Multimedia Agency

What are link directories?

Link directories list down all websites - sometime not according to rank or popularity but based on category. For example if you have an online store for plus size clothing for women, your website will be listed under the category of clothing in a link directory. There are two types of link directories – general and human edited.

The general type of link directories based on categories, region, country or language while human edited is the updated link directory. Human edited link directories are updated by editors based on the concept of search engine organization or SEO and through ranking. Most people prefer the human edited type of link directories.

Penalized Link Directories

Of late, issues are roaming around the Internet world regarding penalized link directories by the largest search engine Google. What does it mean of link directories being penalized? Penalized link directories means they have lost or don’t have their usual ranking from search engine results. For example, a link used to monopolize the first page in Google search but after the penalty, they are no longer there.

This is the main concern for most link directories since they have worked hard to improve or maintain their ranking in search engines and waking up one day loosing their ranking that they worked so hard to achieve. Likewise, these people will just get the surprise of their life when they learned that the traffic from their websites lowered to as much as 95%.

In fact, there are many link directories that had been penalized like Alive, Aviva, ewebpages, Big Web Links, Elegant Directory, and Directory Dump among others. Some of these have complained that the search engine Google didn’t give any notice that they will be penalized. In fact, almost sixty link directories were penalized by Google causing people concerned to wonder if Google is using an iron fist on those link directories. However, Google is happy and feels justified that it has taken a decision in the longer interest of webmasters.

Reasons for Penalty

Google penalized the paid link directories; that is why, when you search for link directories those are free directories and human edited. Google penalized many big web directories that even brought uproar in many forums from readers and those directly affected like the owners, but Google defended their stand that buying links is against their company regulations.

Google is also against those who are selling links using with unethical techniques and intentions. Some directories were penalized since they buy high ranking pages to increase their own ranking now that is a very obvious unethical method that Google cannot permit to happen.

Google is against all of those “manipulative” directories with general subjects just to generate large revenues. There are also bad links that cause Google a lot of problems especially those that spread spam in the Internet. One of the sign for this kind of link directories are those that anybody can get in; there are no regulations and guidelines for those links who want to be enlisted.

Google bounced back at those penalized link directories that their tem for anti-spam sent notifications to those link directories about to be penalized. Some link directories cleaned and made necessary actions and escaped the penalty. It is also a lesson learned for everybody to stay away from these links that will just cause trouble.

To end up, the move and decision of Google to penalize some web directories is just a way of cleansing the Internet from unwanted and malicious links. Penalizing some link directories will lessen the problems of spamming and phishing that are one of the problems among Internet users.

Last July 2008, Google formally made another power-end project public after announcing it last December of 2007. The project is “knol”, yes it is another new word that technology invented and according to Google, knol is simply the “unit of knowledge”. Knol is very similar to blogging though knol is more of scholarly and professional article writing on the web. Blogging is traditionally like an online journal where you can express your sentiments and later evolved that caters to marketing and business endeavors of people while knol lets authors or writers to publish their scholarly works online

Knol: What is it all about?

Knol’s creator, Udi Mander who is also Google’s Vice President for Engineering envisions knol to “encourage people who know a particular subject to write an authoritative article”. Just is like blogging, writing a knol is for sharing and in the case of knol, you write to share your knowledge. Unlike other sites for article writing, knol wants to “highlight authors”, and have authority and ownership of their own articles. Knol is the place if you want to build your credibility as a writer online.

Knol also imposes rules and conditions to its authors. Authors are not allowed to market or publish articles that obviously advertise a product or service though business related articles that may mentions products and services are allowed.

Knol and Blog

You can start writing your knol using your goggle account, if you are familiar with blogging then; the steps are primarily the same as blogging. The basic “write and post” routine holds true in knol and readers can leave comments about your article. Knol doesn’t have a “dashboard” like in blogs; you just have to write your article on the page right away and publish it. However, knol is also comparable to writer communities online like Hubpages and Helium. Unlike blogging, readers don’t just give comments on your articles; rather, they can also rate your article. You yourself as a reader to other knols can rate other articles. This feature enables authors to build their credibility online. You can include ads like Adsense from Goggle in your knol can generate revenues, thus earning money through your articles.

Declaring war with Wikipedia

Do a search on knol and all of them will mention the similarity in terms of purpose and goals to Wikipedia though Google doesn’t confirm about this particular issue. There is an ongoing issue that Wikipedia declines to have a partnership with Google since Wikipedia is strong in its stand as a non-profit organization. Google as we all know needs ads and marketing to generate revenue and continue its operations.

So, it is very wise and clever for Google to put and build a competition against Wikipedia. But unlike Wikipedia as mentioned earlier, knol emphasizes author’s ownership in a particular article rather than mere contributor. In your own page, your photo is published with your article, thus making you feel more in control of your articles. Knol like Wikipedia aims to cover all branches of knowledge from science to entertainment and with lots of topics; Knol will soon be another online encyclopedia. But at present, most knols centers on medical topics.

To end up, Knol is another innovating product of Google and indeed another step into the Information Age that we are currently living in. Knol provides writers around the world to find another medium to express and share what they know and particularly their specific field of expertise. Likewise Knol will let authors to have a larger audience taking into consideration the millions of people using the Internet particularly the ones with Google accounts.

Extravagant in style

The Internet has closed the gap between people around the world and drew information within everybody’s reach. As they say, we are now living in what they refer as the Information Age and paved the way for new words such as “techie” and “blogs”. Likewise, some words received alternations in their meanings and became the new set of technological jargons; “yahoo” for example no longer pertains to what cowboys yell, nor is “traffic” when we talk about sites and “google” when we are looking for something in the World Wide Web.

Search engines

Search engines are Internet tools that users make use of to look for information from various websites and links. At present, there are many search engines but Google and Yahoo top them all. However, there is a newly launched search engine called Cuil (pronounced like the word “cool), developed and managed by think tanks from IBM and Google.

Cuil’s Founders

The CEO and one of the founders Tom Costello was a graduate of Stanford University and even taught in the institution for a couple of years. Before Cuil, Costello developed another search engine, named Xift in 1999. Joining Costello are Anna Patterson and Russell Power who worked for Google before establishing their company. The founders used the Irish word “Cuil” which according to Cuil’s homepage is “an old Irish word for knowledge.”

Cuil as a search engine

Cuil takes pride that Cuil in terms of web pages has “three times as many as Google and ten times as Microsoft”. Likewise, Cuil is more particular with keyword-enriched articles with relevant contents in ranking web pages rather than merely basing popularity; though Cuil still regard popularity as an important factor in ranking web pages.

Cuil also has its own features that make it different and unique from the other search engines like Google and Yahoo. The company’s website enumerates three distinct features of Cuil; drill down, roll-over definition and tabs.

Drill down

When you are searching in Cuil, it will not only give you results but a list of categories displayed on the right panel under the name of “Explore By Category”. Cuil wants to refine your searches by giving you more information that might be very useful for your research.

Roll-over definition

This feature sets Cuil apart from Google and Yahoo search engines; it will give a very short definition of the items listed under “Explore By Category”. According to the company this feature will et its users save time since you will know if you should click or not that particular subject based on the definition given.

Tabs

As mentioned, Cuil doesn’t have the “Advance Search” options instead; it has Tabs that specify your particular search. For example, if you are going to search for “toddlers”, the Tabs will give you “activities for toddlers”, “babies and toddlers” and many more. It’s up to you if you want to click on those pages.

Testing Cuil

If you try to search by using Cuil, the striking difference that you will see is the short introduction that they provide along with thumbnails. This feature is really good since you as a user have a little idea of what that particular site or web page is all about. Unlike Google and Yahoo in which the introduction is just a matter of one or two sentences, Cuil really let its users know what site they are about to enter.

Cuil also has their preference feature that will not show pornographic sites from the results of your searches. This is great for families who want to safeguard their family’s viewing. On the other hand, it is hard if you misspell a particular topic unlike in Yahoo and Goggle where they will give you suggestions. Cuil will just prompt you with zero results from that particular search.

To end up, Cuil is a newly launched search engine that you as an intelligent user should try and make use to the maximum. It has several useful features that may suit your searching style.