20M search queries released by aol

http://www.seowannabe.com/2006/08/07/aol-releases-privacy-data-20m-search-queries/

It will be interesting to see how this will affect search.

 

There are already downloadable mirrors in several places.

Just think, there's now has a list to extract the top searched terms.

How many new spam sites do you suppose are going to boil up?

Dave

 

a lot of spam sites for sure.
But think of how easy is gonna be to setup PPC campaigns right now with all this data.

I'm pretty sure wordtracker hates aol right now

 

I get more visitors from this forum each month than AOL.

 

but that info is not relevant only to aol.
The sample is big enough to be relevant for all search engines.

 

There's a lot of marketing companies that hate AOL right now. Many are already calling for a boycott.

I feel sorry for the users whose personal data is now in the hands of about anyone who wants it.

Dave

 

mhh pretty interesting stuff

 

Fair point.

 

Here's from Tech Crunch...

http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/08/06/aol-proudly-releases-massive-amounts-of-user-search-data/

Dave

 

interesting move, I actually like it. This kind of data should either be available to everyone or to none at all. Why should the big companies with a lot of money to spend have an advantage like this? We have contributed to the data after all.

 

EDIT. Sorry, I was talking about the google list of words.

 

Ummm... that's how it works. Why should someone who's compiled the data not get as much money for it as they can?

Whats scary is the amount of personal data that is contained.

Dave

 

Right, the problem is that one way or another the data can be associated with users which makes a big privacy issue.
From a SEO & PPC point of view its golden data.

 

EDIT: Saw your edit.

Dave

 

Talk about golden.

Download it. Put it in a data base. Add a search function.

Wonder when the first one hits the net?

Dave

 

I'm still building my index but by greping the files
its pretty sick what some users search for.

 

I very much doubt that the people who contributed to the data were properly informed. Did your cell phone operator inform you that they can for example track your movement? I guess not.
Releasing these data will raise the awareness of the problem in general. And I think it is better if this kind of data is available to everyone, not just to the ones who want it so badly that they are going to pay for it. It is not like a research project, where someone develops something new and then sells it. The data could only be gathered if people cooperate.

 

this data would be really valuable in see user search trends

 

That's putting it mildly.

Dave

 

There's millions, upon millions of things in the world that are tracked without expressly informing you. Every buy groceries? Tracked. Use one of the grocery stores "preferred cards"? Tracked even more. Ever use a credit card? Place where you used it tracks you for coupons and promotions. How do you forcasting is acheived? The only reason your private data may have made the list is because it was searched. Ever search your own name?

I don't diagree about the privacy implications but that's not what has the most "commercial" value. Who you are is not important. What you searched for and where you clicked is.

Dave