If you go to Yahoo!, I bet you'll have a had time trying to use Yahoo!'s Blog Search feature today. Well, at least until it goes back online. Try doing a search at blog.news.search.yahoo.com, it is gone! Yes, it has also been removed from being embedded in Yahoo! News, and has been replaced by Yahoo! Images, for now. A search on google.com at Yahoo! News would typically show both a Yahoo! News listing and Yahoo! Blog Search listing for this site, now we only see a Yahoo! News listing.
Is it gone forever? Nope. At least that is what Greg Jarboe finds from a Yahoo! spokesman, Brian Nelson.
In an email sent a short while later, he added, “Maybe this goes without saying, (but) blog content remains an important part of our overall news and news search strategy. It’s worth mentioning again because I’ve read speculation in the blogosphere about what Y! might be thinking bigger picture when it comes to blog content.”
What is interesting is that the forums are pretty dead on this topic. I was not able to find a WebmasterWorld thread on this, but I did find a Search Engine Watch Forums thread with some limited discussion.
Why didn't Yahoo! post something about this? Why pull it without telling anyone? Heck, the blog community is almost in an uproar about this, as you can imagine. Take a look at Zawodny's recent links section and how he quotes, Steve Rubel;
To me this is a sure sign that Yahoo is gearing up to launch an integrated feed reader/search engine the way Ask.com/Bloglines did in June. This is the second piece of evidence in the puzzle.
Of course Jeremy can't say anything or he would have. Quoting someone else... Well, let's see.
Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.
