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----------------- "Hey, Sherry, just what hey is goin' on in SE world, anyways??"

I read that Go.com had gone bust, GoTo.com has increased its fees, search engines are dropping affiliate programs, reducing payouts and shedding staff, pay-per-click engines are increasing in number, portals are increasing admission fees, more and more web pages are being ruthlessly dumped by majors - and yet, thousands - hundreds of thousands - of web pages are added to SEs daily... What's happening?

"Well, dear, it's obvious, isn't it?", when I voiced my thoughts. She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed turns her chair around, and settles back, and once again, she had that Cheshire cat smile I know so well...

Sherry looks at me, "We know that searching has a lot to do with using appropriate search terms...but, with all junk around, it's still difficult to get a quality result from a search."

"Sooo," I says, "start using portals and vortals more...hey, Yahoo is biggest portal, after all!"

"Agreed...and many of majors are developing relationships or partnerships with many of those specialized areas." She pauses, "But that's not enough...I saw one report just recently which asserted that 7 million pages are added to web everyday!" Whew, that's a lotta bandwidth, no matter which way you cut it.

"Sooo...as I just said, where's it all headin', huh?"

"Well, out've all this Dot Bomb stuff, two things we know fer sure: advertisers/investors are closing their pocketbooks and, to paraphrase Jacob Nielsen (read more about about Jacob Nielsen at http://www.useit.com), an economy without money is unsustainable...and that's obvious when you think about it." Sherry was chewing at her lip again, and staring off into space. I wait patiently...again

At last, she said softly, "Well, dear, we know that SEs are downsizing - all part of reducing costs of course - and they're continuing to prune their databases of junk." I nod my head, a trifle impatiently, but she pays no heed.

"Look," she continues,"s'pose you're a BIG SE" - pointing at me now - "you've gotta make money, you've gotten rid of lots of useless pages and websites, but there's still zillions waiting to come on, investors are leery and weary...what do you do?"

Hmmm...too many pages, dump them...more submissions...growing volumes...falling revenues...gotta make money...gotta make BIG money...

"Hmmm, well, maybe I guess I could be more selective about websites (Sherry nods,"Yes, yes, they're doing that!") that I allow into database...make procedure more difficult...keep out trash...that'd help to keep m'costs down..."

Sherry's smiling now, so I go on. "S'pose I could join pay-per-click band-wagon, also, start making more money that way - GoTo.com has raised its rates y'know, with no real loss, I hear ("Now you're talking," Sherry nods again, vigorously, "any search engine that matters could well go that way.").

I would appreciate notification of where it was used, and if possible, a copy of ezine or newsletter that it was used in. Please send notification mailto:webmaster@online-wealth.com ___________________________

Occasionally...just occasionally...I see something, during my surfing and searching, that I figure a site owner would like to know about. Something that, if left unfixed, will continue to bother prospects, just as it was bothering me...

Not that I consider myself to be definitive guide, but I'm sure you know what I mean. We all like to help a bit, now and then, right?

I was in this e-book site - a very big one, I might add - when suddenly, up pops a blue box with an alert: some sort of "run-time error at line XX - do you want to debug?"...maybe you've seen this sort of thing also?

(And, anyways, why on earth would I want to debug somebody else's program bugs?)

As usual, I punch "No" button and let it go away. This time, however, pesky box came back...and back...and back again and again, each time I hit "No" button.

(By way, have you ever tried to move your pointer quickly from a pop-up box - as you close it - to back button of browser...ya gotta be queeeeck! Better to put your cursor on "no" button, place mouse pointer on back button, then hit "Enter" key on yer keyboard, and then very quickly click mouse...you'll get out OK.)

Soon it became very tiresome, not to say annoying, y'know...so I hit "ContactUs" button and sent off a rocket (a nice, informative one...nothing abusive, OK!) to webmaster, advising him/her of problem and maybe they wanna do somethin' about it...just tryin' to help out and all, y'know.

Next time I check incoming mail, message I'd sent was bounced back to me, accusing me of spamming their site! Aaargh...what's goin' on here? To say that I was surprised and peeved is...well, hardly surprising, right?

So, I mention this to Sherry, who takes a look at messages, her face turns a dark red (almost), elbows me outta way and gets into that website, muttering unner her breath, "Oh, yeah, call me a spammer, huh...just you wait!" Determined now, Sherry searches around that site until she finds an email address with a real name - "Debbie@" was particular one she finally chose.