Does or doesn't G uses LSI (Latent semantic indexing)?

One of our sites that's run as a testground is experiencing sudden good positioning after this update.
The site is not using particular keyword targeting but a more "holistic" approach.

Usage of LSI (Latent semantic indexing) now switched on at G?

http://javelina.cet.middlebury.edu/lsa/out/lsa_definition.htm

Expat

 

I doubt it

 

Ok, so it looks like it does.. http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&safe=off&c2coff=1&q=~house&btnG=Search but only on big results from what i see

 

Does not provide good results in that case though

 

Just take out what it bolds to look through for other semantically related words:
first
~house -house
then search for
~house -home -house
then for
~house -home -house -housing
then for
~house -home -house -housing -floor

 

This can be very real. I think google is going in that direction. Google owns oingo.com and maybe working on smart search type algorithm. They may be testing this out right now as we are seeing strange actions in the search results. They seems to like testing out new ways to index for more relavent results. I would not be at all surprise if G is testing out LSI.

Only time will tell. I think we will know soon.

Does anyone know of any other properties Google owns that deals in sematics?

 

Yep, that's a biggie. I believe it's oingo.com

I'm pretty sure they are looking at ways to use that technology for the way they index pages. We might be seeing a bit of beta testing of it right now.

 

I have found another case of G. playing word association: A page on my site contains "wholesale" and has just started ranking for "discount" - which doesnt appear onsite (no anchors with discount in it either)

 

Applied is a company not an algo or technology
but yes LSI as a concept is certainly used by them on behalv of their masters although their "CIRCA technology" looks very propriatary and the blurb is not very specific. It looks this is used to strengthen ADS which is much more page dependent than SERPS should be.

When a page is displayed content and search resolution are decided and had the added benefit of the user supporting (or being seo'ed) decission, where as the search resolution based on few words and maybe some history is much more demanding.

Expat