Google's GBuy Could Be 'Revolutionary' - Forbes.com

Another move away from the "pure" motive of organising the worlds knowledge to compiling commercially usefull knowledge?

Google's GBuy Could Be 'Revolutionary' - Forbes.com: "RBC Capital Markets maintained an 'outperform' rating on Google in light of the impending launch of the company's online payment system, currently known as 'GBuy.'

Consumers using GBuy, which is set for release on June 28, will be taken off the merchant's site to complete the payment...This will enable Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) to capture e-commerce transaction data, driving more precise targeting in future searches.

"If harnessed, the precision of this targeting could be revolutionary," wrote RBC analyst Jordan Rohan

On its core search results pages, Google will designate each merchant accepting GBuy as a "trusted GBuy merchant." "

Why I'll Never Be a Google VP

Me neither!
Why I'll Never Be a Google VP: "Mayer holds many of the personality traits of tech super-stars, the interview also demonstrates two key reasons why I'll never be a Google VP. First, I need more than 5 hours of sleep a night, second, I like spending time with my husband and daughter. ;)"

Google Inc. Tweaks Its Video Service - Forbes.com

Wonder what percentage of video uploads are porn? 90+?

Google Inc. Tweaks Its Video Service - Forbes.com: "Internet search leader Google Inc. is making it easier to post and share online videos on its site, hoping to widen the appeal of a service that so far has been eclipsed by upstart YouTube.com.

Until the system was changed late Tuesday, uploading a video to Google's site required a special piece of software to be installed on a computer. The Mountain View-based company has retooled its service so that step is no longer required...

As online video becomes more popular, Google is trying to gain ground on much smaller company in San Mateo, Calif-based YouTube.

Since its debut a year ago, the video-sharing site has blossomed into a cultural phenomenon. YouTube says viewers watch more than 40 million videos daily on its site."

Google news - Aussie internship program: ZDNet Australia: News: Software

ZDNet reports that Google has a new program to recruit Australian university students work in projects in Google's Sydney office. Lars Rasmussen, Google's local head of engineering said 5-10 technical and non-technical positions would be on offer. The report also states that Gmail is now available in Australia

Google plans Aussie internship program: ZDNet Australia: News: Software: "Search giant Google will this summer launch a student internship program that will see Australian university students work on projects in its new Sydney headquarters...

as....part of Google's ongoing plans to operate a fully fledged research and development centre in Sydney. The spacious new office next to Google's old quarters in Sydney's Darling Harbour will give those plans a boost...
The local developments will also see well-known Google software engineer Rob Pike split his time between Australia and the United States in an effort to help build Google's Australian engineering offices.

Pike is known for his work on the original Unix, Plan 9 and Inferno operating systems at Bell Labs.


Google also revealed today that it had given Australians the option of signing up to use Google's popular "GMail" Web e-mail service."

Google Press Center: new techie bits

Google Press Center: Press Release: "May 10, 2006 - Today, Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) announced new technologies to enhance and improve the search experience. Three new products � Google Co-op, Google Desktop 4, and Google Notebook � advance the state of the art in search by helping users worldwide find and share more relevant information. The products all incorporate new capabilities that leverage user communities, enabling users to either share more information with others or benefit from other users' expertise to improve the accuracy of search results....

As a first step, Google has worked with partners to annotate web pages related to health and city guides and to offer dozens of subscribed links to specialized content such as restaurant and movie information. Going forward, the broader online community will begin building out new topic areas and subscribed links to help improve the way people find and discover information online.

Users can subscribe to content and providers at www.google.com/coop/directory. Google Co-op is available today on all English language Google domains including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom...

Google Trends builds on the Google Zeitgeist to help users find facts and trends related to Google usage around the world. Google Trends enables users to learn how popular a particular search term has been on Google over time and see the relevant news articles that ran on that subject.

"For the first time ever, Google is making it possible to sift through billions of search queries from around the world to see what people are thinking about," said Marissa Mayer, vice president, Search Products and User Experience, Google Inc."

Google goes back to its search roots - vnunet.com: "Google goes back to its search roots ...New products focus on core business...

"All these [new] products are centred around search," said Marissa Mayer, Google's vice president for search products and user experience. "Our core, and where we innovate most, is inside search"

Google Press Center: new techie bits

Google Press Center: Press Release: "May 10, 2006 - Today, Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) announced new technologies to enhance and improve the search experience. Three new products � Google Co-op, Google Desktop 4, and Google Notebook � advance the state of the art in search by helping users worldwide find and share more relevant information. The products all incorporate new capabilities that leverage user communities, enabling users to either share more information with others or benefit from other users' expertise to improve the accuracy of search results....

As a first step, Google has worked with partners to annotate web pages related to health and city guides and to offer dozens of subscribed links to specialized content such as restaurant and movie information. Going forward, the broader online community will begin building out new topic areas and subscribed links to help improve the way people find and discover information online.

Users can subscribe to content and providers at www.google.com/coop/directory. Google Co-op is available today on all English language Google domains including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom...

Google Trends builds on the Google Zeitgeist to help users find facts and trends related to Google usage around the world. Google Trends enables users to learn how popular a particular search term has been on Google over time and see the relevant news articles that ran on that subject.

"For the first time ever, Google is making it possible to sift through billions of search queries from around the world to see what people are thinking about," said Marissa Mayer, vice president, Search Products and User Experience, Google Inc."

a href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2155794/google-emphasises-search">Google goes back to its search roots - vnunet.com: "Google goes back to its search roots ...New products focus on core business...

"All these [new] products are centred around search," said Marissa Mayer, Google's vice president for search products and user experience. "Our core, and where we innovate most, is inside search"

Google admits to being disorganised - vnunet.com

Page comments that being disorganised is part of Google culture...how does that reflect on the mission to organise the worlds knowledge? Such internal contradiction may well be Google's achilles heel....

Google admits to being disorganised - vnunet.com: "Google is growing too quickly and has become 'disorganised' as a result, according to the company's co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin."


Google Corporate Information: Company Overview: "Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. "

Schmidt's Google Goes To Authorities About MSN - Forbes.com

Fair or unfair? Schmidt's Google Goes To Authorities About MSN - Forbes.com: "Google, led by Chief Executive Eric Schmidt, seems to be feeling the heat already from the impending update of Microsoft's Internet Explorer, the Web browser which is used by 85% of the world's PCs and which is set to be released with Windows Vista later this year as an updated version 7....

The complaint has initially prompted some to chortle at what looks to be a case of the pot calling the kettle black--Google happens to have its own search tool integrated into Microsoft's rival web browsers Firefox and Opera. But Google is deadly serious. A spokesman for the search giant, Steve Langdon, said that the company had approached the U.S. Department of Justice and European Commission about the issue, though no formal complaint had been filed.

"We have spoken with the commission as part of its investigation of Vista," Langdon said. "We have expressed our concerns that Microsoft's approach to setting search defaults in IE7 benefits Microsoft while taking away choice from users." He added that Google was not aware of a similar investigation in the U.S. but had also spoken to the Department of Justice "generally about our business and the importance of preserving competition in the search market."
....this points to the fact that Google will not rest on its laurels when it looks like its share of the market is at stake. "

Google - Notifying webmasters of penalties

Does this mean that sites not signed up to Google sitemaps are more likely to be penalised? Cutts writes that Google is testing notiying webmasters of spam issues with their site via the Google sitemaps webmaster interface.


Cutts writes somewhat confusingly as if the spam detection is done by humans carrying the inference that is done manually but it is Google , the entity, that contacts webmasters....

"if the webspam team detects a spammer that is creating dozens or hundreds of sites with doorway pages followed by a sneaky redirect, there’s no reason that we’d want the spammer to realize that we’d caught those pages. So Google clearly shouldn’t contact every site that is penalized–it would tip off spammers that they’d been caught, and then the spammers would start over and try to be sneakier next time."

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � Notifying webmasters of penalties

Google’s Webspam team is working with our Sitemaps team to alert some (but not all) site owners of penalties for their site. In my world (webmasters), this is both a Big Deal and a Good Thing, even though it’s still an experiment. Sign up for Sitemaps to try it out.

....as Google grows, we get more of a chance to “go back and fix things,” to build the ideal search engine. And part of doing that is having more and better communication with webmasters...

Pages Dropping Out of Big Daddy Index

Most posters blame duplicate content issues for pages dropping from the Google index....Pages Dropping Out of Big Daddy Index at the Boston PubCon Matt Cutts confirmed that Google is to change the process used to spider pages.

Caching will be implimented on the spider and thus reducing the requests that Googlebot will be required to make of a page."

google travel - Google News

I was hanging fire to blog this to see if anything came of the rumours....not yet it would appear....google travel - Google News: "Travel looks like Google's next target Times Online, UK - Apr 17, 2006
... has kept the subject of the press briefing tightly under wraps, and it is by no means necessarily the case that the London briefing will involve Google Travel. ...

Google Travel Coming Soon?
Search Engine Watch - Apr 17, 2006
... Google: Senior Account Executive, Travel Vertical.' Russell explains that the job posting details 'sounds' that 'Google is building a Google Travel brand.' I ...

Google to launch travel portal?
Monsters and Critics.com, UK - Apr 18, 2006
... account executive for a travel vertical, was posted before the Easter weekend and analysts are speculating that the travel vertical will be Google Travel. ...
Is Google going to launch a travel portal? Eye For Travel
Google Travel Rumor On The Road WebProNews"


Yahoo flexes its muscles in travel search business - Technology - International Herald Tribune: " Yahoo flexes its muscles in travel search business By Bob Tedeschi The New York Times THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 2006

Yahoo announced last week that it had integrated its FareChase technology into its main search engine, so that it could scan multiple sites for airlines, hotels and car rentals and show the lowest-price offers directly in results whenever someone typed in, say, 'lowest fares to Las Vegas.' Previously, users had to click around Yahoo's site to gain access to FareChase, or turn to one of the handful of competing so-called meta- search sites like SideStep, Kayak or Mobissimo for a similar specialized search. The move is perhaps the most aggressive countermeasure a major search engine has taken against the growing number of sites that specialize in searching specific categories, like jobs, medical information, shopping or travel.

Indeed, the competition between Yahoo and its travel-specific counterparts appears to be moving to a new level. Yahoo initially responded to the threat in 2004 by buying FareChase, then SideStep's chief competitor, for an undisclosed sum. FareChase became an obscure corner on Yahoo's site, while speculation mounted as to how the company would ultimately use the technology.

Google last year began offering some travel-specific search results where users who typed in a travel route and dates were given a search box with some information already filled in, along with links to online travel agencies to find prices and book the flights. But analysts say Google's offering is far less sophisticated than Yahoo's or that of meta-search competitors. (Google declined to comment on such comparisons.)

Other analysts say they believe that Google and MSN may simply follow Yahoo's lead and buy the niche search players. "If someone wants to play catch-up fast, that's the way to go," said Dougherty, of Nielsen/NetRatings.

Life just got easier for travelers looking for bargains on the Web, while for some of Yahoo's competitors, things just got a bit more complicated.

Yahoo announced last week that it had integrated its FareChase technology into its main search engine, so that it could scan multiple sites for airlines, hotels and car rentals and show the lowest-price offers directly in results whenever someone typed in, say, "lowest fares to Las Vegas."

Previously, users had to click around Yahoo's site to gain access to FareChase, or turn to one of the handful of competing so-called meta- search sites like SideStep, Kayak or Mobissimo for a similar specialized search.

The move is perhaps the most aggressive countermeasure a major search engine has taken against the growing number of sites that specialize in searching specific categories, like jobs, medical information, shopping or travel.

Indeed, the competition between Yahoo and its travel-specific counterparts appears to be moving to a new level. Yahoo initially responded to the threat in 2004 by buying FareChase, then SideStep's chief competitor, for an undisclosed sum. FareChase became an obscure corner on Yahoo's site, while speculation mounted as to how the company would ultimately use the technology.

It also comes on the threshold of a major media campaign by a rival travel search engine, Kayak.com.

"This is a very smart move for Yahoo," said Heather Dougherty, an analyst with Nielsen/NetRatings, an Internet measurement company. "It's the first time any of the big search engines have tried to integrate this type of searching into their results. And FareChase finally isn't going to be off sitting on its own."

Rather, it is central to a Yahoo user's experience, or at least close to it. Last week, for instance, typing in a search for "flights New York to San Francisco" returned the lowest price for that flight over the next few months - $279 for a trip from May 5 to May 9 - and a box offering the chance to search other dates. If a user's location has been indicated in previous Yahoo searches - on the site's Local or Maps sections, for instance - simply typing in "flights to San Francisco" will produce the same result.

"This is definitely a step for Yahoo, and a step for the industry," Jasper Malcolmson, director of Yahoo travel services, said about the integration of meta-search with general search results. The integration of FareChase highlights a series of upgrades to Yahoo's travel offering, including introduction of a satellite map service showing hotel locations.

Yahoo's new functionality could significantly increase user exposure to this type of service, which has until now struggled to attract attention. Just 12 percent of Internet travel shoppers now visit such meta-search sites, according to a recent survey by Forrester Research, a technology consulting firm. But that figure is twice what it was just a year ago, despite the fact that none of these services has done much advertising at all.

Roughly 4.4 million people visited such sites in March, according to Nielsen/NetRatings - a tiny number compared with the number of visits to Expedia, the leading travel commerce site, which attracted 16.4 million.

But FareChase and its two biggest competitors, Kayak.com and SideStep.com, offer a significantly different experience from other travel sites. SideStep, for instance, scans the inventories of 100 airline sites, as well as that of the online travel agency Orbitz.com, and lists the best fares on a single page.

In terms of revenue, travel search sites have much ground to make up to challenge the general travel sites. SideStep and Kayak are privately held, and Yahoo does not break out revenue figures for its FareChase division, but analysts said these sites earned only a small fraction of what the big travel agencies did, because they handle far fewer bookings and have fewer sources of revenue....

Kayak and SideStep earn undisclosed commissions for customers they refer to suppliers, but as Rob Solomon, SideStep's chief executive, said, "The challenge for all of us is scale - how to go from three to five million users to seven to 10 million."

Google last year began offering some travel-specific search results where users who typed in a travel route and dates were given a search box with some information already filled in, along with links to online travel agencies to find prices and book the flights. But analysts say Google's offering is far less sophisticated than Yahoo's or that of meta-search competitors. (Google declined to comment on such comparisons.)

Other analysts say they believe that Google and MSN may simply follow Yahoo's lead and buy the niche search players. "If someone wants to play catch-up fast, that's the way to go," said Dougherty, of Nielsen/NetRatings"

Google & Gambling Ads

Not new news but I know for a fact that Google adwords for gambling relating sites including casinos many on gambling sites are still making money... so unless Google is assiduaosly handing over all that revenue it is still profiting from illegal gambling proceeds....Search Engine Journal � Yahoo and Google Sued Over Gambling Advertisements

Two years on from the above judgement and Google are still displaying gambling related adwords - many times on gambling related sites so are still raking in a fair portion of dollars from this multi billion pound industry in direct contradiction of their own T&Cs..Evil? Or a failing of their technology? Why not just ban gambling ads for the whole of America and let the rest of the world operate according to their local legislation?

Google wins rights to Aussie algorithm - Breaking - Technology - smh.com.au

Google wins rights to Aussie algorithm - Breaking - Technology - smh.com.au "The algorithm, or search engine tool, is called Orion and was developed by UNSW PhD student Ori Allon at the university's School of Computer Science.

Orion works as an add-on to existing search engines to improve the relevance of searches and won praise from Microsoft founder Bill Gates last year.

The algorithm is a problem-solving computational procedure and is the building block for all search engines such as those operated by Google and Yahoo!

Orion finds pages where the content is about a topic strongly related to the key word. It then returns a section of the page, and lists other topics related to the key word so the user can pick the most relevant.

The results of the query are displayed immediately in the form of expanded text extracts, giving the searcher the relevant information without having to go to the website - although there is still that option."

SMH previously interviewed Allon "The Sydney Morning Herald Blogs: MashUp / Google buys Aussie invention Archives: "Contrast the difference between September when the University of NSW unveiled the project to today, when all they can say is that Ori is now working with Google."

See Google's Redesign

See Google's Redesign Experiment

I cannot get it to load but the screenshots show the new layout...

Google employees' wireless patents published | CNET News.com

Three new patents from Google signal their move into advertising in the wireless market..

Google employees' wireless patents published | CNET News.com: "The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has published three wireless-related patents filed by Google employees as the search giant seeks to delve deeper into the wireless market.

The patent applications, filed by Google employees Wesley Chan, Shioupyn Shen and former Google product management director Georges Harik, propose lowering the cost of wireless access by offsetting the costs via advertisements on the service....

Patent application No. 20060058019 seeks to develop a system for dynamically modifying the appearance of browser screens on a client device when connecting to a wireless access point. Under the patent, the browser's appearance would be modified to reflect the brand associated with the wireless access-point provider...

No. 20060059044 and No. 20060059043, cover ads based on wireless access points and wireless access at a reduced rate, respectively."

In another privacy flap, Google email riles spam fighters - MarketWatch

If your gmail is not being delivered this could explain why.....In another privacy flap, Google email riles spam fighters - MarketWatch:

"The problems experienced by Schwingel and possibly thousands of other Gmail users are a consequence of Google's sometimes-hawkish policy on privacy. In an unusual practice, Google makes Gmail users virtually anonymous. That's led some spam blockers to occasionally blacklist entire Gmail servers, the massive Google computers that hold many Gmail accounts, because they can't separate the spammers from the legitimate emailers.


Some publicly available black lists, including the widely used Spamhaus list, have a hands-off approach to Gmail to avoid blocking legitimate email. Others, most notably IronPort Systems Inc.'s SpamCop, aren't willing to give Gmail a free pass.

"Gmail has taken an extreme position on privacy that inhibits the antispam community from doing their job, and it's ticking people off," says Tom Gilles, co-founder of IronPort...

....assessing reputation, which requires knowing a senders' identity, is now at the cutting edge of antispam technology. Black lists, which are rosters of spammer IP addresses, are used by many organizations as a first line of defense, though experts stress they should be used with care to avoid blocking legitimate email.

Google's strategy seems to be to attain both reliability and privacy for its email service through the sheer force of its engineering prowess, rather than by hewing to the informal protocols of the Internet community...

Gilles of IronPort says Gmail servers only land on the SpamCop list "every few months," and that Google is good at keeping spammers out of its system and at fixing any problems so its servers are delisted."

Google specific robots.txt

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � 2006 � March: "one more way to block Googlebot by using wildcards in robots.txt (Google supports wildcards like �*� in robots.txt). Here�s how:
1. Add the parameter like �http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/some-random-post.html?googlebot=nocrawl� to pages that you don�t want fetched by Googlebot.
2. Add the following to your robots.txt:

User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow: *googlebot=nocrawl

That�s it. We may see links to the pages with the nocrawl parameter, but we won�t crawl them. At most, we would show the url reference (the uncrawled link), but we wouldn�t ever fetch the page."

Matt Cutts: Big Daddy Update

I Must monitor the search results to see how my site is doing...Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � 2006 � March: "We�re down to just 1-2 data centers left in the switchover to Bigdaddy. It�s possible that the Bigdaddy switchover will be complete in the next week or two. Just as a reminder, Bigdaddy is a software upgrade to Google�s infrastructure that provides the framework for a lot of improvements to core search quality in the coming months (smarter redirect handling, improved canonicalization, etc.)."

KinderStart v Google Page Rank Suit Unlikely To Get Far

...but can you blame them for trying?
MediaPost Publications - News Analysis: Page Rank Suit Unlikely To Get Far - 03/21/2006: "The Norwalk, Calif.-based KinderStart late last week filed a lawsuit against the search giant, charging it with unfairly degrading the site's placement in the organic search results. KinderStart is also seeking to represent other Web publishers--at least 100, by KinderStart's estimation--that have seen their sites drop in Google's organic results pages.

Google said in a statement that the suit is without merit, and it intends to fight the case...

..industry experts say the company's chances of prevailing appear to be slim-to-none--especially since Google previously won a similar suit brought by another company several years ago. What's more, they say, if companies could sue Google whenever their placement in organic listings dropped, Google--and other search companies--would no longer be able to function."

The searchking v google case is cited but there seem to be only superficial similarities...more to follow

Google To Unveil Finance Site - 03/21/2006

Not what I expected Google's foray into finance to be.....MediaPost Publications - Google To Unveil Finance Site - 03/21/2006: "GOOGLE IS EXPECTED TODAY TO launch a new financial site that will include stock market figures, links to business stories, and links to blogs." All sounds pretty run of the mill especially when I envisaged a challenge to paypal...

Matt Cutts on Does the sandbox exist?

Same old, same old....nothing conclusive but then again if I found something claiming to have the definitive explanation of the sandbox and a tech solution I would probably be just as sceptical as M Cutts in the article cited in my previos post re seo software...

Coffee Talk with Senior Google Engineer : Matt Cutts: "Q: Does the sandbox exist?
A: Matt said here comes the audience part? How many feel there is a sandbox? How many feel there is no such thing as a sandbox? SEOs normally split down the line. There are some things in the algorithm that may be perceived as a sandbox that doesn't apply to all industries. He knows it works to keep some spam out.


Q: Do you guys ever do hand tweaks of the results?
A: For the most part, we let the algorithm do all the work. However, Google News uses editor trust. PageRank uses hyperlinks by humans. Google does not have the ability to hand boost any site, or hand boost any pagerank. They can penalize sites if they are spam, manually. Legal reasons and spam reasons for penalizing sites (also viruses). They try not to differentiate large sites versus small sites, they remove both. Our goal is to return the most relevant results."

Google Avoids Surrendering Search Requests

ALBERTO R. GONZALES, in his officialcapacity as Attorney General of the United
States,Plaintiff,v. GOOGLE, INC.,Defendant.
The full 21-page order PDF "this case raises three vital interests:

(1) the national interest in a judicial system to reach informed decisions through the power of a subpoena to compel a third party to produce relevant information;

(2) the third-party's interest in not being compelled by a subpoena to reveal confidential business information and devote resources to a distant litigation; and

(3) the interest of individuals in freedom from general surveillance by the Government of their use of the Internet or othercommunications media.In aid of the Government’s position

Google Avoids Surrendering Search Requests - Forbes.com: "A federal judge on Friday ordered Google Inc. to give the Bush administration a peek inside its search engine, but rebuffed the government's demand for a list of people's search requests - potentially sensitive information that the company had fought to protect...

... District Judge James Ware told Google to provide the U.S. Justice Department with the addresses of 50,000 randomly selected Web sites indexed by its search engine by April 3...." The judge " though, decided Google won't have to disclose what people have been looking for on its widely used search engine, handing a significant victory to the company and privacy rights advocates."

Click Fraud: Review of Google case

Click Fraud: An Industry Crisis? Kevin Lee explains the Google settlement and click fraud. He explains which advertisers may be eligible to collect from the settlement and " whether you should opt in to the proposed settlement and whether you need help managing the click fraud problem going forward"

Three adwords campaign features increase the likelihood of click fraud:

Participation in Google's broader networks.
High CPC (define) keywords in popular markets
Monthly budgets under $20,000 in a competitive marketplace with privately held players

Lee concludes:

"click fraud caught by the engines' filters and clicks that escape detection are quite different across segments, keywords, and bid prices. For some marketers, the occasional fraudulent click can be regarded as a cost of doing business; for others, it may be a major issue."

Want to Work for Google ?

Only in the States,and only if you are "fit", shame.

Google hiring AdWords Seminar Leaders - JenSense.com "Google is apparently sending out invites to its pool of Google Advertising Professionals for AdWords. Those that receive an invite are encouraged to submit a resume, a video and an application form in order to secure one of the paid spots. Those that are selected as speakers will apparently also be given access to contacts within the AdWords teams and to inside information about coming AdWords features.

Supplemental club: Big Daddy update debate

Many sites have seen a noticeable drop in traffic & sales numbers primarily from Google traffic over the past couple of weeks from the end of feb into march.

Webmaster world hosts a long discussion with all the usual "moral panic" symptoms..

Quote "around FEB 21st where 1000s and 1000s of legitimate sites lost all their pages except their homepage."

Pretty hysterical until Google guy steps up to soothe all those fevered brows...Supplemental club: Big Daddy coming - Part 1 Google Guy writes: "It's like old times. :) ... Based on the specifics everyone has sent (thank you, by the way), I'm pretty sure what the issue is. I'll check with the crawl/indexing team to be sure though. Folks don't need to send any more emails unless they really want to. It may take a week or so to sort this out and be sure, but I do expect these pages to come back to the main index."

Google Advertising How Google determines ranks and rates of its sponsored links

Plain English article detailing main features of Google Advertising..

Behind the Curtain / How Google determines ranks and rates of its sponsored links: "Scott Kessler, a Standard & Poor's analyst, worries about what he calls Google's ABCs of risk: the absence of other means for making money; building competition; and click fraud, a practice in which competitors or scammers click on ads repeatedly, potentially costing Google and its advertisers thousands of dollars.
'It's one of the great questions people have to ponder with Google,' Kessler said about click fraud.
But before laying odds on Google's future, it helps to have a better understanding of the firm's deceptively simple business model. So, how does Google make all that money?

Google's advertising business appears simple. It takes just a few minutes and $5 to start posting sponsored links.

The tricky part comes as businesses battle for the top position on the first page of Google's results. Naturally, that's the sweet spot: An ad at the top of the page receives roughly double the clicks of others, said Michael Schwarz, a researcher at UC Berkeley.

But there is no way to guarantee that crucial spot. Where an advertisement appears depends on a combination of how much a business is willing to pay, and how much the ad has to do with the search.

That means that no matter how much an advertiser is willing to pay, the ad will not get top billing if the user is looking for something completely different...

In January, U.S. consumers used Google for 2.8 billion searches, or nearly 50 percent all of online queries, according to Nielsen/NetRatings. That helped produce 41.1 billion sponsored links in January on Google and its partner sites. And the experience with click fraud hasn't stopped E-magine Networks and other businesses from continuing to use Google.

"I'm not trying to be angry with Google. I want to work with Google," said Dupell of E-magine Networks.

"It is not an evil corporation," he continued. "It may be a place where fraud does occur, but Google does refund the money back if it can be proven. ... They have made us a fortune and they've made our clients a fortune and they continue to every day."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How to do it
Placing an advertisement on Google can cost as little as $5 and take just a few minutes.

1. Draw up a three-line advertisement, no more than 100 characters total.

2. Enter the keywords that will activate your sponsored link, such as "cheap airfare" for an ad about discount travel.

3. Bid in an auction for those keywords, determining how much you're willing to pay. The minimum bid is 1 cent per click. The maximum is $100 per click. You can't spend more than $250,000 a day.

4. Give Google your billing information and wait for your ad to appear."

Google Execs Paint Bright Picture - Forbes.com

Update 5: Google Execs Paint Bright Picture - Forbes.com: "Google Inc. provided stock market analysts with more color about its secretive operations Thursday, painting a bright picture that appeared aimed at defusing growth concerns raised by the search engine leader's chief financial officer earlier this week....

In his opening remarks, Google CEO Eric Schmidt assured the roomful of analysts that he sees "tremendous headroom" to develop an even more effective advertising approach.

Schmidt underscored his optimism at one point by saying Google someday might generate $100 billion in annual revenue as it expands into a variety of new advertising channels, including television, radio and publishing. The 7-year-old company's revenue totaled $6.1 billion last year.

"Our assessment is we are in the strongest position that we have ever been," Schmidt said later in the day...The upbeat remarks contrasted with Reyes' cautious commentary during a question-and-answer session at a Tuesday investor conference in New York. At that time, Reyes cited the difficulty that Google would have improving its advertising formula and advised the company's growth rate was bound to slow down - a prospect that set off alarms among investors and caused Google's stock price to drop precipitously

Reyes told analysts that Google's capital spending this year will be substantially higher than last year's $838 million investment. He indicated most of the money will be spent increasing Google's already formidable computing power so it can deliver more products and servers to Web surfers.

Google also plans to continue a hiring spree that expanded the company's payroll by an average of 7 new employees per day last year. Reyes said much of the hiring will be concentrated outside the United States as Google continues to expand internationally.

In another development, Schmidt identified Microsoft Corp. as the rival that most worries Google because of the way the world's largest software maker has aggressively attacked other technology upstarts in the past.

Microsoft currently runs the Internet's third most popular search engine, ranking behind both Google and Yahoo Inc., but it has vowed to close the gap by improving its technology and luring new users by giving away free merchandise and services.
"

Pagerank update update

Great result for a little bit of effort on the linking aspect, my humble litttle gambling blog now has a pagerank of 4! Better work on some links for the main site which now shows PR2, not bad though....Gambling Housewife Free Horse Racing Tips may be not as impressive as my January tipping

SiteProNews: Google.cn: The Internet As Beijing Sees It

SiteProNews: Google.cn: The Internet As Beijing Sees It: "the last two or three years have shown us the inherent strength of the search engine - and none more than
Google. And I believe that an unintended consequence of Google's controversial stance in China has an awareness increase of just how influential search results can be. Comparisons of 'Tiananm en' searches are illustrating this. Several blogs are showing split screen stills of keyword results using 'Tiananmen'on Google Images. Google.cn shows picture after picture of a lovely park, while Google.com shows a screen full of those infamous images of a lone protestor in front of menacing tanks.

Just one example of real time censorship is being beamed live over the internet, brought to you by Google. It makes for
unintentional and terrible publicity for Google. Oddly timed,too, considering Google's righteous defense here in the United States against government intrusion into their own affairs.

From a business perspective Google's position is sound and totally understandable....

Could anyone actually believe that Google will protect Chinese Internet users if the powers in Beijing started making demands for private search information on Chinese searches? Google has entered China on Beijing's terms, compromised. When issues of ethics arise Google won't have much to say because they are clearly in China for the dough. The power of search, that we see in China, can - and let's be frank, will be used against the people someday. This would make Google, of "Do No Evil" fame - somewhat complicit.

Until some big changes occur in Beijing I foresee much awkwardness for the "Do No Evil" bunch's operation in China.
Simply put, the Party Leaders in Beijing have Google over a barrel - I suppose that means selling out. If they cared only
about profits, this article might not have even been written. But this is Google. And their product is a powerful tool and they've already yielded it to some very powerful folks in Beijing. This time it was to prevent the Chinese people from accessing certain information. As this tool of search continues to refine and become powerful, it's tough to say what Google will be asked for. Perhaps Google will be coerced into giving up the identities of their own users in China. It is anything but a farfetched scenario.

Is hypocrisy in big business expected? Sure, to some degree. But this is dangerous hypocrisy."

Google Takes the Road More Traveled

Google Takes the Road More Traveled: "Search Engine News > Google Takes the Road More Traveled...

A little more than a year after their attempt to shake up the IPO world by selling shares through a Dutch auction designed to give the "little guy" just as much chance at buying in as the big investors have, Google seems to be giving in to traditional Wall Street tactics and shifting their attention toward the big money buyers."

The Search Experience has a De Facto Standard -Google (for Now)

The Search Experience has a De Facto Standard (for Now): "Google: The User's Definition of Search

Google's interface has become the de facto standard for search. Even now, all three of the major properties have very similar search results layouts, with only slight variations to distinguish them. It's in those variations, the nuances of design and layout, where the differences in the user experience can be found. Everything is measured against Google, and at this point, Google's interface defines the ideal search experience...

Google has done a lot right (and a few things wrong) but perhaps the smartest move they've ever made is to pay meticulous attention to the search user experience. Whether they designed an ideal interface by intention, or whether we've just been conditioned to accept it as the ideal interface, it works for us"

Q&A With Google Time Magazine

A Little Q&A With Google: "Brin, Page and Schmidt, the trio that runs Google, are the cover boys of this week's Time Magazine. Asking questions like 'Can we Trust Google With our Secrets' and publishing a general Q&A with the threesome turns up some interesting tidbits of information, including a claim by the founders that porn makes up a tiny percentage of their overall search numbers... The article includes some interesting insight. For example, the decision not to run ads on Google's image search results because the estimated $80 million that it would produce in revenue each year isn't "worth it."

From the article:

Google's decision to launch a censored website in China was so jarring. (See "Google Under the Gun," TIME, Feb. 13, 2006.) Doing a totalitarian government's bidding in blocking the truth in order to make a few extra bucks is practically the definition of evil. Google acknowledges that it's in a tough situation but says it ultimately has to obey local laws. "There's a subtext to 'Don't be evil,' and that is 'Don't be illegal,'" says Vint Cerf, an Internet founding father who now serves as "chief Internet evangelist" at Google. "Overall, having Google there is better than not having Google there." But at what cost? Can Brin and Page live with the idea that Chinese Netizens can't access anything other than the official line on, say, the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and that Google is part of the cover-up?

There's another big question that makes Brin and Page squirm: Does Google have a master plan? To outsiders, it sometimes seems as if the company is investing everywhere, trying to be everything, often giving its products away. A few of the newer pursuits: a proposal to provide free wireless Internet service for San Francisco; an online video store selling TV shows and NBA games; a classified-advertising site; a project to scan every book ever published and make the texts searchable; a free desktop package loaded with software; free instant messaging and online voice communication; a $1 billion investment in America Online. (AOL, like this magazine, is owned by Time Warner.) In the past year or so, Google Inc. has doubled in size to about 6,000 employees to handle all the new work. Even the bullish Rashtchy acknowledges that "Google is a black box for most people."

Google partners with BearingPoint | CNET News.com

Google partners with BearingPoint | CNET News.com: "A partnership that's expected to be announced Tuesday between Google and professional services provider BearingPoint, formerly KPMG, aims to make searching across corporate and internal desktops and databases as easy as using Google's Web search page.

BearingPoint has thousands of consultants trained to help companies--including many Global 2000 businesses--install, integrate and customize the Google Search Appliance and the Google Desktop for Enterprise software, Chris Weitz, managing director for BearingPoint, said on Monday.

The Google search appliance is used to let employees at corporations, federal agencies and other organizations search for documents in internal databases and other sources that may be spread across different locations and that tend to be unstructured data hidden from Internet search engines. The Desktop for Enterprise software lets people search for data on their desktops. "

GBUY hits the mainstream newsPayPal Prepares For a Challenge From Google

WSJ.com - PayPal Prepares For a Challenge From Google: "PayPal Prepares For a Challenge From Google...

When Jeff Jordan learned last May that Web-search leader Google Inc. was building its own Internet-payment service, he reacted swiftly.

Mr. Jordan, who is president of eBay Inc.'s PayPal online-payments unit, immediately asked employees to unearth information about the Google service. Soon, PayPal employees were monitoring blogs, news reports and other data for information about Google's progress in payments. PayPal staffers even gleaned details about Google's plans during regular calls to customers who were eager to dish about how Google had reached out to them.

"It's a very legitimate competitive threat," says Mr. Jordan, 47 years old. "It's hard not to pay attention to what Google is doing."

PayPal must now contend with Google. The Mountain View, Calif., Web-search giant, which has terrified Silicon Valley with its ability to quickly create new consumer products and services, is developing a rival service called GBuy. For the last nine months, Google has recruited online retailers to test GBuy, according to one person briefed on the service. GBuy will feature an icon posted alongside the paid-search ads of merchants, which Google hopes will tempt consumers to click on the ads, says this person. GBuy will also let consumers store their credit-card information on Google."

Matt Cutts: robots.txt, Google, and SEO � New robots.txt tool

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � New robots.txt tool: "Sitemaps team just introduced a new robots.txt tool into Sitemaps. The robots.txt file is one of the easiest things for a webmaster to make a mistake on. Brett Tabke�s Search Engine World has a great robots.txt tutorial and even a robots.txt validator...

Part of the problem is that mucking around with robots.txt files is pretty rare; once you get it right once, you usually never have to think about the file again. Another issue is that if you get the file wrong, it can have a large impact on your site, so most people don’t mess with their robots.txt file very often. Finally, each search engine has slightly different extra options that they support. For example, Google permits wildcards (*) and the “Allow:” directive...

the robots.txt checker from the Sitemaps team is that it lets you take a robots.txt file out for a test drive and see how the real Googlebot would handle a file. Want to play with wildcards to allow all files except for ‘*.gif’? Go for it. Want to experiment with upper vs. lower case? Answer: upper vs. lower case doesn’t matter. Want to check whether hyphens matter for Google? Go wild. Answer: we’ll accept “UserAgent” or “User-Agent”, but we’ll remind you that the hyphenated version is the correct version.

The best part is that you can test a robots.txt file without risking anything by doing it on your live site..."

Matt Cutts: Bigdaddy update, Google, and SEO � Bigdaddy progress update

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � Bigdaddy progress update: " Bigdaddy continues to roll out and is now available at three data centers. In addition to 66.249.93.104 and 64.233.179.104, Bigdaddy is now up at 216.239.51.104. We’ve been going through the spam feedback and acting on it, and reading through the general search feedback as well.
...

Bigdaddy involves new infrastructure and is not just a data push or algorithm update. Don�t take it as a promise, but I�d expect a new data center to be converted to Bigdaddy roughly every 10 days or so. "

Matt Cutts: on Big Daddy & possible sandbox behavior

Matt Cutts: on the SEO Rockstars show on webmasterradio.fm Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � I�m on webmasterradio.fm!: "show is live at http://www.webmasterradio.fm/episodes/index.php?showId=16 so go download the mp3. It�s a mere 70-ish megabytes. Highlights included an update on BigDaddy, some questions about possible sandbox behavior, my take on the new show Lestat before it heads to Broadway, SEO contests, and my current pet peeve (subdomain spam, which BigDaddy does better on). "

Matt Cutts: BMW reincluded Google, and SEO � Recent reinclusions

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO � Recent reinclusions: Cutts writes "I appreciate BMW�s quick response on removing JavaScript-redirecting pages from BMW properties. The webspam team at Google has been in contact with BMW, and Google has reincluded bmw.de in our index. Likewise, ricoh.de has also removed similar doorway pages and has been reincluded in Google's index."

The phrase that jumps out at me is "The webspam team at Google has been in contact with BMW"...did BMW not have to submit "a reinclusion request with details on who created the doorway pages. We’ll probably also need some assurances that such pages won’t reappear on the sites before the domains can be reincluded." as posted earlier? It doesnt sound like it..

In comments it appears they did but there are still many questions:

" Can small sites without BMW’s financial clout expect comparable treatment from Google or can we consider this as just another newsworthy case study?"

"How convenient for BMW to be in touch with google. How exactly does the average webmaster get in touch with google? How often is the regular webmaster told why their site has been taken out of the google index? How quickly (or delayed) is the re-inclusion of banned sites?"

Cutts replies: "Our main goal has to be to give the most relevant results to our users; there is currently a trade-off between taking action to remove spam from our index vs. removing sites that lots of users look for with navigational queries. In my mind, the most scalable, robust direction to move in is to provide tools like Sitemaps and the webmaster console that allow everyone to diagnose and debug as much information as possible with their site. As we introduce features like the robots.txt checker, that helps every website owner equally, whether it be a mom and pop website or Nissan, Metallica, or the California DMV (all of which have had robots.txt issues in the past)....

we’ve been working on programs like emailing webmasters when we find quality violations on their sites...

it’s a pretty common idiom to have a Flash site and then provide a text version of a site; I wouldn’t worry about anything like that "

an entirely new way to optimize web sites... Visitor Enhanced Optimization - VEO for short

Internet Marketing Secrets and Strategies. Issue #85 February 02 2006: "Does Google trust you? Are you on the list of trusted sites? Do you ever wonder why some sites get the green light and rise to the top of the SERPs (search engine results pages) and why others never seem to get anywhere? It's all about trust....

In VEO you don't play against the search engine algorithm, you ignore it completely. You don't focus on keyword densities, you aim for a happy visitor. You don't sell sell sell products like an affiliate, you brand the site and soft sell the products through articles...

suggests that you have a passion for your topic matter. That you become an expert in your field. Learn it inside out and write about it, putting that content on your site. Advertise the site and build it into a strong brand while soft selling products in the background.

If all this sounds backwards and crazy, remember that Colin's inspiration and motivation, came from that long conversation with Google. It's as close as you'll ever get to them giving an endorsement.

VEO Report: "how to establish trust with Google' - It is not enough to pursue inbound links and tweak your content to match a keyword density formula. In fact these activities will likely erode trust with Google""

Google to Unveil New Chat Feature

Google to Unveil New Chat Feature - Forbes.com: "Online search engine leader Google Inc. is wedding its instant messaging and e-mail services in the same Web browser, hoping the convenience will lure users from the larger communications networks operated by its chief rivals.

The new chat feature to be unveiled Tuesday will provide users of Google's Gmail service with a list of contacts drawn from past e-mail exchanges and then signal who's available for online conversations...

Google hopes to make it even simpler to connect with an online contact by allowing users to initiate an electronic conversation within the same Web browser showing an e-mailbox, bypassing the need to switch to a separate instant messaging application."

Matt Cutts: on 410's 404's Google, and SEO

Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO: "a good interview with the Sitemaps team. The most useful tidbit (which I didn�t know until now) is that Google treats a 404 HTTP status code (page not found, but it may reappear) and a 410 HTTP status code (page not found, and it�s gone forever) in the same way. I believe that we treat 404s as if they were 410s; once Googlebot has seen a 404 at that location, I think we assume that the document is gone forever. Given how many people use 404 instead of 410, that�s probably a good call for the time being."

Google blacklists BMW for page rank cheats - vnunet.com

BMW.de is in trouble for using 'doorway' pages which violate Google webmaster guidelines Matt Cutts: Gadgets, Google, and SEO blogs that the Google: "webspam team continued ramping up our anti-spam efforts by removing bmw.de from our index, and ricoh.de will be removed soon for similar reasons....

BMW used JavaScript-redirecting pages which fell foul specifically of "the principle of “Don’t deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users.”

It appears that at least some of the JavaScript-redirecting pages have already been removed from bmw.de, which is very encouraging, but given the number of pages that were doing JavaScript redirects, I expect that Google’s webspam team will need a reinclusion request with details on who created the doorway pages. We’ll probably also need some assurances that such pages won’t reappear on the sites before the domains can be reincluded""

Wi-Fi sharing company wins Skype, Google backing | CNET News.com

Wi-Fi sharing company wins Skype, Google backing | CNET News.com: "A wireless communications start-up in Spain that is partly a grass-roots social movement seeking to encourage users to share Internet access with their neighbors is set to announce on Monday $21.7 million in funding from big name backers, such as Skype Technologies and Google.

Fon Technology SL said it has secured 18 million euros in initial financing from Skype, the popular Web-based calling company now owned by eBay, Google, and venture capital firms Index Ventures and Sequoia Capital. "

Adsense Rich Media Beta

Adsense Rich Media Beta: "I just received an invitation to be part of the big G's Rich Media AdSense program. Has anybody heard of this yet? They ask for a variety of CPM rates. I've never done CPM just done adsense. I'm hoping people might be able to give a range for the following:
Expanding ads CPM:
Floating ads CPM:
Audio/Video ads CPM:
Prestitial ads CPM:
Intersitial ads CPM:
Dedicated home page placement (no out of the box) CPM:...

After doing some research here is what I've found:
Expanding ads CPM: $8 - $20
Floating ads CPM: $8 - $20
Audio/Video ads CPM: $35 - $70
Prestitial ads CPM: $35 - $60
Intersitial ads CPM: $30 - $50
Dedicated home page placement (no out of the box) CPM: $10 - $30 "

Google Tests VoIP Ads

Google Testing VoIP Ads: "Google confirmed on Tuesday that they are working with Florida based VoIP Inc. to introduce a new system of click-to-call advertising to Adwords, their popular paid search advertisement system. Google has been testing the service since last fall with select advertisers...

The Click-to-Call program brings together two of Google's interests -- Internet phone calls and advertising, said industry analyst David Lemelin of In-Stat...

With Google already exploring print advertising and last month's purchase of radio advertising company dMarc Broadcasting, it's becoming more and more clear that Google's long-term plans are to act as an advertising brokerage for all types of media, not just search and contextual media."

Judge postpones Google subpoena hearing | CNET News.com

Judge postpones Google subpoena hearing | CNET News.com: "Google's attempt to fend off the government's request for millions of search terms will move to a federal court in San Jose, Calif., on March 13...

The outcome will determine whether the U.S. Justice Department will prevail in its fight to force Google to help it defend an anti-pornography law in a trial in Philadelphia this fall...

..the Justice Department also demanded that Yahoo, Microsoft and America Online to hand over similar records, Google was the only recipient that chose to fight the subpoena in court.

Court documents reveal that the Justice Department has been pressuring Google for excerpts from its search logs for half a year. Prosecutors hope to use the excerpts to show that filtering software can't protect children online...

Prosecutors are requesting a "random sampling" of 1 million Internet addresses accessible through Google's popular search engine, and a random sampling of 1 million search queries submitted to Google over a one-week period...

The request is part of the Justice Department's attempt to defend the constitutionality of the Child Online Protection Act. The law orders commercial Web sites to shield minors from materials that may be "harmful" to them--or face prison time--a requirement that the American Civil Liberties Union claims it violates free expression rights"

Unified Theory of Google

Unified Theory of Google: "Google has been undergoing a remarkable series of changes over the past six months as it adds new features, acquires new technologies and expands its operations. It is no longer a pure search engine company though its search engine is the most popular around the world. Google acknowledged the shift early last summer when CEO Eric Schmidt famously defined Google as a media company.
That is an important distinction moving forward towards global domination. Google is a very big business, one that is growing faster and far more powerful than any other business before it. In seven short years, Google has grown from a university dorm room to universal dominance...

Quick tour of Google lesser projects...

...No honest SEO is 100% certain about anything in regards to Google, however, following the Jagger algorithm update, we are confidently certain Google has incorporated several of the concepts covered in their March 2005 patent application, “Information retrieval based on historical data”. (click here to read our examination of the patent)..

The Unified Theory of Google, (and it is only a theory), suggests to us that as Google grows into itself, it will subtly favour information found within its own databases. We believe this provides a series of indispensable tools along with a basic outline for client campaigns that uses the strengths of Google to propel client sites to the top of the general SERPs."

Google offers fee-based online ad analytics | CNET News.com

Google offers fee-based online ad analytics | CNET News.com: "Google is partnering with Seattle-based Zaaz to offer a fee-based service for advertisers who need more support, consulting and training than they can get from the search giant's free analytics service.

Zaaz will offer high-end data analysis and marketing services including accuracy audits and data collection best practices, forecasting models, competitive analysis and site optimization...

Google said anyone seeking a new Google Analytics account will need to request an invitation.

"Today, we sent out another batch of invitations to many of you who expressed interest in a Google Analytics account," the company said in a posting on its Web site Thursday. "If you have not received an invitation, please continue to be patient. Although we are adding system capacity every day, the demand for Google Analytics accounts still outpaces our ability to add resources,"

Microsoft also offers a service that lets customers monitor how their online ad campaigns are faring. Last month, Yahoo launched a service that lets customers compare the effectiveness of online ads side-by-side with advertisements on radio, television and in print"

Reactions to Googles censored search results in China

� Reactions to Google�s censored search results in China: "When you do a search in the new, censored version of Google in China, you find a message at the bottom of the results page that translates like this:
�In accordance with local law, regulations, and government policies, a portion of search results are not shown.
Google.cn has been called the Eunuch Version. Google Blogscoped shows just how castrated the Chinese version of Googles search engine is.
Read on for reactions and analyses from blogs and web sites all over the world."

Grading Google

Is Google's dependence on one main revenue stream search ads (Adwords) its achilles heel? Twelve page article runs through all of Google's current products and finds most of them weak and lacking marketing ...

on Grading Google - Forbes.com: "Can Google ever go wrong? With a stock price hovering around $435, Google ranks as one of the world's most valuable companies, and competitors quake at its name...

Google’s one and only successful marketplace is a system for the buying and selling of ads, but Card thinks a Google Money product is possible."

Google Computer Talk Mounts

Rumors persist that Google will announce it is manufacturing a $200 networkable personal computer that has no hard drive and is based around an open-source operating system, when company founder Larry Page takes the podium at the Consumer Electronics Show. Google did not deny the story, but did not confirm it either, but last month a company called Wyse Technology told Red Herring magazine that Google had contracted it to build Google-branded PCs.

RED HERRING | Google Computer Talk Mounts: "Google Computer Talk Mounts Analysts say search giant plans Internet devices for the home...

Speculation mounted this week that Google and its partners will introduce plans for cheap, Internet-linked computers with the goal of changing the way consumers use computers and access the web.


Wyse Technology told RedHerring.com last month it has been in talks with the Internet search behemoth to make inexpensive Google-branded PCs (see Wyse to Make $150 Computers). Wyse’s hard-drive-less computers, called thin clients, are often used in clusters in business or organizational settings."