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Yahoo is one of the most dominant forces on the Internet. It is a multimedia icon, providing its free email services, news, love personals, chat room, weather reports, and games all in one. Although it has expanded to the multi dimensional super house it is today, it began as a search engine before Google stepped in. Because of Google's newfound dominance in search engines, Yahoo has decided to mount a comeback of astronomical proportions.
For starters, Yahoo bought a first-class algorithmic search engine called Inktomi for $235 million. In October 2003, Yahoo bought out Overture which owned AltaVista and AlltheWeb. Realizing that search engines constituted a major part of their success over the years, Jeff Weiner (Yahoo's Vice President of search) has declared it a "strategic initiative." Right now, Yahoo is partnering with Google in many facets. Hearsay dictates that their partnership will come to an end, considering the capabilities Inktomi has with its unique search algorithms.
Surprisingly, Inktomi is not Yahoo's major draw - Overture is. Overture is a paid search engine that allows customers to place their websites in first page rankings by simply paying for it. As a result, the search engine is divided into "free searches" and "paid searches" with paid search results. The difference between the two search engine companies lies simply in the name - Yahoo calls it sponsor results and Google calls it sponsored links. One thing is clear: paid searching is creating plenty of fat wallets in the executive offices.
Yahoo and Google have been battling neck and next for years. Although they remain partners for a time, they'll soon split apart from one another and engage in a full-contact war for higher traffic and to make their mark as the No.1 search engine presence on the Web. Fortunes are being spent, cash-chows are being milked and new innovations and algorithms are being developed with the goal of "one-upping" one another to attract even more of a legion of search engine fans. Can you blame them?
Competition brings out the best in both parties, which means we're all better off as well through our Internet browsing experiences. Let these two superpowers collide for the benefit of Internet search engine technology in its entirety.
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