Affordable and Cost-Effective Search Engine Optimization in India

Search Engine optimization is the process of improving the rank of a website in search engine results and also improving traffic of the web page. With the help of SEO techniques, your website will be visible in millions of web pages. No matter, if you have small organization or large organization, SEO is required everywhere to get beneficial results. In order to have successful e-commerce, it is essential for you to follow and implement effective SEO techniques.

Being an important internet- marketing process, search engine optimization in India has become an essential part of every business. It assists you in business and helps you to earn higher business returns. For any business, to reach its ultimate users it is important that it’s listed on the search engine.

Indian SEO Company Services

Search engine optimization in India offers one of the best internet marketing services and one can easily take full advantage of them. Search engine optimization in India holds expertise and experience in the field that will enhance your business and also boost it in the long run. Here you are offered both on page and off page search engine optimization services and following are the benefits that you can reap from search engine optimization services in India-

• By utilizing search engine optimization services in India, you can save a lot of money. There is a huge difference between the prices because the labor is cheap in India, which makes it one of the best destinations for outsourcing business.
• Search engine optimization in India offers one stop shop solution to all your website needs. You can get all services right from website designing to website maintenance under one roof. All these services are available at competitive prices that attract companies to outsource SEO work from India.
• Competent human resources, with substantial education, working in Indian outsourcing companies tend to provide impeccable services to the clients. Search engine optimization companies in India offer top notch services with no compromise on quality.
• In India, one can easily get tailor made solutions as per their requirement. SEO companies in India also offer multilingual search engine optimization that also helps companies to get hold of wide range of traffic.

All of the above mentioned pointers ensure that search engine optimization companies in India offer high quality, proficient and customized services to meet the requirements of clients from all over the world.

Web Development Services – Dot Technologies

The Internet is the biggest source of online trade and commerce that has revolutionized business activities across the globe. It helps in easy transactions which enables direct access to both service providers and clients for effective exchange of goods and services. The Internet is a great virtual medium that helps both buyers and sellers in interacting with each other. Therefore, it is very important to create a website that helps a company in showcasing its products and services properly. A well made site will help an organization in providing crucial information to its clients in an easy manner.

Here web design is an importanat part of web development. It is only through this medium that an efficient and informative website is made. In order to make good websites, it becomes very important at the part of web site developer that it is created and designed professionally with accurate details. In order to improve your business, it is very important to hire professional ecommerce web development experts as they will be deft at their work. Currently, the web development industry is a burgeoning one and is growing at fast pace. With the dot-com revolution, this phenomenon has turned into a popular mass media tool.

In order to create web design, it is very important that the web development professional knows software that are useful in designing purposes such as Adobe Dreamweaver, Linux, Apache, php/MySQL. Apart from this, of late, some of the new technologies that have changed the scene of web designing include blog layout which is an interactive way of exchanging useful information. Some of the other basic tools that are a useful part of web development include client and server side coding techniques such as XHTML, Flash, JavaScript, CSS, ASP, ASP.NET, php, Java..

However, beyond all these applications, it is very important that the content of the website provides the latest information. This is an expert job that comes under a web content writer. Web development also includes a content writing service which helps in making a website informative. This immensely helps an organization in getting priority on search engine optimized result pages on the Internet search engines. This ensures effective use of the keywords with high page rankings. It is very important that the website is designed according to the latest techniques so that it is easy to sift. It is important to keep the website simple without, excessive use of Flash and other graphic applications as it will make the website hard to read.

Try not to stuff all information on a single web page as you can use the hyperlink facility which makes reading an easy process. In order to make the website more attractive, make sure that your web development team is good at White Hat SEO techniques so that your website gets listed on the search results on the Internet, which will help in the long run. Finally, if the website is full of updated information about your products and services, it will definitely help you in attracting more business clients because of higher web traffic. Therefore, web development is the key to success for a professional website.

Seeking Software Designing and Development Services from India

The software services India have taken core place in everyday functioning of any business. Today any business needs software’s for its day to day connections. For an enhanced market reach, business companies need a good website that makes them visible to the world and latest software to keep their business abreast with what is most recent around the world. An IT enabled company is more efficient and profitable and has become critical for business success. Using IT services, they make use of real-time information and run a smarter business. Today’s world is customer driven. Software Development Company engaged in software development and web designing services works to achieve client satisfaction.


Software services India and Web Design Services have a long track record. In fact, India has emerged as pioneering destination for offshore software and web solutions. Offshore software development companies engaged in providing services to outsource project involve the best tools and technology suitable for the work. The tools used are not only adaptive; rather they are predictive as they help in influencing the success of a business. Last decade has witnessed the blooming of India in IT services globally. The talented resources, their operational efficiency with commitment to excel and deliver next generation solutions have made India a forerunner in IT industry.


Software services include an array of services from custom software development, product development to re-engineering services. Software development in India is on the rise with increasing demand of online businesses. Software and web solutions from India are dynamic, professional and affordable. Software services India are delivered leveraging applications, infrastructure, experience, know-how and quality. The software team keeps track of each and every milestone pre-decided at the start of any project. Each phase of project is approached with diligence. The use of various reporting tools helps the client and vendor to be in sync with the developments in their project. This not only increases the level of involvement but also leads to a better understanding of business process that is taking shape. Software developers make sure that client requirements are delivered in time and with quality assurance. The use of global delivery model helps in managing resources and making profits.


While seeking software services and web development services from India, outsourcing companies benefit from the geographical location, reasonable cost, quality product and timely delivery of services. These all factors have helped India rise as a major software development hub.

Web Development Company - Dot Technologies

India is today the world market for software development. What began as a pilot as software technology has become a huge market in India is a huge number of foreign projects that find their place in the Indian software market. An infinite amount of work in software development in India was outsourcing to India and there is enormous competition in high-quality software projects on time and quantity at an affordable price.

Software development is a process in which companies provide services such as development, maintenance and publishing software such as software, training, documentation, tips, etc. There have been enormous changes in the form of development languages software and providing various tools such as Microsoft. NET technologies, PHP, MS SQL Server, AJAX, Atlas, Silverlight, Java, J2EE, JSP, J2ME, ASP, ASP.NET, C #, VB.NET, database MySQL, Oracle, etc. have more two decades of time.

Software Development in India is not limited to product development software and sell out. It also extends to other resources, such as market surveys, research and development, maintenance, software product and software configuration management. Analysis of the problem, the design plan or the plan for a software solution for deploying or coding of the product, bug fixing and commissioning are also important factors that make software development as a whole.

It is true that IT companies are growing rapidly in India, mainly due to higher service needs for software development in India. We can see that the development of software and IT companies are closely interrelated, as when a levee, and the other is up too. Therefore, many companies now offer software development services, leading to unlimited growth in the sector.

Professional Web Development Solutions - Dot Technologies

Choosing a right web development company that understands your business needs is a crucial task. Well-designed, customized website, which represents products, services and other information in an impressive user-friendly way, can create an outstanding presence in the online world. Hence, one needs to hire a reputed and efficient web development company that has a specialization in web designing and content representation. Known as software power, Indian companies hold a grip on web development solutions market. Their websites provide details about the previous clients and projects, prices of their service package and most important the technologies they are using. That information can help a new client to choose the best web development company India among a number of other web development companies.

Web development company is known for providing a unique combination of

creativity, latest technology, expert and experienced staff. Their work starts with preparing a strategy plan that includes details from market trends, competitor’s position, business requirements, to presentation of text, graphics, audio and visuals, and so on. Indian web developers are providing their services for 24x7 and with various packages that give flexibility to include or exclude some services/products. Apart from good content and attractive design of website, it is equally important to create an SEO friendly website. Here, one can find ready-made web solutions for his business and custom made web solutions/applications. Web development offers complete on-site-offshore services, testing services with a focus on quality assurance and client satisfaction. Their well-experienced professional staff is well versed with advance technology developments, methods, industry-standards and well known for creating charismatic and result driven websites. Web developers of Indian companies are known for their proficiency in all technical aspects, using of MySql, .Net, Jquery, HTML/CSS and SEO semantic coding, etc. Their work do not end with designing a web solution, but also covers the entire end to end testing, execution, defect analysis and SEM process. Such a responsive, supportive, client-oriented and accountable work environment is the hallmark of web development company. Hence, choosing an Indian web developer or company could be a fruitful decision for your business.

For growth of a company in today's modern, networked setting, having a solid web presence is not only necessary, but also of utmost importance. Web Development Company in India provides a complete package when it comes to developing a holistic and customer sensitive web presence. The team begins with a proactive analysis of the requirements, and based on the strategies drawn up during preliminary forays, decides on the best methods to employ in gaining a concrete and effective web presence that portrays the values and directives that the company stands for. This helps to gain a firm footing in the web based market and also provides a competitive edge in the long run.

Our Working Strategy - Dot Technologies

We have set processes to roll out a finished application from our lab. We emphasize on quality, our detail oriented system analysts analyze the requirement specification thoroughly, regular interaction with the client during whole of the project life cycle enables us to build a most workable solution.

We define different stages for each project. At the end of each project stage we make the project available for client’s review. Necessary changes/modifications are done based upon client’s feedback. This strategy makes it possible to build a most cost effective and workable solution.

After the development phase of an application is complete, application undergoes a rigorous quality assurance phase. The application is declared complete only after QA team approves the project. No project is delivered without approval from quality assurance team.

Affordable Web Designing Solutions - Dot Technologies

                                    Web Designing Company India

India has become the hot favorite destination for web designing services. Indian web developers are offering affordable designing services with excellent quality. Web designing is not just about creating a website filled with necessary information, but it requires a creative idea coupled with strong technical support. Web designing company India is the place where expert brains are providing tailor made solutions for different needs. To get an upper hand on your competitors in cyber-business world, it is extremely necessary to create a vibrant, dynamic, user-friendly website that can attract the targeted audience. Most Indian web designing companies that are providing on-site and offshore services across the globe, have experienced, well-trained and highly skilled professionals to cater all varieties of client requirements. It could be hard task to choose a good web designing company India. Therefore, going through their websites to know more about their work, previous clients and service descriptions can help comparing among different companies and to make a right choice,

Today, when almost each company is trying to exploit the benefits of e-commerce through their website, it is important to make a communicative, easily visible and unique looking website. Apart from presentation and appearance of site, high ranking in search results and adherence with search engine guidelines is also important. While working with the professionals of web design company India, the clients can be assured about a clean, positive and trouble free website reputation in virtual world. Indian web designing companies use the latest versions of web designing technologies such as XHTML, web 2.0 versions, CSS, Drupal and megento. Their creative and specially customized web applications and designing solutions have no match. Web designing company India developers have immense experience to work with clients spread across the globe. They also provide complete package that includes post maintenance and up gradation services as well.

The combination of such a vast pool of talented and well-trained professionals with the right technical advancements and tools make these companies a favorite with the overseas clients. The choice of the correct website that can extend the right mix of technologies and talent for aligning with the objectives of the clients is however a tricky job and should be done with utmost care and vigilance.  

Importance of Search Engine Optimization - Dot Technologies

Search engine optimization or SEO is a popular technique that increases the visibility of any website in search engine results. It helps websites to get popularity and quick visibility in the virtual world, ensures more traffic and revenue for the site. An effective and well-planned SEO strategy is the key aspect for achieving success in online business. Therefore, search engine optimization India is the name that can provide excellent SEO solutions for any type of business. Their SEO solutions are totally in accordance with Google’s search policy and guidelines that help in maintaining clean and positive reputation of site along with quick appearance in search queries. The main purpose of SEO is to get top place in search results. For that, right keywords, titles and secondary phrases should be included in the introduction of website. Search engine optimization India experts hold a sheer experience in this context, be it domestic stage or abroad, Indian professionals are providing effective SEO solutions.  

Nowadays, search engine optimization is not only limited to traditional SEO technique, but also includes search engine marketing, social media marketing, PPC and many more. The professionals of Search engine optimization India are a step ahead in this regard, as they keep themselves updated with the changing policies of major search engines. Indian SEO professionals are using various advanced SEO technological solutions clubbed with different types of marketing platforms. In today’s competitive world of online business, where each website is offering best user-friendly environment, it is a challenge to maintain regular traffic and high revenue for the website. Social media marketing that uses social networking sites, link building and other affiliated marketing tools for higher exposure and gaining popularity; is a highly result oriented SEO strategy that can ensures visibility of a site across the globe. In that context, search engine optimization India is the best available option in today’s market.

Search Engine Optimization India holds the distinction of delivering high quality web content that is designed to enhance your website’s visibility, capture your target audiences’ attention and ensure audience loyalty to information that is both engaging and relevant. SEO India boasts of an international clientele and believes in delivering extraordinary service, on time, every time!

10 Reasons to Write Unit Tests - Dot Technologies

It’s been bothering me for quite some time not being able to explain the people out there why they need to write unit tests. The most common responses that I got were “this is a waste of time” and “my application has no bugs”. Unfortunately, this overconfidence and cutting corners is hurting the developers (and the industry).

I compiled this short list of why I write unit tests:

Don’t let your customers discover embarassing bugs. Write tests to cover a multitude of scenarios and catch these bugs before they get into production.
Test complex scenarios quickly, without having to manually reproduce them in the application.
By testing often, you don’t break the application as you go. You can’t always know the indirect implications of what you’re writing, especially if you didn’t write the original application.
By testing early, you don’t write unnecessary code but only the strict necessary. This makes the codebase smaller and more maintainable. It also saves on development time.
You do not have to debug the same code twice. Once you have a test to account for a possible bug, you’ll pick up any wrong turns quickly.
You ensure readability. A unit test makes the purpose of your code easier to understand.
You ensure maintainability. Unit-testing forces you to better encapsulate functionality, thus making it easier to maintain and add new features.
Refactor without worries. Run the tests to make sure everything still functions as intended.
Save time on testing. You can test the entire application at the speed of your CPU.
Feel safer. How many times were you afraid to add a new feature or change something in your application’s core? No more!
Bonus: know exactly what is broken. Instead of hunting for an obscure bug, let the tests tell you what’s wrong and why. Example: the application will tell you when you add an item to a cart but the cart still appears empty. It will also tell you what item you tried to add for the cart to break.

Source : http://marxsoftware.blogspot.in

Bluestacks emulator runs Android apps on Windows PCs - Dot Technologies

The software can run the latest Angry Bird Android application on a Windows laptop


Software company Bluestacks is trying to close the gap between Microsoft's Windows and Google's Android OS with its App Player application, which was released in beta today.

App Player is an emulator that allows Android applications to run on Windows 7, Vista, and XP OSes. Users can install the software in Windows and then run about 450,000 Android applications, including Angry Birds and Fruit Ninja, the company said.

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Beyond PCs, the App Player could also allow Windows tablets such as Hewlett-Packard's Slate 2 and Dell's Latitude ST to run Android applications. Bluestacks made headlines at last year's Computex trade show in Taipei when Advanced Micro Devices showed off an x86 tablet with Android running on top of the Windows 7 software stack. Android applications are mostly written for the ARM instruction set, but the x86 tablet was able to switch between Android and Windows without any problems.

The emulator has new Layercake technology, which exploits hardware accelerators to improve the performance of Android games in Windows. The layer was not included in the Bluestacks alpha version. Android applications typically use hardware accelerators found in ARM's Mali, Nvidia's Tegra, and Imagination Technologies' PowerVR graphics cores, but Layercake can take advantage of hardware accelerators found in x86 chips from companies like AMD.

The Bluestacks app is 3.6MB and can be downloaded from the company's website. The software installed without any issues on Windows XP, and on start provided the option to download software from Google's Android application market. Angry Bird Space, the latest iteration of the game, was released last week and ran on the PC through Bluestacks. However, resizing the window to full-screen mode required restarting the Angry Birds application.

The software also offered the option to sync apps and contacts with an Android device.

Article Source : http://www.infoworld.com

Does Having Good Content on Your Site Really Matter? - DotTechnologies.net

When it comes to building a business website, there are a lot of different elements that you have to think about. The content that you put on your site is going to be a lot more important than you might realize. People talk about content and whether it really counts, and the fact of the matter is that if you don't have solid information on your site, you're wasting your time with the investment in designing and creating a website in the first place. Content is everything and you have to make sure that you utilize it to create a site that is informative, engaging, and useful to your audience to keep them coming back for more.

The content that goes on your website will either make or break your success, in most cases. There are many different elements that your content needs to provide to your audience. In order to make the best use of your business website, your content should be:

-SEO-friendly. Make sure that you're using keywords so that search engines are able to follow and pick up on your website to rank it in search results. Just remember to follow rules for keyword usage and density so that you don't overdo it. It's better to have a keyword about once or twice for every 100 words than to stuff it in as much as you can.

-Brief. People are looking for quick, concise information. If your content is not to-the-point and easy to follow, your audience isn't going to stick around very long. Make sure that you get the facts out, get your point across, and be done with it.

-Informative. People need to know what you have to offer or why they are at your site. Provide them with all of the facts and information that they need to know about your business. Give them the chance to learn about your business, what you do, and how it can benefit them. This is what people want to know.

-Engaging. If you're not capable of producing simple, clean, engaging content on your own, you should hire someone to do the work. You content has to get people's attention and give them a reason to invest in your business, no matter what you are selling.

-Friendly. The last thing that people want online is to visit a website where they feel like they're being talked down to. Therefore, you have to make sure that your content is friendly and simple, not overly professional and 'better than thou' in its tone and style.

Content is king in the internet world, and your website is not going to be able to succeed without it. By taking the time to create useful, engaging content, you can rest assured that your audience will be much more likely to buy whatever you're selling and see your business in a professional light. 

Source: http://www.visualscope.com

Most Creative 404 HTTP Response Ever? - DotTechnologies

The HTTP 404 Status Code is one of the HTTP status codes that all web developers and nearly all web users are all too familiar with. It is an HTTP response indicating that an HTTP request was received by the intended server, but that the exact resource specified in the request URI cannot be found on the server. In the early days of the World Wide Web, it seemed like many sites did not bother doing anything in particular about this page. This meant that a pretty useless and nearly blank page would show up in the user's browser. Some browsers, such as Internet Explorer, attempted to provide more general details in a "user friendly" format.

These browser attempts at providing more details about the cause of a 404 response status were still not very helpful because there is no good general way to handle a 404 error response. Instead, it is preferable for a site to provides its own custom 404 response page. The advantages of a custom 404 are discussed in more detail in Importance of Custom 404 Error Pages.

In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in the percentage of sites providing a custom 404 error response. This is especially true for sites that want to do whatever that can to retain the user's business and/or traffic to their site. These sites attempt to do their best to provide a search or suggestions for what the user can do next. Some sites don't try to fix the situation, but instead automatically redirect to the site's main page. Other sites perform a combination, providing a search box and acknowledgement of an unfound page for a few seconds and then automatically redirecting to their main page.

After seeing the reference on reddit Programming to Github's Star Wars Themed 404 Page, I wondered if there are any 404 error responses more clever than this one. The Github 404 page may not be the best at helping the user find what he or she was looking for, but it is funny and does provide links to other actions that might be taken.

I tried some intentionally unavailable URIs on some of my most-accessed sites to see how their 404 responses are handled. In the rest of this post, I look briefly at some of them and analyze the value each provides. Mostly though, I was simply looking for the most interesting 404 page I could find and so far I haven't found any more funny than Github's.

http://marxsoftware.blogspot.in

Adobe Launches Sandboxed Flash Player For Firefox, Hopes For Fewer Exploits - DotTechnologies

The design is similar to that of Adobe Reader X Protected Mode

Adobe has released a beta version of Flash Player for Firefox, which has better protection against vulnerability exploits because of a new sandboxed architecture.

"The design of this sandbox is similar to what Adobe delivered with Adobe Reader X Protected Mode and follows the same Practical Windows Sandboxing approach," said Peleus Uhley, platform security strategist at Adobe, in a blog post on Monday. "Like the Adobe Reader X sandbox, Flash Player will establish a low integrity, highly restricted process that must communicate through a broker to limit its privileged activities."

In secure software development, sandboxing refers to the practice of isolating a process from the operating system in order to minimize the fallout of a potential exploit. This type of technology has gained popularity in recent years, primarily because of its use in Google Chrome, a browser that has never experienced a successful remote code execution attack so far.

Adobe decided to implement sandboxing in Adobe Reader back in 2010 in order to counter the large number of exploits that targeted the product and its users. The technology was built into Adobe Reader X (10.0) and is based on the same sandboxing principles that Google used when developing Chrome.

Later that same year Adobe also launched a sandboxed version of Flash Player for Chrome and promised to explore the possibility of doing the same for other browsers. The new sandboxed Flash Player for Firefox, which works with Windows Vista and Windows 7, is the result of those efforts.

Critical Flash Player vulnerabilities have regularly been exploited to infect computers with malware during the past several years. Along with Java and Adobe Reader, Flash Player is one of the most attacked software applications because its vulnerabilities can usually be exploited by simply visiting a malicious website.

"Since its launch in November 2010, we have not seen a single successful exploit in the wild against Adobe Reader X," Uhley said. "We hope to see similar results with the Flash Player sandbox for Firefox once the final version is released later this year."

However, the success of this version at deterring cybercriminals from writing Flash Player exploits in the future will largely depend on how quickly it gets adopted. In order to speed up the process, Adobe is working on a new update mechanism, the company's senior manager for corporate communications, Wiebke Lips, said.

Having a sandboxed version of Flash Player for every major browser, not just Chrome and Firefox, is also important, if Adobe wants cybercriminals to lose interest in its product. "We are currently in the process of researching the best path to provide Flash Player sandbox protection for Internet Explorer," Lips said.

However, because Internet Explorer has a completely different plug-in architecture than Chrome and Firefox, namely ActiveX, developing a sandboxed Flash Player version for it requires a different approach, Lips said. Nevertheless, the current version of Flash Player supports Protected Mode in Internet Explorer 7 or later on Windows Vista and Windows 7.

Article Source: http://www.infoworld.com/

PHP 5.3.10 Fixes Critical Remote Code Execution Vulnerability - DotTechnologies

The vulnerability was introduced by the fix for a hash collision denial-of-service flaw.

The PHP Group released PHP 5.3.10 on Thursday in order to address a critical security flaw that can be exploited to execute arbitrary code on servers running an older version of the Web development platform.

The vulnerability is identified as CVE-2012-0830 and was discovered by Stefan Esser, an independent security consultant and creator of the popular Suhosin security extension for PHP.

SecurityFocus classifies the issue as a design error because it was accidentally introduced while fixing a separate denial-of-service (DoS) vulnerability in early January.

That vulnerability is known as CVE-2011-4885 and was disclosed in December 2011 at the Chaos Communication Congress by security researchers Alexander Klink and Julian Wälde.

It affects a number of Web development platforms including PHP, ASP.NET, Java and Python and can be exploited in a so-called hash collision attack. The PHP development team addressed CVE-2011-4885 in PHP 5.3.9, which was released on Jan. 10.

"The fix for the Hash Collision DoS introduced a new directive (max_input_vars) to limit the number of accepted input variables," said Carsten Eiram, chief security specialist at vulnerability research firm Secunia.

"However, due to a logic error in the "php_register_variable_ex()" function in php_variables.c certain cases are not handled correctly when the number of supplied variables is greater than the imposed limit," he explained.

This error can be exploited by attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code on a system that runs a vulnerable PHP installation. PHP 5.3.9 along with any older versions for which the hash collision DoS patch was backported, are affected, Eiram said.

Proof-of-concept code that exploits this vulnerability has already been published online, so the likelihood of attacks targeting CVE-2012-0830 are high. Web servers administrators are advised to upgrade to PHP 5.3.10 immediately.

 Article Source: http://www.infoworld.com/

Google Introduces Country Domains On Blogger To Aid Content Removal - DotTechnologies

The decision by Google appears to precede a move by Twitter to selectively delete messages in some countries.

Google is directing users to localized country domains on Blogger to provide it flexibility to comply with content removal rules in various countries.

 The move suggests that Internet companies are coming to terms with the need to follow local rules, as they try to gain users in countries where there are concerns about pornography, and certain political and religious content.

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Google's update on Jan. 9 came ahead of Twitter's controversial decision last week to withhold certain content from users in a specific country, when required by local laws, while keeping it available to the rest of the world.

Over the coming weeks, users might notice that the URL (uniform resource locator) of a blog they are reading has been redirected to a country-code top level domain, or ccTLD, Google said on a support page on Blogger that was first noticed by the news site Techdows.

"Migrating to localized domains will allow us to continue promoting free expression and responsible publishing while providing greater flexibility in complying with valid removal requests pursuant to local law," Google said. Content removed due to a specific country's law will only be removed from the relevant ccTLD, it added.

Google is facing legal action in India in connection with content on its sites that is said to be objectionable. The Indian government in January allowed a court in Delhi to prosecute Google, Facebook, and 19 others, after Vinay Rai, editor of a local newspaper, filed a suit alleging objectionable content on their websites. Google had meanwhile appealed the lower court order before the Delhi High Court.

The Indian government has also demanded that Google and others should evolve mechanisms to quickly remove online content considered objectionable under Indian law.

But the feature on Blogger is part of a global rollout, and has little to do with the current situation in India, said a source close to the situation, who requested anonymity.

Services like Blogger, YouTube and Google+ help users to express themselves and share different points of view, Google said in a statement on Thursday. Where content is illegal or breaks Google's terms of service, the company will continue to remove it, it added. Google did not respond to a request for comment whether the changes on Blogger were linked to the court decision in India.

Google's YouTube also restricts access to content by IP address, citing the requirement of some content partners to make their videos available only to certain countries. It also blocks specific content in order to comply with local laws in countries where YouTube has launched. "For instance, certain Nazi imagery is unlawful in parts of Europe," according to a YouTube support page.

French Court Fines Google $660,000 Because Google Maps Is Free - DotTechnologies

Google faces a $660,000 fine after a French court ruling that the company is abusing its dominant position in mapping by making Google Maps free.

                                                        

According to The Economic Times, the French commercial court “upheld an unfair competition complaint lodged by Bottin Cartographes against Google France and its parent company Google Inc. for providing free web mapping services to some businesses.”

Bottin Cartographes provides mapping services for a cost, and its website boasts several business clients such as Louis Vuitton, Airbus and several automobile manufacturers.

The French court ruling requires Google to pay $660,000 (500,000 Euros) in damages and interest to Bottin Cartographes, along with a 15,000 Euro fine. That means Google’s total cost from the ruling is about $680,000.

A Google France spokesperson says the company is still studying the court’s decision and reviewing its options, adding that Google is “convinced that a free high-quality mapping tool is beneficial for both Internet users and websites.”

As you can see from the related stories listed below, this is far from the first time that the French have raised legal issues with Google.

About The Author: Matt McGee is Search Engine Land's Executive News Editor, responsible for overseeing our daily news coverage. His news career includes time spent in TV, radio, and print journalism. His web career continues to include a small number of SEO and social media consulting clients, as well as regular speaking engagements at marketing events around the U.S. He blogs at Small Business Search Marketing and can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee and/or on Google Plus. See more articles by Matt McGee

Google, Bing & Yahoo In Partnership To Sell Top Organic Local Listings - DotTechnologies

A new service offered by Bruce Clay Inc. called Local Paid Inclusion should raise a few eyebrows in the search marketing community – if there's any truth to it, that is. Officially in alpha, according to backend partner Universal Business Listings, the LPI program will offer top organic rankings in local listings for a fee, sources told Search Engine Watch.

UBL’s Doyal Bryant told SEW in a phone interview that the service is on hold, at the very least until next week, while the organizations test and troubleshoot.

However, both Google and Bing strongly deny any such program is in development.

"We are not working on any program that enables a site to pay to increase ranking in organic search results," according to a Google spokesperson.

Bing also denied taking part in such a program.

"Bing is not working on the Local Paid Inclusion program and would not consider giving preferential treatment to advertisers in organic search results," according to a Microsoft spokesperson.

Now UBL is also denying any involvement:

Universal Business Listing denies any association with articles and news reports about a "paid inclusion" business listing service. The company has made no such announcements or claims, particularly in regards to Google. It has no product announcements pending.

Bruce Clay Inc is a reseller of UBL's existing business listing syndication service and is not currently testing any new service from our company.

One program partner explained to Search Engine Watch how it will work:

“Using Google as an example, a local business in the ‘organic places’ area can pay a small monthly fee and this program moves them to the top area of the Places results. So essentially, it creates a premium section at the top of the Places results that never before existed, and a local business can pay a fee to appear in that area. As a result, whenever Places appears on the first page of Google results, and you are in the Local Paid Inclusion program, you should appear in that area of the first page of Google results.”

                        

The Local Paid Inclusion website, owned by Bruce Clay, states:

    “In January of 2012 we were approached to participate in a new and exciting program: Local Paid Inclusion (LPI). We’re offering it directly to local businesses, to chains of businesses, to resellers and through large distribution channels. We have an exclusive agreement to distribute LPI to domain registrars.

    Local Paid Inclusion is a Google, Yahoo and Bing official service that is offered as an approved official contracted program in cooperation with those search engines. This is a program supported by the search engines directly - and you can order it here. The search engines do not sell this directly.”

The website also has pricing information:

    The paid inclusion prices are based upon value: First page local results rankings for an average of less than $1.70 per day. If Call Tracking is involved that call fee is extra. This fee covers up to 30 keywords appropriate to your profile page and business, making the fee about $0.06 per day per keyword... less expensive than PPC and definitely higher impact because it is in the organic results area of the search results page.

We have confirmed that the paid listings are categorized as organic and will not be marked paid, advertising, or sponsored. They should blend seamlessly with organic local listings. This offering is not connected with Google’s AdWords Express program or other similar programs offered by others in the arrangement, but creates new space for LPI program listings.

“It’s a really exciting program, when we’re ready we’ll start talking about it,” Bryant told us earlier today.

This arrangement raises a few important questions:

    * Should search engines profit from the sale of organic listings?
    * Should this type of paid advertising be marked as such?
    * How does paid organic inclusion affect the quality of local listings, when paid listings can outrank those chosen for the top spot based on relevancy, geography, ratings, or other factors?
    * Hasn’t paid inclusion died a slow death a few times already?

For now, there are more questions than answers. As it stands, the players have been dragged into the limelight on this one kicking and screaming, you could say; the search engines involved are reportedly working out technical issues and did not want the program announced for another two to three weeks.

We reached out to Google, Bing and Yahoo to ask why the program was awarded in an exclusive contract, rather than through an internal program or some other kind of open, premium listings offer. We will update this article as we hear back.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to include statements from Google, Bing, and UBL.

Microsoft Sets Office 15 Public Beta For Summer 2012 - DotTechnologies

Microsoft today announced it has kicked off a "technical preview" of the next version of its money-making Office suite and promised a public beta will ship this summer.

                                                

The move is a repeat of the route Microsoft took with Office 2010, which was distributed to a select group of testers as a technical preview in July 2009.

Microsoft said little about "Office 15," the code name for the product, and nothing about its Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint applications in a blog post Monday that announced the preview.

"I'm not able to share too much about Office 15, but I can tell you Office 15 is the most ambitious undertaking yet for the Office Division," wrote P.J. Hough, the executive who leads the Office division. "With Office 15, for the first time ever, we will simultaneously update our cloud services, servers, and mobile and PC clients for Office, Office 365, Exchange, SharePoint, Lync, Project, and Visio."

Hough said the Office 15 technical preview was "already full," but added that "everyone will have the opportunity to try the Office 15 public beta later this summer."

He did not specify a date or set a month for the beta's availability.

Three years ago, Microsoft began the technical preview of Office 2010 in July 2009, followed that with a public beta in mid-November and launched the final product in April 2010. The suite hit retail shelves in June 2010.

If Microsoft follows a similar pace, it will release an Office 15 beta in late May or early June, wrap up the final code in October or November, and start selling the suite in December 2012 or January 2013.

Unless Microsoft changes Office's naming convention for Office, it will be called "Office 2013," as the two previous editions of the suite -- Office 2007 and Office 2010 -- actually shipped in the year prior to the one used in their titles.

It's possible, of course, that Microsoft has a faster release cadence in mind, and will ship the next Office alongside Windows 8 -- which most experts expect to see in October -- to duplicate the simultaneous launch of Windows Vista and Office 2007 in November 2007.

Microsoft may have required the invitation-only testers to sign a nondisclosure agreement that bars them from sharing secrets about the new suite, but that may not stop the unfinished code from leaking to others: Copies of the Office 2010 preview appeared on file-sharing sites even before Microsoft officially opened the program.

The company has not pegged the system requirements for Office 15, but it's possible that the new suite will not run on the decade-old Windows XP because that operating system is slated for retirement in April 2014.

Office 15 refers to the numbering system Microsoft uses to identify each edition: Office 2010 on Windows and Office 2011 on the Mac, for instance, are both labeled as "Office 14." Microsoft skipped "Office 13," jumping from 12 (Office 2007) to 14 (Office 2010) to avoid the unlucky number.

Office is one of Microsoft's biggest sources of both revenue and profit: In the fourth quarter of 2011, the Business division, which is responsible for Office, accounted for 30% of all revenues and 52% of all operating income.

Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld. Follow Gregg on Twitter at Twitter @gkeizer or subscribe to Gregg's RSS feed Keizer RSS. His e-mail address is gkeizer@computerworld.com.

Dear Google: Crappy Results Like This Don’t Give The Impression You Care About Search

The debate about what should — and shouldn’t — show in a Google search result for “santorum” has been well-documented, at this point. But I’d like to use this now famous search to illustrate something else: how it appears Google is taking its eye off the ball of being a search engine.

Searching For Santorum: A New Surprise

I did a search for santorum a few minutes ago, and this is what I got:

See the YouTube link showing up there? It helps illustrate all that I think many people are feeling is wrong with Google right now. It’s a pretty bad result, and it’s also something getting there probably because Google’s not catching some potential old-school search engine spamming.

Universal Search Picked This?

The video result is showing up as part of Google Universal Search. That’s a system that blends content from Google’s various “vertical” or specialized search engines into its regular search results. It’s only supposed to inject this type of specialized content if it’s deemed especially relevant to the search topic.

Certainly, you can imagine that there’s video content relevant to a search on “santorum” from across the web. The Daily Show and The Colbert Report alone have over ten different Santorum comedy clips that might all be relevant.

Beyond comedy, there are news reports from across the entire web. The same search at Binggives some examples of this, of how video content from Bing Video, as well as Fox News and CNN is inserted into its own search results for “santorum,” as you can see here:

Out of 20,000 potential matches on YouTube, out of 21 million potential video matches across the web, what does Google’s supposedly sophisticated Universal Search algorithm pick out to display as the top video content to be shown within the top search results?

A cartoon created by a company pitching its SEO software on YouTube as a way for Santorum to solve his Google problem. Wow.

You Couldn’t Have Picked….

That’s the most relevant thing that Google can show? I think most people would agree it’s not. I mean seriously, it’s better than these?

• Any of the Colbert Report or Daily Show clips
• Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum arguing with a student on gay marriage
• Dan Savage explaining how his campaign against Rick Santorum ultimately caused searches on Google and Bing to show a definition as “santorum” being related to anal sex

You Couldn’t Have Caught A 65% Like Ratio?

It’s embarrassing for Google to be doing this. And it’s worse when you look at the views the video has received: only about 2,000, at this point. That’s nothing compared to some of the other clips relevant to santorum, if you’re considering views to be one possible ranking factor. How does this video get such a boost?

Well, there’s another clue when you look at the number of likes the video has received: about 1,300, at this point. That means about 65% of people who viewed the video also liked it, a ratio that is hugely out of proportion to what you normally see.

For example, the classic Honey Badger video — which is hilarious — has a like ratio of 0.5%. How about the classic Double Rainbow video? Hey, 0.5% again. The Bedroom Intruder song? A tiny bit better, 0.6%.

Either this SEO tool video is something like 130x more likeable than any of these other videos or something abnormal is happening — something that you’d think Google’s spam detection systems would have flagged.

Can I Haz My Relevancy Back?

In this particular example, the poor relevancy isn’t caused by any of the ongoing Google+ification of Google. This result is what anyone would see, even if they are logged out of Google. It’s not caused by Search Plus Your World or anything like that.

But Google has spent so much time and energy shoving Google+ into seemingly every nook and cranny that it can find that this type of relevancy screw-up feels like another bit of evidence that Google’s original core mission, delivering awesome search results, is being forgotten.