History is littered with people who receive little attention for what they have achieved in the struggle for racial equality. One of those people was Mildred Loving. Her story is as important as Brown vs. The Board of Education in Topeka. I had not heard here story until yesterday, when I read about her passing in the L.A. Times. Her story is based on the simple fact that at one time (not so long ago) interracial marriage was illegal in a number of states (mostly likely all of them at one time).

In her case the state was Virgina. Her desire to be with the one she loved lead to a landmark supreme court decision in 1967. As a person who is in an interracial marriage (my wife is a Filipina)  I’m blessed that Mildred and others like her followed the paths their hearts lead them to. This is my attempt to pay homage to her and others like her. Visit the link above to read her bio and click here to read The Washington Post’s article about her passing.

This posts comes from Search Engine Watch and was written by Chris Boggs.

SEO involves getting lots of moving pieces coming together in the right way to form a perfect storm of sorts, which equates to better search results for a Web site. Beyond SEO best practices, I polled our SEO team to come up with the top five “non-SEO” tasks that can help support the SEO process and get Web sites consistently ranked for relevant desired terms within the results.

1. Enhance Web Site Usability

Dr. Jakob Nielsen is considered to be a foremost authority of Web site usability factors, and he also has a knack for SEO. In his book “Designing Web Usability” (which many consider to be the “Bible” of usability), he writes that “site design must be aimed with simplicity above all else, with as few distractions as possible and with very clear information architecture and matching navigation tools.” From an SEO perspective, this is preaching to the choir. If sites aren’t human-friendly, they are usually even more unfriendly to search engine spiders.

Typically, enhancing usability also involves improving the information architecture of a site, which of course will help the site to be more easily spidered, and will often increase the potential for solid anchor text-rich internal linking. As SEW Expert Carrie Hill said last year: SEO and Usability: Use ‘em or Lose ‘em. Click here to read the four remaining tips.

A study conducted with funding from The Kauffman Foundation by researchers from Harvard and Duke University found the average ago of Internet entrepreneurs is 39 years old. This research shows there were twice as many entrepreneurs older than fifty than those who were younger than twenty-five. The data proves most Internet technology companies are not started by people in their 20’s in college dorm rooms. Click here to read the results of the study.

BEIJING (AP) — By some measures, China has tied the United States as the online population leader with its government reporting that the number of Internet users there has soared to 221 million.

The figure, reported Thursday by the Xinhua News Agency, reflects China’s explosive growth in Internet use despite government efforts to block access to material considered subversive or pornographic. It was a 61 percent increase over the 137 million Internet users reported at the start of 2007.

But the numbers alone can be deceiving.

Nielsen Online estimates the U.S. online population at 221 million as well, but it counts only those with home or work access, as the vast majority of U.S. Internet users do. By contrast, one-third of Chinese Internet users surf through cybercafes.

And China’s Internet penetration is still low, with 16 percent of people online, compared with a world average of 19 percent, Xinhua said. The Pew Internet and American Life Project places U.S. online penetration at 71 percent.

China still lags the United States, South Korea and other markets in online commerce and other financial measures, though e-commerce, video-sharing and other businesses are growing quickly, and companies have raised millions of dollars from investors.

“We’ll see this growth continuing,” said Duncan Clark, chairman of BDA China Ltd., a Beijing technology company. “Even though China might overtake the United States in total (Internet) population, it still lags in the size of its Internet industries, and there will be a lot more opportunities.”

Beijing promotes Internet use for business and education but operates extensive online censorship. Web surfers have been jailed for posting or e-mailing material that criticizes Communist rule or is deemed a violation of vague national security laws.

Most recently, Chinese Web surfers have been blocked from seeing Google Inc.’s YouTube and other foreign sites with videos about protests in Tibet and the security crackdown there. In March, the government said it would shut down 25 Chinese video sites and punish 32 others for violating new rules against carrying content that is deemed pornographic, violent or a threat to national security.

The Xinhua report cited February data from the government’s China Internet Network Information Center. An agency spokeswoman, who would give only her surname, Zhang, declined to give more details. She said the agency would release a report in July.

The U.S. online population has largely stabilized, meaning that when March figures for China are released they may show that the country has already overtaken the United States.

BDA’s Clark said the Chinese online population should keep growing by 18 percent annually, reaching 490 million by 2012 — a number larger than the entire U.S. population.

The boom has produced Chinese success stories such as games site Tencent.com and search engine Baidu.com, which are competing with foreign rivals for market share.

The Internet’s mushrooming popularity has been driven in part by a regulatory quirk: Fixed-line phone companies are losing potential new customers to mobile phone services but are barred from getting into that market themselves. So they are trying instead to bring in new revenues by promoting low-cost broadband Internet access, which has brought high-speed service to millions of homes. Phone companies also are experimenting with Internet-based cable television.

Web businesses are looking for another boost when Beijing takes the long-anticipated step of issuing licenses for third-generation, or 3G, mobile technology to support video, Web-surfing and other services. No date has been set.

With the world’s largest mobile phone market, at 520 million accounts, China has a vast potential pool of wireless Internet users.

“There will be a lot more opportunity to move online,” Clark said.

I frequently receive questions about, “how come my Google search engine rankings change all of time?” This article in Popular Mechanics which is, “20 (Rare) Questions for Google Search Guru Udi Manber“, provides some interesting insights into the mysterious workings of Google’s search engine algorithm.

Today I’m going off topic. Recently I have tried to have discussions with people about politics but have found virtually everyone I have tried to have conversations with closed minded and unwilling to even consider whether my opinions had an substance and validity. I read this great article in the L.A. Times today that explores why, “Most Americans are increasing closed-minded and unwilling to listen to opposing views.” I hope you enjoy this article.

This post comes from Information Week. “An Internet retailer that used a pay-per-click advertising service operated by Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) is suing the Internet giant for more than $1 million, claiming it was overcharged by thousands of dollars as a result of click fraud that Yahoo did little to prevent.Bigreds.com, which sells collectibles online, said it paid Yahoo’s Search Marketing unit, formerly known as Overture Services, more than $900,000 between 2002 and 2006. The fees were based on the number of clicks that Bigreds ads received on sites affiliated with Yahoo and Overture.

Bigreds claims that many of the clicks were not from legitimate buyers but from affiliate Web site operators who received commissions from Overture and Yahoo based on the number of clicks their sites generated for advertisers.

“These clicks were not actual traffic, but were fraudulent clicks,” Bigreds claims in court papers filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in New York. “Affiliates of Overture used software programs, employed people, and/or directed people other than actual customers to click on plaintiffs links from keyword search results,” the complaint states.

Yahoo acquired Overture, which launched in 1998 as GoTo.com, in 2003.

Bigreds claims Yahoo in 2006 acknowledged the bad-click problem, but offered a refund of only $17,000. Bigreds also alleges that Yahoo’s Overture unit had technology and information at its disposal that it could have used to prevent click fraud but did not take steps to do so.

“Overture was able to tell what was bad, who conducted the bad click, where it came from, what keyword was involved and generally had superior technology and access to records in its dominion that enabled Overture to determine what persons or entities or affiliates were involved,” the suit claims.

Bigreds is seeking more than $1 million in damages and penalties. Yahoo has yet to file a formal response to the allegations.

Click fraud is one of the multi-billion dollar search marketing industry’s dark secrets. Virtually all major players, including Yahoo, Microsoft and Google, have been forced to acknowledge the problem. Critics argue that search engines have little incentive to police the practice because much of their revenue is generated by ad clicks.

Yahoo in 2005 paid $4.5 million to settle a click fraud class action lawsuit. Google paid $90 million to settle a similar suit in 2006.”

It seems hard to believe but Google increased its share of the Internet search market by .6% at the expense of all competitors. According to Comscore. In March, Google Sites extended its share of core searches to 59.8 percent, up from 59.2 percent the previous month. Yahoo! Sites ranked second with 21.3 percent, followed by Microsoft Sites (9.4 percent), AOL LLC (4.8 percent), and Ask Network (4.7 percent).

Americans conducted 10.8 billion searches at the core search engines, representing a 9-percent gain versus February. Each of the five core search engines experienced search query gains during the month. Google Sites saw more than 6.4 billion core searches, followed by Yahoo! Sites with 2.3 billion, and Microsoft Sites with 1 billion. Click here to take a close look at Comscore’s data.

This excellent interview comes from SEO Blog MarketMou where “Top SEO Expert Aaron Wall Speaks Out About SEO’s Bleeding Edge,” I hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

Trellian has announced the recent acquisition of Add Me.com  

Addme.com is a leading source of information for webmasters and new website owners specializing in search engine optimization, search engine submission and internet marketing since 1996.

With over 800,000 members, featuring a bi-monthly newsletter, sent out to over 360,000 subscribers, full of tips and advice for successful website promotion.

The following services are currently available on Add Me.com  

-      Free Search Engine Submission

-      Professional Search Engine Submission

-      Word Count Tool

-      Link Popularity Tool

-      Search Engine Ranking Reports

-      Advanced Meta Tag Generator

-      SEO Search Toolbar

-      Free Website Content

-      Keyword Research Tool

-      and a variety of other helpful SEO and webmaster tools.

“Addme.com has for many years been a great source of new clients for Trellian, that is why we were very exited to acquire Addme! Trellian now plans to substantially develop Addme and add new SEO tools to the current Addme offerings. Including many of the Trellian in-house tools developed over the years.” Said David Warmuz - Trellian President.