If you live outside of united states, Is this url 404 for you? http://www.google.com/2008election/ Then check it with a US webproxy then see. Very strange...magically it now exists!! haha or if you live in US check it with this canadain web proxy and it will say 404.
I can't see it, error page Page Not Found The page - www.google.com/2008election/ - does not exist. Suggestions: * Check the spelling of the address you typed * If you are still having problems, please contact us
Its actually not magic. The web server that serves a page when requested can filter requests based on your IP. Since the url deals with providing information to US voters it does not in any way concern to people outside the United States. So what Google has done is configured the server in such a fashion that it only serves pages to computers having a US IP and rejects everything and hence the 404. Google is clever enough to save resources and computing power and has very cleverly implemented it. MYTH BUSTED.
What I thought. But they did a blunder on the PSA ads on Adsense becuase thats how I found it. The ads said someting about 2008 election and I accidently clicked on it becuase it the PSA use the old format where the whole space is clickable and it brought me to this 404 page. So from curiosity I put the url into the us web proxy and it was not 404. So yes there probably is some Geo-ip being used there, except they forget to remove the PSA being served to non-us.
confirmed the page is there. or http://www.google.com/search?q=2008election that page html code here: <!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd xhtml 1.0 transitional//en" "http://www.w3.org/tr/xhtml1/dtd/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"/> <title>google 2008 u.s. election</title> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="style.css" /> <!--[if ie]><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="screen-ie.css" media="all" /><![endif]--> <!--[if ie]><script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.google.com/uds/gadgets/inthenews/excanvas.js"></script><![endif]--> <script type="text/javascript"> var gajshost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3cscript src='" + gajshost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3e%3c/script%3e")); </script> <script type="text/javascript"> var pagetracker = _gat._gettracker("ua-5346008-1"); pagetracker._setcookiepath("/2008election/"); pagetracker._setallowanchor(true); pagetracker._trackpageview(); </script> <script src="http://www.google.com/uds/gadgets/inthenews/inthenews.js" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="http://www.google.com/jsapi/" type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> google.load("search", "1"); google.setonloadcallback(initialize, true); function initialize() { var options = { displaytime : 120000, format : "513x500", usenav : true }; new inthenews("itnid-513x500", options); } </script> </head> <body> <div> <div id="header"> <form action="http://www.google.com/coop/2008election_results.html" id="cse-search-box"> <div style="margin-top:14px; float:right;"> <input type="hidden" name="cx" value="003058154128075648025:l_aqfvo4pp8" /> <input type="hidden" name="cof" value="forid:9" /> <input type="hidden" name="ie" value="utf-8" /> <input type="text" name="q" size="25" /> <input type="submit" name="sa" value="search" /> </div> </form> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.google.com/coop/cse/brand?form=cse-search-box&lang=en"></script> <h1><a href="/"><img src="http://www.google.com/images/logo_sm.gif" width="150" height="55" alt="google" /></a>2008 u.s. election</h1> </div> <div id="promo"> <h2>explore the american political landscape</h2> <ul class="promo"> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/youtube16x16.gif" class="icon" alt="youtube" /><b>learn about the issues</b></span><br /> <span>find out what politicians are saying about the issues that matter most.</span><br /> <a href="http://www.youtube.com/youchoose#utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-&utm_term=youchoose" title="youtube" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/youchoose');">you choose '08 »</a> </li> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/knol-16.gif" class="icon" alt="knol" /><b>inform yourself</b></span><br /> <span>here what the experts have to say and participate in debates on the keys issues of the election.</span><br /> <a href="http://knol.google.com/k/knol-debates/the-bailout-of-the-us-financial-sector/1zs871mejtqiw/5#" title="knol" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/knol');">knol debate series »</a> </li> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/maps16x16.png" class="icon" alt="google maps" /><b>locate election maps</b></span><br /> <span>browse 2008 political mashups to keep up with this year's election.</span><br /> <a href="http://maps.google.com/elections#utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-&utm_term=mapsgallery" title="google maps" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/mapsgallery');">election maps gallery »</a> </li> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/quotes.png" class="icon" alt="in quotes" /><b>get the quotes</b></span><br /> <span>see what the candidates had to say about popular issues.</span><br /> <a href="http://labs.google.com/inquotes#utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-&utm_term=inquotes" title="in quotes" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/inquotes');">in quotes »</a> </li> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/reader16x16.png" class="icon" alt="google reader" /><b>follow the political insiders</b></span><br /> <span>read what obama and mccain read and view shared articles by leading political commentators.</span><br /> <a href="http://www.google.com/powerreader#utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-&utm_term=powerreaders" title="google readers" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/powerreaders');">power readers in politics »</a> </li> <li class="content"><span class="promo_title"><img src="images/tools16x16.gif" class="icon" alt="campaign toolkit" /><b>start your campaign online</b></span><br /> <span>organize volunteers, distribute your news and follow the latest breaking stories.</span><br /> <a href="http://www.google.com/events/campaigntools#utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-&utm_term=campaigntools" title="google campaign toolkit" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/campaigntools');">campaign toolkit »</a> </li> <li class="content"><b>search election videos</b><br /> <span>search and find where terms were spoken or mentioned by the candidates.</span><br /> <a href="http://labs.google.com/gaudi" title="search election videos" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/gaudi');">search election videos »</a> </li> </ul> </div> <h2>get prepared to vote on election day</h2> <div id="promo_banner"> <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps/mpl?moduleurl=http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/mapplets/elections/2008/us-voter-info/us-voter-info.xml&utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-gns-gm&utm_term=votinginfo" title="find voting info on google maps" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/votinginfo');"><img src="images/promo_maps.png" width="243" height="122" alt="find voting info on google maps" /></a> <div class="banner"> <ul> <li>find registration information</li> <li>learn where to vote</li> <li>get an absentee ballot</li> </ul> <div><a class="promo_action" href="http://maps.google.com/maps/mpl?moduleurl=http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/mapplets/elections/2008/us-voter-info/us-voter-info.xml&utm_campaign=en&utm_medium=ha&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-gns-gm&utm_term=votinginfo" title="find voting info on google maps" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/votinginfo');">find voting information »</a> </div> </div> <div id="mobile"> <img src="images/mobile_16x16.gif" style="position:absolute; margin:8px 0 0 4px;" width="16" height="16" alt="mobile" /><a href="http://www.google.com/mobile/2008election/" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/mobile');" style="position: absolute; font-weight:normal; margin:7px 0 0 23px;">get this info on your phone »</a> </div> </div> <h2 class="gadget_texts">use google tools to learn more about the 2008 presidential candidates</h2> <div id="gadget"> <div id="itnid-513x500" class="sample"></div> </div> <div id="gadget_bottom"> <div class="gadget_youtube"><b>see more youtube campaign channels : <a href="http://www.youtube.com/members?s=mv&t=a&g=8" onclick="javascript: pagetracker._trackpageview('/outgoing/politicianschannels');"> politicians</a></b></div> </div> <div id="about">©2008 google - <a href="http://www.google.com">home</a> - <a href="http://www.google.com/about.html">about google</a> - <a href="http://www.google.com/privacy.html">privacy policy</a> - <a href="http://www.google.com/accounts/tos">terms of service</a></div> </div> </body> </html> HTML: