Google Enters Vertical Search With Travel

Something really major happened today. The New York Times reports: “Google has acquired ITA software, a 14-year-old company that makes software that organizes flight and pricing information, for $700 million in cash. ITA, based in Boston, specializes in organizing airline data, including flight times, seat availability and pricing.”

Forbes Column 2010: Facebook’s Ideal Future

Facebook should enter Google’s territory. Read more in this week’s Zero In, Facebook’s Ideal Future.

Microsoft Needs Acquisition Spree

After positive quarterly results from IBM and Apple, it looked as though we could see the beginning of a tech stock recovery. But yesterday’s report from Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) cast a shadow on those hopes. The truth, however, is that Microsoft is making a grand display of bad products and bad strategy.

Demystifying Horizontal vs. Vertical Searches

By Guest Author Saad Fazil In an earlier post I argued that Google would benefit from acquiring search engines in verticals such as travel, jobs, and products. By doing so, Google can retain “rich” traffic which otherwise might directly go to those search engines for specific needs.

Keyword Pricing

Readers, one of my research associates, Saad Fazil, is working on making sense of the convoluted world of keyword pricing – Google AdWords, Vertical Search Engines, and well as Organic Search. Saad would like to request that you share your knowledge if you have perspective to share on the topic …

Deal Radar 2008: Baynote

I have written a few pieces on recommendation systems that help sites personalize their offerings. As you know, my thesis on Web 3.0 heavily centers around personalization. In this installment of the Deal Radar, we will be looking at yet another recommendation technology company.

Deal Radar 2008: Mahalo

Mahalo, which means thank you in Hawaiian, is a human-powered search engine founded by former Weblogs co-founder, Jason Calacanis. The site launched in public alpha in mid-2007 and public beta in October 2007. Mahalo focuses on handling requests that are filtered with the help of a team based in Santa Monica, California, to avoid the spam

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Top Eight Online Travel Startups

We have covered online travel extensively over the last couple of years, beginning with the in-depth analysis, Web 3.0 and Online Travel. Here is an overview of the online travel startups to watch: