The Officially Official Blog of Searchles

Introducing Tweetle! - The New Related Tweets Widget

2009-04-15T10:52:00.000-05:00

We just released a new widget that searches the the Twitterverse for related tweets. Tweetle! is powered by the same intelligent technology behind the related content widget. This time, the widget contextually analyzes the page and searches the Twitterverse to show who's tweeting about your topic! We're giving Searchles users exclusive access to be the first to test it out. Go here to grab the code and use it on your blog:

http://www.widgetbox.com/widget/my-widget-dumbfounder

We want to hear what you think! Feel free to contact us and let us know your
thoughts on Tweetle!


dumbfounder

New Customization Options for Searchles Widgets Based on Blogger Feedback!

2009-03-11T10:25:00.004-05:00

We've just deployed new parameters for the Searchles Related Content widget - you can now adjust the font, style, link-spacing and header text (if "Related Content" isn't your style) in our widget-configurater (see screenshot below). We've also removed the 'Options' bar which should result in a higher CTR for your widget. Definite thanks to those of you who have provided us with this valuable feedback to make these updates - keep it coming!! If you're interested in using the Related Content widget for your site or blog - which is designed to increase pageviews by linking to related posts from Your archive under or next to each story on your blog - then by all means, sign up here!

Searchles Launches Conversation-Tracking Tag Cloud on Washingtonpost.com

2009-02-19T16:49:00.002-05:00

The Buzz Map tag cloud placed on Washingtonpost.com's Live Discussion pages is a quick snapshot into the most buzzed about topics within the national news site's comment sections, forum posts and live discussions. This dynamic social tag cloud is designed to increase user interaction as readers can now navigate through and engage in the active online conversations by topic. The rich social layer of content - or the on-site "micro-blogging", if you will - generated by the Washingtonpost.com reader-community is now surfaced through this trending tag cloud and conversational topic-search powered by Searchles!

The tags link through to a corresponding search results page that aggregates the most recent site-wide user comments, discussion group posts or live discussion feeds where users can also quickly jump to the source content that sparked the conversation or the user profile behind an interesting comment.

This new social feature for Washingtonpost.com is powered by Searchles Discovery technology which crawls and analyzes both published and user-generated site content to establish connections between related users within the community, related online conversations to a particular topic or related content recommendations to an article - to cite a few examples. Searchles Discovery currently offers both tailored social solutions for large media and a free contextual Related Content widget for publishers of any size from the Open Widget Platform. If you think Searchles Discovery would offer a valuable solution for your site - check out the info page or contact us!

Recent Site Accessibility and Maintenance - Widgets Not Affected!

2009-02-19T09:37:00.001-05:00

Hey guys, just an FYI - the access issues with the Searchles.com portal have NOT affected any Searchles Discovery widget delivery for sites that have our related content widget installed. Everything is still running smoothly there. That being said, we'd like to apologize for the issues accessing the site you may have had over the past couple of days. We were experiencing a few growing pains as we adjusted to the traffic increases. Things should be back up to full speed very shortly! We're also performing some server maintenance to ensure that these issues won't occur again going forward. Once again, sorry for the inconvenience!

Searchles Related Content Widget for Wordpress v.2 Released - Better Placement & Customization Options!

2009-02-13T15:00:00.005-05:00

Based on your generous feedback we've released v.2 of the Related Content widget Wordpress Plugin! The widget is now displayed below each post instead of in the sidebar - which has shown to give you a higher click-thru-rate - and also allows you to change the background color to better fit the color scheme on your site. The installation instructions have reached a new level of easy too - so Wordpress users, head on over to the sign-up page to grab the Related Content widget! (seen below on this very officially official blog) Of course Blogger, Typepad, Drupal, etc. users can grab the widget as well!

Bloggers: Tips for Searchles Widget Placement to get the Best CTR

2009-02-12T14:15:00.002-05:00

First and foremost we want to say thanks to those bloggers that have installed the widget and given us some great feedback so far! Please keep it coming. We've done a little check into widget performance ourselves and wanted to share a few tips with bloggers as to what placement & configuration trends have been bringing in the excellent Click-thru-Rates for our blog partners - which translates into page views, reader-engagement and ad revenue!

Obviously it depends on the layout and other features you may have on your site, but we've found that placing the widget below your blog posts has been generating some awesome CTRs - right where the reader finishes up the text of your post. Check out Stephanie Klein's blog or the Tax India's blog for good examples of widget placement.

The next highest CTRs are generated from blogs that have placed the widget prominently at the top of the page in the right side-bar - have a look at Gavin's Blog or Malc in the Burgh to check out their widget placement.

Another important factor is configuring the dimensions & color scheme to match the feel of your site. Realtrix has done a real great job with this and boasts a pretty stellar CTR as well - changing the border color to match the background of your site can give a great sense of flow from the blog post into the list of related content.

So those are our findings thus far based on CTR and we thought we'd share them with you! Every blog is different and we all have our own preferences, but we hope this was helpful.

New Searchles For Bloggers Page: Starring Widgets, Blog Partners and SEO!

2009-02-10T17:06:00.002-05:00

We've created a one-stop shop with links to all of the cool gadgets we've built to help enhance your blog and reach a wider audience! Check out the new Searchles For Bloggers page. Here are the highlights:

* Plug & Play Related Content Widget to surface related content from your archive next to your blog posts, kick up your page views and earn incremental revenue with in-widget ads (see widget installed below posts on this blog!)

* Take advantage of our great SEO by installing the widget on your blog. Your content will be automatically be pushed into our index and featured on our partners page with our other blog partners - soon to feature partner content on the Searchles homepage as well!

You put in the effort as the content-creator - let us help you take full advantage of your archive and have a great reach on the web!

Speaking of our blog partners - here are a few more blogs that have installed our Related Content widget and have done a great job customizing it to their site!

RealTrix: Rendezvous with Computing, Web 2.0, Blogging

KevinMD Medical Weblog: The home of provocative physician opinion and commentary on breaking medical news.

And because we're all about 'buy local', some great partner blogs from good old DC!

Beyond Bread: Official Blog of "Bread for the City" whose mission is to provide vulnerable residents of Washington, DC, with comprehensive services, including food, clothing, medical care, and legal and social services, in an atmosphere of dignity and respect.

Bellweather: a native Washingtonian who loves-loves-loves fashion. This is my record of the fun, creative, and stylish things I like to do, see and buy here in the D.o.C.

Catch the Searchles Discovery Widget in Action - Ballin' Bloggers Who Were the First to Grab It!

2009-01-23T13:12:00.005-05:00

We'd like to highlight and send a special thanks to early adopters of our Related Content widget - the first of many contextual widgets for bloggers and publishers to roll on out of the Searchles Discovery Open Widget Platform. Sign up here!

If you'd like to see the widget in action you should wander over and check out these bloggers who are hip not only to their areas of expertise, but also to the importance of social media and engaging widgets! Also check out articles on Denverpost.com where we deployed our related content and Searchles Discovery technology earlier this year...

Social Media at Work "We will try to be slightly ahead of the center ahead of the curve, to give you a sense of what’s around the corner. Much of our content will be about the media and marketing worlds initially but, as the wave change continues build, we’ll include reports on all aspects of the networked economy."

NeoCon Express...*Worldwide Sources * Constantly Updated * Hard News * Soft News * Articles * Links * Images * and comments from a Neo-Conservative Perspective. Blogging politics since 2005.

Don Singleton...Don Singleton sends us some political blogging too and related posts too!

So have a look and please continue to send us feedback! OH and of course, have a look to the left panel of our own Officially Official Blog right here to see it in action too! Happy Friday, folks.

Channeling President Obama: Your Weekly Address via YouTube and Searchles TV

2009-01-28T16:02:00.002-05:00

Thus far President Obama (I was about to just write "Obama" but it just doesn't seem right anymore) hasn't let us down in living up to his title as the first Internet President. We were excited to see that his media team has completely re-hauled Whitehouse.gov to bring it up to social media speed and promote transparency in his administration.

We were ALSO excited to see this post from last Saturday on the White House blog (yes...The Obama Administration be bloggin') that the President will be administering a weekly address to the American public via youtube. You can see the White House youtube channel here (the ultimate in branded youtube channels) and we've also put it in a Searchles TV channel where we'll be updating it weekly to save all the addresses in one place where we can play them back-to-back! It'll almost serve as a little President Obama flip-book where we can watch him age slowly (Real Change!!!). See below starting with his first address on Jan. 24 2009! Create your own Searchles TV video mashup here.

We're Inaugurating the Searchles Discovery Open Widget Platform for Bloggers and Web Publishers

2009-01-22T08:44:00.003-05:00

Grab Free, Plug-and-Play Widgets to Enhance Social Media On Your Site

New President, new web tools! The Searchles Discovery platform is the culmination of all the Searchles/Dumbfind technology that has been built up over the years. To kick off the platform we have released in beta a Related Content widget aimed at blogs and content websites looking to make their sites a bit more sticky.

The Related Content widget displays a site's contextually relevant content on article pages to engage readers with options for further exploration. It comes pre-packaged with ads and operates within any site or blog-hosting service (TypePad instructions just added to the widget configuration page!). Think boosting page views and generating incremental revenue with our 50/50 revenue-share split! You can sign up here, grab the code and have the widget up and running in minutes! ("Self-serve", "Grab 'n Go", "Plug-and-Play", "Set it and forget it", "some other phrase that truly captures the simplicity of this process"...)

The search technology behind this widget goes beyond basic tag-matching and text search - no need to even tag your posts. We do the work for you and determine relevancy by spidering your site's content - analyzing relationships between extracted concepts in order to retrieve the most comprehensive set of relevant posts in your site's archive.
____________

So you get Related Content - but what wonderfulness can you expect out of the open platform over the coming weeks? The open widget platform will be expanding to offer a larger set of social features that leverage the content and on-site activities of and conversations between your users to identify and surface relationships (what has been referred to as the "contextual web") between pieces of content and relationships between like-minded users or groups of users.

A few examples:
* Related Users to a Blog Post
* Related Categories (people, places, topics) to a Forum Post
* Related Forum Posts to an Article
* Related Communities to Blog Post
* Popular Articles
* Related Comments
* Related Anything to Anything (challenge us...)

Depending on what types of content your site or community produces, we can identify and surface via widget the relationships that will make your site stickier, more interactive, and have less dead-ends as your readers explore different topics and engage related readers.

Start off by giving our Related Content widget a go! Of course we'd appreciate any feedback or issues you have regarding the relevance, installation and aesthetics of the widget. Please don't hesitate to contact us!

Denverpost.com Taps Searchles Discovery Widgets to Increase User Interactivity

2009-01-05T10:07:00.004-05:00

We've launched Searchles Discovery Related Users and Related Tags widgets on article pages of denverpost.com! Taking the Neighbors social networking section of the media site to new heights, the Related Users widget surfaces relevant denverpost.com users that have been interacting with similar content to a particular article. Clicks on a Related User leads directly to their denverpost.com profile page. This social widget, seen here on an article pages, serves to connect and engage like-minded readers within the denverpost.com community - leading to increased site-interactivity and personalized content recommendations through these peer-networks.

The Related Tags widget, also on the right panel of article pages, is assembled from extracted relevant concepts from a corresponding article. The tags link through to a denverpost.com site search - allowing readers to jump straight through to articles relevant to their specific interests.

These widgets is part of Searchles Discovery® technology that is geared towards online publishers, bloggers, and social network sites and priced based on a revenue-share working scenario. Searchles Discovery tools offer a set of customizable solutions for increasing user interaction, realizing full value of site content by using it as a foundation to build and utilize networks of trusted peers, as well as enhancing social search features and capabilities for targeted advertising. If you want further info on how our Searchles Discovery technology can socialize your site and community of users contact us here! Or if you're into videos have a look at our Searchles Discovery video below:

Searchles Takes a Look Back on 2K8

2008-12-31T10:58:00.003-05:00

Well it's been an interesting year for everyone. We all laughed, cried, met Sarah Palin, saw The Dark Knight, touched an iPhone... Here at Searchles we launched our Searchles Discovery widget on washingtonpost.com pages, helped a former Presidential candidate secure the Vice Presidency*, redesigned our homepage and made some key my!searchles upgrades to help users track conversations and get social recommendations. Yeah...pretty big stuff. Want to delve deeper into the awesomeness (and not awesomeness) of 2008? Check out and join the Looking Back on 2008 group on Searchles where our users are posting Best of, Worst of and other lists in general looking back on this year (Hey...remember '07?). Just another way you can utilize Searchles groups to organize and socialize what's out there on the web.

Here's a channel with the Top 10 Viral Videos of 2008 as chosen by TIME Magazine and Happy New Years to all!

* No...no, we can't actually prove this.

A Delicious Collection of Holiday Tweets

2008-12-19T13:35:00.010-05:00

It's the most wonderful time of the year! And all over the web people everywhere are expressing their extreme joy and mild dismay at the impending holidays... Via twitter search, here are our favorite holiday tweets:

Bah Humbug dot com
from jconnor

What a Big Baton You Have
from dspark

Best (most depressing) Headline of the Season
from the huffpost

Christmas Irony
from andya

What Happens When You Twitter Search for "Christmas" and "suck it" (I thought it would be fun)
from ryersonben

A Fitting Warm-Up...
from stilletot21

"Clean" coal?
from lee eisenberg

And as always a Holiday Searchles TV Channel! This one comes from user Paisano sharing his favorite Christmas movies. Happy Holidays from Searchles!!

New My!Searchles Ramps Up Conversation and Keeps You Tuned-In To Your Network

2008-12-16T09:13:00.005-05:00

We've given your my!searchles page -- your own personalized Searchles portal -- a makeover with a focus no longer just on relevant content, but also on connectivity to and conversation within your Searchles network of groups and friends. Your new my!searchles page keeps you more keyed-in to new relevant comments and also lets you stay on top of friend requests, group invites and new links your friends have shared with you. On the right panel of your my!searchles page we've added social recommendation boxes in the spirit of social discovery. Here we surface fellow Searchlers and relevant groups that you may be interested in based on our search technology and what we know about you from your activity.

This revamped version of my!Searchles with a focus on interactivity and participation within your Searchles network will make it effortless to jump into heated, comical or just plain interesting conversation in the center panel. We keep things super-relevant in your comment tracking by surfacing comments directed towards you, comments your friends are making, comments in your groups, comments on relevant posts, etc. to make sure if something up your alley is being discussed on Searchles - we put it in front of your face!

You can still easily jump and track your own Searchles index from the links on the left panel - your recent posts, your groups, your Searchles TV channels, your friends or your fans. You can also edit your profile, picture or alert settings right under your profile picture at the top left.

If you're a new user or haven't posted anything yet your first visit to your my!searchles page will prompt you to input a few keywords related to your interests (politics, green living, football, spelunking, etc.). We'll then jumpstart your recommendations based on these keywords and offer you some groups to join which will fill in your my!searchles with relevant conversations and content! It's THAT simple. So go check it out and we always appreciate feedback!

Top 100 US Newspaper Sites According to Alexa Rankings

2008-12-10T09:04:00.008-05:00

Forget circulation, we're talkin' page views. Below are the Top 100 US Newspaper sites and their corresponding Alexa rankings. The following list is based on the traffic rankings as of Dec. 4, 2008, but note this list is subject to change slightly as Alexa continually updates its rankings. Also of interest is a list compiled by Jay Rosen and the Blue Plate Special team of the NYU School of Journalism of the best Blogging Newspapers in the US - if one would like to note how integration of social features and UGC on a newspaper sites corresponds to their rankings on this list.

1. New York Times -- nytimes.com -- 87
2. The Washington Post -- washingtonpost.com -- 283
3. Wall Street Journal -- online.wsj.com -- 356
4. Los Angeles Times -- latimes.com -- 374
5. USA Today -- usatoday.com -- 511
6. Boston Globe -- boston.com -- 578
7. San Francisco Chronicle -- sfgate.com -- 767
8. Financial Times -- ft.com -- 903
9. New York Post Online -- nypost.com -- 975
10. Chicago Tribune -- chicagotribune.com -- 987

11. New York Daily News -- nydailynews.com -- 1173
12. Seattle Times -- seattletimes.nwsource.com -- 1207
13. Houston Chronicle -- chron.com -- 1769
14. Associated Press -- ap.org -- 1951
15. Chicago Sun-Times -- suntimes.com -- 2075
16. San Jose Mercury News -- mercurynews.com -- 2326
17. Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- ajc.com -- 2439
18. Star Tribune -- startribune.com -- 2513
19. The Dallas Morning News -- dallasnews.com -- 2528
20. The Arizona Republic -- azcentral.com -- 2682

21. Toronto Star -- thestar.com -- 2687
22. Philadelphia Inquirer -- philly.com -- 2714
23. New Jersey Online -- nj.com -- 2758
24. Detroit Free Press -- freep.com -- 3044
25. The Miami Herald -- miamiherald.com -- 3256
26. The Flint Journal -- flintjournal.com -- 3405
27. Variety -- variety.com -- 3513
28. San Diego Union-Tribune -- signonsandiego.com -- 3527
29. The Examiner -- examiner.com -- 3678
30. Boston Herald -- bostonherald.com -- 3866

31. The Baltimore Sun -- baltimoresun.com -- 4001
32. Orange County Register -- ocregister.com -- 4196
33. Kansas City Star -- kansascity.com -- 4202
34. Orlando Sentinal -- orlandosentinel.com -- 4240
35. Sun-Sentinal -- sun-sentinel.com -- 4320
36. National Review -- nationalreview.com -- 4575
37. Detroit News -- detnews.com -- 4605
38. St. Louis Post Dispatch -- stltoday.com -- 5112
39. Milwaukee Journal Sentinal -- jsonline.com -- 5150
40. Cleveland.com -- cleveland.com -- 5242

41. The Washington Times -- washingtontimes.com -- 5442
42. The Denver Post -- denverpost.com -- 5490
43. Christian Science Monitor -- csmonitor.com -- 5635
44. Everything Alabama -- al.com -- 5801
45. Epoch Times -- en.epochtimes.com -- 6346
46. Nola.com -- nola.com -- 6754
47. Sacramento Bee -- sacbee.com -- 7073
48. Anchorage Daily News -- and.com -- 7447
49. Indianapolis Star -- indystar.com -- 8221
50. The Palm Beach Post -- palmbeachpost.com -- 8998

51. Deseret Morning News -- deseretnews.com -- 9096
52. The Salt Lake Tribune -- sltrib.com -- 9262
53. Village Voice -- villagevoice.com -- 9400
54. The Hartford Courant -- courant.com -- 9439
55. Pittsburgh Tribune-Review -- pittsburghlive.com -- 9715
56. New York Observer -- observer.com -- 10231
57. The News & Observer -- newsobserver.com -- 10585
58. Rocky Mountain News -- rockymountainnews.com -- 10793
59. Honolulu Advertiser -- honoluluadvertiser.com -- 10815
60. The Statesman -- statesman.com -- 11011

61. Syracuse.com -- syracuse.com -- 11194
62. Fort Worth Star-Telegram -- dfw.com -- 11894
63. The Oklahoman Online -- newsok.com -- 13196
64. Nashville Tennesean Online -- tennessean.com -- 13358
65. San Antonio Express-News -- mysanantonio.com -- 13802
66. Buffalo News -- buffalonews.com -- 13957
67. Daily News -- dailynews.com -- 15457
68. Times Union -- timesunion.com -- 16272
69. Des Moines Register -- desmoinesregister.com -- 16419
70. Knoxville News Sentinal -- knoxnews.com -- 17141

71. Honolulu Star Bulletin -- starbulletin.com -- 17207
72. Press Enterprise -- pe.com -- 17754
73. Daily Herald -- dailyherald.com -- 18561
74. Delaware Online -- delawareonline.com -- 18699
75. Florida Times-Union -- jacksonville.com -- 18961
76. Philly Burbs -- phillyburbs.com -- 19270
77. Las Vegas Sun -- lasvegassun.com -- 19520
78. Florida Today -- floridatoday.com -- 19549
79. Courier-Journal -- courier-journal.com -- 19553
80. The Hill -- hillnews.com -- 19587

81. Providence Journal-Bulletin -- projo.com -- 19666
82. The Gainesville Sun -- gatorsports.com -- 19796
83. Arizona Daily Star -- azstarnet.com -- 19940
84. Contra Costa Times -- contracostatimes.com -- 20298
85. Memphis Commercial Appeal -- commercialappeal.com -- 21110
86. The State -- thestate.com -- 21532
87. Omaha World-Herald -- omaha.com -- 21539
88. St. Petersburg Times Online -- sptimes.com -- 22198
89. The Akron Beacon Journal -- ohio.com -- 22647
90. Press Democrat -- pressdemocrat.com -- 22838

91. Democrat and Chronicle -- democratandchronicle.com -- 23109
92. The Record Online -- northjersey.com -- 23579
93. Tacoma News Tribune -- thenewstribune.com -- 24166
94. The Morning Call -- mcall.com -- 24240
95. Tallahassee Democrat -- tallahassee.com -- 25843
96. Worcester Telegram & Gazette -- telegram.com -- 26214
97. The Reno Gazette-Journal -- rgj.com -- 27200
98. Ventura County Star -- venturacountystar.com -- 27588
99. Sarasota Herald-Tribune -- heraldtribune.com -- 27839
100.The Pantagraph -- pantagraph.com -- 28983

That Which We Are Thankful For At Searchles This Fine Thanksgiving

2008-11-25T15:50:00.002-05:00

5. These girls...serving as a reminder that there are worse things than the economic crisis.

4. DC TechEvents. This site is a great upcoming event aggregator for developers, tech professionals, and enthusiasts within the DC Tech community. Some solid meet-ups and events approach! If you're in the DC area make sure you check out the Social Times event on Dec. 11 and Twin Tech III coming up in Jan. Searchles will certainly be in attendance.

3. Obama's and his Presidential YouTube Addresses. Obama's taking "Fireside Chats" to a new level and communicating to the American people directly via YouTube. This is a pretty big step for online video and the web in general as a medium for communication...and we get to mashem up into Obama Searchles TV channels to spread far and wide! Muchos gracias Mr. President-Elect!

2. The ability to telecommute the day before Thanksgiving!! Ahh I love the web. I can skip this here town to head home tonight, avoiding the 116,000 people looking to get from DC to their respective familial commitments tomorrow night...and I can still fit in a day of work out of the office tomorrow.

1. Our users! Oh yes...we are thankful for you. Those who are into video, those who are into social news, those who are big on posting links about your causes, those who comment passionately...you know, all of you. Keep up the good work and invite your friends to join us at Searchles.

Happy Turkey Day from Searchles!!

Searchles TV Picks of the Week: Music Video Mashups from Our Users!

2008-11-13T16:53:00.005-05:00

At the end of the day, I personally like to kick back and listen to/watch the fairly unique music video playlists our users have put together using Searchles TV. The real beauty of our dynamic video mashup tool is that, while state-of-the-art, it's not rocket science, it's actually quite easy to use - even my Mom can! And that says quite a bit (with all due respect to Mom). It's a nightmare even getting her to memorize her own cell phone number, but I digress... Anyway a Searchles TV channel is a great web tool for music playlists (Youtube is a 24/7 treasure trove of free music). It's a real synergy between the dynamic world of online video and the tried and true mixed tape. Below are our favorite recent music channels - of varied musical stylings - from our esteemed users. Note: probably shouldn't of started my day with Michael Bolton again...

Wild Horses from Bahramerad

20 Classic Genesis Songs from ProgRockTV1000
The entire span of the progressive rock band, from Peter Gabriel and the early Genesis to the Phil Collins era (old vs.new).

Country and Elvis from Tietsort
A tribute to fathers.

Mario Grangoulis - Greek Opera Singer by Russianinmate

Singer and Political Activist Manu Chao by diane_court
French-born singer and political activist of Spanish (Galician-Basque) origin

Nominate Searchles for 2nd Annual Open Web Awards Here!

2008-11-10T14:39:00.003-05:00

Mashable is proud to present the second annual Open Web Awards.

Open Web Awards is the only multilingual international online voting competition that covers major innovations in web technology. Through an online nominating and voting process, the Open Web Awards recognizes and honors the top achievements in 26 categories. This year, Mashable is partnering with over 100 blog partners, Poll Daddy for extra security and ease of voting and extending the nominations period and voting rounds for greater participation.

Are you a loyal user? Nominate Searchles in the Search and Social Search category via the widget below!

If you haven't signed up yet check us out and see if we earn your nomination! Our network search enables users to discover content with personalized filtering features that include tags and keywords, as well as the ability to apply these same filters to search all postings, groups, friends, or friends' friends based on each user's personal criteria. By analyzing the associations and patterns between trusted people, sources, tags and content, Searchles is able to deliver more precise results while suggesting relevant content and people as well.

P.S. Tell your friends!

Videos at the Ready: Searchles Serves Up Related Videos For Every Post

2008-10-31T14:37:00.003-05:00

We've launched a related videos widget for every link page on Searchles! Now when checking out a link info page, you can also easily view related Youtube videos right there without skipping a beat. We could all use a little less time wasted on video search over at Youtube so thought we'd do the work for you and serve up relevant videos right here on Searchles!

In effect, what we've done here is leverage our Searchles Discovery technology to serve as matchmaker between the content of a web page that has been posted to Searchles and the recent youtube videos that are related to that article, blog post, etc. Checking out a link about to Obama's tax policies?? All the recent Youtube videos related to those topics (obama, taxes, income tax, election 08, etc.) are right there next to the link and are mashed up into a Searchles TV player that streams the videos back-to-back or easily lets you jump from one video to the next.

We're also working to have this widget available for online publishers and bloggers to grab and embed on their own sites. Imagine grabbing a piece of code and serving up related videos to your readers on every blog post! So stay tuned-in to Searchles TV...

Prominent News Sites Taking Community To A New Level - What Are Their Readers Saying??

2008-10-24T13:21:00.005-05:00

Just as common as the old "newspaper reports 30% losses in Q3" headline is the "newspaper adds community and social networking features to its news site" these days. Most recently, both the Wall Street Journal and NPR.org, launched social platforms to kick their reader commenting and site-interactivity into gear. WSJ, not surprisingly, chose to limit the access to the community section of the site to paid subscribers, who also must present their comments and user-profile under their real names...no anonymity here. NPR implemented the Pluck SiteLife platform which indexes commenting activity and allows readers to "add friends". Also notable is NYTimes.com recent promotion of reader registration by putting a TimesPeople toolbar encouraging readers to register on every page (see screenshot below).

So in the spirit of reader comments - here's a look at the reader comments on the news of the respective launches! General enthusiasm! Some nerves about anonymity vs. using a real identity...but it looks like these sites have taken an excellent step in instilling reader loyalty - and this reader engagement will hopefully help bring online advertising into a more targeted, profitable place. What do we at Searchles think? These readers can now more easily react to and index their favorite news content but also need to be able to more effectively interact with each other. The idea behind Searchles Discovery widgets is that we surface like-minded users for you based on the content you've interacted with/commented on. These are the users you would be most likely to interact with on certain topics that apparently whip you into an online commenting frenzy. Check out what we're doing on WashingtonPost.com's growing social network. Anywho, reactions to the NPR and WSJ launches below.

NPR

Samuel Rutledge (Samuel) wrote:

I think this is great. I've always appreciated the degree to which NPR is committed to public input, and helping us to hear and understand one another (Story Corps comes to mind as a glowing example of this spirit). That said, I have genuine fear that the new social media features could be abused by small minded troglodytes to spread and foster messages of hate and intolerance in a public forum. But maybe that's the eternal risk of free speech.

Thu Oct 2 20:26:45 2008

J. Hudzin (May) wrote:

How nice. I've always been happy that NPR keeps up a publicly available website that improves access to it's material and lets me listen to Morning Edition every night. This is a sweet little bonus. I hope it works out for you, especially the part about keeping things "civil." It will probably be a lot of work removing ads, threats, obscenities, etc, but it would be great if you can actually promote polite conversation. And... what is my avatar exactly? An unhappy, naked Viking holding... something. Lol, oh well, best of luck!

Tue Sep 30 13:59:42 2008

Levy Rivers (Reputationist) wrote:

I too think this is a great tool that social networkers like me should include in their online homes. With Linkedin being about business/job searches - Myspace youthful music - Facebook relationships - there is a space wide open for those of us that want to share intellect. What better place than NPR where information is the key draw. My hope is that the space will become easier to navigate - integrate with other social network applications, but for now this works

Tue Sep 30 10:09:53 2008

Mike Nash (halemikale) wrote:

Terrific job on the new online community! I'd like to suggest you add a way to connect with other people who have selected the same local and/or favorite NPR affiliate(s) that I included during the sign-up process. I can see others who have selected the same favorite NPR programs that I have selected, but I can't see other fans of my local NPR station. Adding such a feature would be a great way to include fans of local affiliates in the new community. Thanks for building a great new on-line community opportunity.

Mon Sep 29 20:15:02 2008

WSJ (comments on the NYTimes article)

I think this is a great idea, but I find that WSJ attracts a different demographic than some of the other sites such as Slashdot, Ars Technica, TechDirt, etc.

It will be interesting to see how they implement it, and if they get the “secret sauce” of community management and privacy features to work.

Also, I think you made a great point, Vindu, this has potential to become just a big love-fest where people want to ask questions, but not answer questions for fear of reprisal at work, home, et cetera. A report came out late last week that people google, check facebook for potential employees, and even for internal promotions. How will this data be anonomized?

A simple example is this: If you work for X and went to work for a competitor, will they see any/all commentary?

I think I will hold back until I see how it works out.
— Consider The Lobster September 15, 2008 3:27 am

“New community features will allow WSJ.com’s million or so paid online subscribers to comment on every story,”

I have been sending emails to Nytimes.com on more than a few occasions asking them to consider this! I always get a form letter saying thanking me for my comments and that they were sent to the appropriate department. Of course, as all Nytimes.com readers know, nothing changed. It’s good to see another major online paper figure this out at least, and I do subscribe to wsj.com so it benefits me.
It always made sense that allowing readers to comment on every story would be a great idea. Not just comments on blog stories. At least one paper understands this.
— jeffj September 15, 2008 1:28 pm

What do you think?

A Searchles Group for On- and Off-Line Local Socializing - DC Adventures!!

2008-10-01T11:46:00.006-05:00

Searchles groups can be utilized in many different ways - a teacher could post relevant news to a course for the students to join and follow, a group of Science junkies could create a group to post and share all their favorite Large Hadron Collider end-of-the-world updates, or you can create a group to post the links to upcoming fun events for your group of friends! Since we're local (and I'm biased since it is, in fact, my group) we're going to have a look at the DC Adventures group on Searchles! "Adventures" being loosely defined...

In my spare time I like to troll the internet for fun stuff going on in and around the DC area to check out - fall festivals, trail runs, bluegrass shows, local cabins, wine tastings, camping spots, swimming holes, Oktoberfests, the Punkin' Chunkin', demo derbies...so on and so forth. Friends and locals that join the group can get the daily updates to the new upcoming events that have been posted via Searchles Recaps that alert you to new posts in your groups. It's a great and quick way to keep tabs on things and Searchles unique search functions let you search within the group if you're trying to find a specific event - or check the tag cloud for a quick overview of what you can find.

So how about your area?? What are the upcoming riproaring-good-time events in and around Philly? Or Boston? Or Fargo? Or Tehran? The sky's the limit here - for whatever you use Searchles for most, get your GROUP on!!

A Google Killer?: The Search Business Model That Gives The Sites They Index A Fair Cut

2008-09-11T15:33:00.005-05:00

The way the search business currently functions (and has since the dawn of…Google) no money exchanges hands between the search engines and the sites they index. Just about all web sites and the companies running them allow all search engines the same access to their data – the web sites clearly benefiting from the traffic driven from popping up in search results and the search engines benefiting from search ad revenue. The way the search business is modeled at the moment – a virtual free-for-all – we have yet to find a search engine that’s really come close to Google-killer status.

The notion that search engines should be paying these sites for the rights to index their copyrighted content has been raised before. News sites in particular have taken issue with Google in the past for extracting blurbs from their content – giving web users the ability to get the answers to their questions solely from the abstract in the search results without even having to click on the link. In these instances, Google has more or less “stolen” their content and, more importantly, their ability to make money off of it.

So what sorts of solutions are being proposed? And what sort of search business model would it take to beat Google? In an interesting article by Mark Cuban back in May on Digital Media Wire he toys with the idea that big players like MS or Yahoo can offer sites big money to block Google – to ask to be removed from the Google Index.

“Mahalo.com thinks it needs to support the 25k most common search terms in order to be successful. What would happen if MicroSoft or Yahoo or a MicroHoo went to the 5 top results for the top 25k searches and paid them to leave the Google Index?”

Certainly a different way to approach things and it just might work if the companies behind these Top 5 search results are willing participants in this great Google-killing venture out to degrade their index (and if the money was right). But isn’t that a sort of short term fix? Aren’t these top search terms and top search results in flux? Would a one-time payout be alluring enough to pull these companies away from a top traffic driver (and continuous money-maker) that has been so dependable for so long?

Dumbfounder believes the logical direction for the search business model to take is that these web sites comprising popular search results and giving the search engines their inherent value should receive payment from the engines in the form of shared search ad revenue. For example, they should be paid based on the clicks they receive in organic search results – receiving a cut of the ad revenue the search engine is receiving on that page…and in general making everyone happy that the search engines exist (beyond driving them traffic…and stealing copyrighted content).

Is this a Google-killing concept? Well it does offer a bit more of a more two-way search business model in a time when everyone – particularly media companies – are figuring out a way to better monetize their web presence. This model also addresses the copyright issue in a fair and scaleable manner of pay-out. As folks become more and more fascinated with the idea of a Google-killer (note: Cuil buzz and blow-up), the idea of a shake-up such as this in the search engine business is getting more likely.

A Special Thanks to CERN: Large Hadron Collider Spares Us Fate Worse Than Shelley Long Movie Marathon

2008-09-10T10:31:00.006-05:00

We can all let out a big "phew" this fine morning of September 10, 2008 as Stephen Hawking, the folks at CERN, and the Large Hadron Collider (particle-smasher extraordinaire) have not allowed us all to be sucked into Europe and nothingness by a black hole. Stephen Hawking did not predict, however, the ensuing twitter-mania (twitter search shows "The LHC" as the trending topic du jour) - edging out Sarah Palin in a close, close non-Presidential race.

In other news, failure of The LHC to destroy earth is the leading cause of us all having to go to work today...and repeatedly playing role of Captain Obvious (www.hasthelhcdestroyedtheearth.com)

Read about The LHC on Searchles as well (social search!). It's a great day to be alive...

Taking YOU Into Account: What's The "Right Way" For News Sites To Integrate Social Media?

2008-09-03T15:13:00.006-05:00

Comments, profiles, “friends”, reader blogs, forums, recommendations, thumbs up, thumbs down…eesh – news sites both fear playing host to social media features and have come to recognize that these site-interactions create the engaging social experiences around their content that will drive the page views and ad revenue they so desperately need (hold the phone, here’s a question – why does MS Word still put the squiggly red line under the word blog?). Here are some common questions these media companies are asking themselves as they reach out into the social web - figuring out what exactly they want to hold onto:

Does the news site want to host these user-profile/social networking pages or pawn it off to a third-party platform with the site’s frame around it?

Is it better to surface news from other sources for a site’s user community? Are there advantages to a centralized platform that hosts users across different sites interacting?

Data portability may also pose a major problem. Where does the data reside? Once news sites go with one social platform can they switch or are they locked-in?

Filtering spam? Inappropriate content? Is the world going to end if someone drops the eff-bomb? Trials, tribulations…and spam’s a question for another day. Back to addressing the first few questions regarding use of a centralized or site-specific platform to provide social networking for a user-community:

Pluck’s SiteLife Social platform is currently powering the social networks on washingtonpost.com’s Discussion Groups section, USAToday, and Discovery’s Planet Green among others. Pluck provides user-profiles, reader blogs, forums, photos, friending capabilities, and also indexes the comments users have recently made and the corresponding articles on their profiles. The social network is hosted on washingtonpost.com, for example, and the profiles are specific to that site – there are no links put forth by the Pluck platform that would lead a reader elsewhere. What are the advantages? Keeping the reader on-site as they weave through forums and other profiles does up the page views for washingtonpost.com – and I feel as though it works for the Discussion Group communities because it has found its niche in debating politics (woo hooo DC). This community common-denominator provides enough material and interaction that users may very well stay engaged enough to keep clicking around and kicking up page views – same goes for the Planet Green community and the Green niche (so hot right now).

What can be an issue with this sort of set-up is the fact that web users generally like to consult multiple news sources in a sitting and may not want their identity and their comments tied to one site, one contained community. This is where a platform like Topix steps into the game. Topix powers the social network and comment-engine for Chicago Tribune, but it also integrates its own social news destination site that features localized content across different news sources. Clicking on “read comments” at the bottom of Tribune articles takes you to a co-branded page hosted by Topix itself within the Tribune’s frame. Clicking around between profiles, forums, and headlines within the Topix platform easily leads you to non-Tribune content but the Tribune frame remains (page views!...ad revenue!) and the user can comment on any content or post to any forum that Topix surfaces and have it track back to their Topix profile/persona.

There are advantages and disadvantages to each. The Topix profile gives the Tribune a chance to be a jumping off point for content-discovery, offers a portable identity where a user can interact with multiple content sources without multiple usernames, and in the short-term is easy on the implementation side of things – but it’s not true integration with the site. What are the chances that a user will migrate back to Tribune pages? Will they associate this social experience with the Tribune? Having to actually register with Topix is also another roadblock that some users may not migrate past on the Tribune site. The Pluck platform keeps users loyal to the washingtonpost.com or USAToday pages – but how sticky is that? How many clicks until a reader feels as though they’ve just hit a dead-end?

In general these news site-social platform partnerships need to get authentication down correctly so that users just create one login on-site. They also need to create more tools that can be plugged-into various parts of the site – the forums, blogs, comments, live chats, etc. – so that these pieces of content are surfaced and users can navigate from their profile or personalized homepage to these various social media features seamlessly. If news sites going to go to all the trouble of social media implementation, there’s no use in having a disconnect between the reader-generated blogs and the user’s forum activities. Ultimately the real kicker is how strong the sense of community is on-site. Users go to the trouble of logging-in and associating themselves with an identity, because when they comment or post they want someone else on your site to read it and/or respond.

Joe Biden's VP Nomination Due to Searchles TV Channels?

2008-08-25T10:56:00.005-05:00

Now legally we can't say this...and it would be silly to suggest such things. But back in the pre-primary days a certain Delaware Senator was making great use of certain web tools to spread campaign videos far and wide - packaged in one player - and now he's Barack Obama's running mate.

All suggestions aside - these are exciting times in the Election! Below is a Searchles TV channel created by one of our users with full footage of Obama's introduction of Joe Biden in Springfield this past Saturday. You can also view the channels Biden's Presidential Campaign put together on Searchles here. We can't wait to see some Searchles TV channels with footage from the Conventions!