were work related. The court’s decision reversed a lower court ruling, and found that the carrier was in violation of the 4th Amendment and California constitutional guarantees.

Court limits employer access to worker messages, Associated Press, June 19, 2008

9 Things to Know from one place to another Your Digital Privacy

Digital technology brings lots of conveniences, but also can enable snoopers. The development of new technologies if not properly engineered can open avenues for satisfying the curiosity of others.

Opinion: 9 things you should know about your privacy and rights in the digital age, Computer World, June 19, 2008

Boston of medicine Pays for Privacy Violations

The Boston curative Center’s health insurance plan will pay the state of Massachusetts $562,000 to settle a case about the improper use of patient information. The hospital sent 2,600 patients with health insurance letters promoting the hospital’s medical insurance. This was a fundamental violation of privacy rules that limit use of personal information only to the purpose for which it was collected. In this case insurance information was for the purpose of paying medical bills.

Boston Medical settles privacy abuse flap, Boston Herald, June 20, 2008

Federal Contractors be necessitated to practice Employment Screening universe

A new rule by the Bush Administration requires that all federal contractors and subcontractors use E-Verify, a unconstrained employment verification system, to sift employees. The system checks private information against Social Security Administration and Homeland Security Databases. Other screening programs initiated by the Department of Homeland Security have faced problems with accuracy and transparency.

E-Verify proposed for contractor employees, Federal Computer Week, June 13, 2008

Swedish Law Allows powers that be Access to E-mail and Phones

Sweden adopted legislation that will give the government access to all e-mail and telephone traffic within its borders. The law was first proposed in 2005 and follows efforts at pervasive surveillance found in China, Saudi Arabia, and the programs disclosed in the United States. An international survey of privacy finds an increase dependence by governments on digital surveillance technologies.

Swedish law allows tapping of emails and phone, The Guardian, June 20, 2008