Yahoo Takes Over Inktomi

jmcc

Yahoo has announced that it is taking over Inktomi. Google used to supply search results to Yahoo but this looks like Yahoo are going head to head with Google.

http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release1050.html

Regards...jmcc

Terminator

I remember when Yahoo used Inktomi before. The results were pretty poor.

Unless they completely revamp the crawling schedule I don't think they can match Google for relevancy.

Still I'd imagine once they jettison Google and start using Inktomi (which charges for inclusion) they'll be saving/making more money. They can't lose.

Google will surely miss the Yahoo revenues though.

peterd

Are Yahoo going to start displaying *all* ink results now? or maybe a mix of ink and Google.

Also, where does this leave submitting to Yahoo. Will it be worth the astronomical $299 to submit/renew? (i.e. if it was ever worth it)

jmcc

Originally posted by Terminator
I remember when Yahoo used Inktomi before. The results were pretty poor.

Inktomi has been actively spidering over the last few months and it looks like they are working at keeping a fresh index. While the Google ranking methodology has made Google far more popular, this does give Yahoo the ability to go head to head with Google. Inktomi also supplies search facilities to the MSN sites.

Google will surely miss the Yahoo revenues though.

Yep it could be a head to head search war.

Regards...jmcc

jmcc

Originally posted by peterd
Are Yahoo going to start displaying *all* ink results now? or maybe a mix of ink and Google.

I think Yahoo Europe is still Google. But it may change in the next few months. It probably has more to do with the contract period that Yahoo has with Google than anything else.

Also, where does this leave submitting to Yahoo. Will it be worth the astronomical $299 to submit/renew? (i.e. if it was ever worth it)

The $299 was for inclusion in the Yahoo directory. The problem is that most people don't use directories that much and prefer to navigate by search engine. I think that the default option on Yahoo's search was flipped to the search engine a while ago and it caused a lot of upset among people who had forked out to be in the directory. Though inclusion in the directory could be a way into the Inktomi index. But then Dmoz would also be a way of getting included.

When Yahoo announced the inclusion fee, I could see where they were going - trying to make a profit from the traffic they were driving to other websites. When Doras introduced a fee for inclusion - it was an indication of extreme cluelessness faced with the brick wall of extinction. Pay for inclusion does work where a: the site gets a lot of traffic and b: the results are useful. At a guess, Yahoo's directory would be a primary input to a new index for Inktomi though this also looks interesting http://google.yahoo.com - Google apparently also includes the Yahoo directory and the http://www.dmoz.org directory as fodder.

The interesting aspect (speaking from a search engine operator's point of view ) is that if someone is willing to pay money to have their site included in a highly trafficked directory like Yahoo, the site may well be more important than a site that has not been submitted to any directories.

The biggest killer of any search engine is stale data. Yahoo's directory is no different. If you look at the .ie websites returning 'Last-Modified' data, you can see the link rot problem straight away:

Websites Last Updated 2002: 9478
Websites Last Updated 2001: 2706
Websites Last Updated 2000: 1111
Websites Last Updated 1999: 232
Websites Last Updated 1998: 51

With pay for inclusion (the Yahoo yearly subscription fee) there is the possibility that the re-up fee for an expired or dead site will not be paid and thus there is a method of keeping the directory fresh. I haven't run a comparative check on the Doras site to see the live:dead link ratio but I would reckon that it is fairly high.

Google has such a hold on the market that it is now far more important to be in Google than any other directory. The best way (apart from submission) is via directories like Dmoz/Yahoo.

The other very important aspect of with Yahoo is to have a cctld URL for the particular country that you are targeting. The Yahoo 'pages from' aspect is a particularly poor index in that it tends to rely heavily on .ie for Ireland and thus misses a lot of .com/net/org/info/biz registered Irish websites.

The only real way to justify the $299 would be in terms of whether Yahoo generates significant web referrals and more importantly whether those referrals result in sales. If you can make the money back, then it is worth it. Alternatively, concentrate on getting the site into Dmoz or some other directory which is used as fodder by Google/Alltheweb/Altavista/Inktomi.

Regards...jmcc

Snowball

i thought that yahoo had bought the google tech?? can't remember who said it to me but ... yeah no I thought that google sold the tech to yahoo so they could use it.

By the sounds of it it was just lisenced to yahoo, which is right?

jmcc

Originally posted by Snowball
i thought that yahoo had bought the google tech??

Yahoo own 10% of Google I think. However the Google searches were on contract as far as I know (Yahoo Europe still seems to be using google results so I am not sure when that will change over to Inktomi. It will probably happen when Yahoo's search contract with Google expires or is terminated. I could be completely wrong on this angle though.) Generally Google offers a rate of Million searches/$ to portals/ISPs etc. This is basically what the big SEs do to make money - sell searches to ISPs/sites that don't have the capability or the technology do run a SE themselves. The branding can be seen with IOL/Esat/Oceanfree's Oirish version of Google.

Regards...jmcc