Today Google publicized the split of revenue they share with their hundreds of thousands of AdSense publishers worldwide.In short, Google pays out 68% for AdSense for Content (AFC) ads, and 51% for AdSense for Search (AFS) ads. Quote from the post:AdSense for content publishers, who make up the vast majority of our AdSense publishers, earn a 68% revenue share worldwide. This means we pay 68% of the revenue that we collect from advertisers for AdSense for content ads that appear on your sites. [...] Since launching AdSense for content in 2003, this revenue share has never changed.We pay our AdSense for search partners a 51% revenue share, worldwide, for the search ads that appear through their implementations. [...] The AdSense for search revenue share has remained the same since 2005, when we increased it.This announcement is a welcomed news by websites monetizing their content with Google AdSense; this will in addition end many speculations around the subject.Read the entire post here: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2010/05/adsense-revenue-share.html Read More
This is something which I'm really excited about and I believe is a real killer feature for Google Search. Unfortunately with the frantic hype around Apple's announcement of the iPad, this news has not yet got the attention it really deserves. Back in October 2009 Google announced Social Search as an experiment on Google Labs. Users could then opt-in and test the feature which enabled them to find more relevant results from their broader social circle. The result is relevant information recommended by your contacts which is bound to be better than from strangers, and which results in a more personalized search experience. Yesterday Google rolled this feature out of experimental and into beta which means it's now available for everyone.The principles of the Social Search feature are very simple. As a user I can create a Google Profile and link it with my various public accounts on for instance Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr. Google then uses this information, plus other clues such as my Gmail contacts or blogs in my Google Reader, to generate a social graph of my direct connections, friends of friends and so on. Next time I perform a search, the search algorithms look through the public content published in my social graph to see if there is something relevant available.Here is an example of how it can look like: when I for instance search for [301 redirect], I get two very relevant results from my social circle blended with other results. One is an excellent blogpost from my ...Read More
In a blogpost on Google's official blog tonight the company is delivering a direct attack on the Chinese government and states that Google has had enough and will effectively stop censuring its search results in China. The firm lists three points for taking this momentous decision:1- Google and a number of other organizations have lately been a target for a sophisticated cyber attack on its corporate infrastructure originating in China
2- Evidence that the attackers' main object have been to gain access to Gmail accounts of human rights activists inside China
3- Evidence that Gmail accounts of a large number of human rights activists in U.S., Europe and China has been regularly accessed by third parties. This has been achieved through using illegitimate methods such as phishing attacks and malware installed on user's computer.
Google declares:
"We launched Google.cn in January 2006 in the belief that the benefits of increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results. At the time we made clear that "we will carefully monitor conditions in China, including new laws and other restrictions on our services. If we determine that we are unable to achieve the objectives outlined we will not hesitate to reconsider our approach to China."
These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered--combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web--have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. ...Read More
Not a week goes by without new allegations and threats against Google from German officials. Recently there were reports of federal and state officials debating to make the usage of Google Analytics illegal because of fears that Google might create detailed user profiles based on users' interests. This would consequently impose fines on websites using this tool to collect and analyze anonymous usage data from their visitors. In other bizarre news, local officials in a small city have voted for a plan to charge Google per kilometer for Street View footage.The latest assault comes from Germany's minister of justice Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger (FDP) who in the Spiegel magazine (poor translation here) threatens with legislative actions unless Google is rethinking its what she calls "gigantomania". She criticizes Google for its general arrogance against user privacy, lack of transparency, and megalomania. Just as in any Google bashing article, she also mentions Google Book Search which has recently been harshly criticized by Angela Merkel's government. In a speech before the opening of the last Frankfurt Book Fair Merkel said her government opposes Google's endeavour to create an online library due to the "considerable dangers" for copyright protection online.Germany has a dark history of breeches in citizens' privacy and still to this day there are new revelations about the GDR's repulsive treatment of its own citizens. Thus, this suspicious view of Google the Giant might not come as a surprise. One can only hope though that there are enough politicians and advisors in the current ...Read More
My name is Hessam Lavi and I live in Berlin, Germany. I'm an ex-Googler and have worked with Search and SEO for almost 5 years now. Apart from the obvious (optimization, conversion, web analytics etc) I'm also passionate about music and photography. 
