Part way through the interview, I noticed something in Rand Fishkin's voice, so I asked him...

Google has penalized Rap Genius for link schemes this morning. If you go to Google and search for [rap genius], rapgenius.com will not be found on the first page. Instead you will find links to their Twitter account, Facebook page, Wikipedia profile and stories like this about them being penalized by Google. But you won’t […]

Those lovable rascals from Andreessen Horowitz-backed Rap Genius are stirring up trouble again. But this time it’s not for controversial statements they’ve made — instead, the company came under fire for spammy SEO tactics.

AT&T plans to charge $70 a month for its gigabit service in Austin if users agree to let AT&T track their searches. This is a relatively new model for an ISP, although it has been tried elsewhere.

DuckDuckGo: a private search engine

An incredible search engine.

David Cameron has welcomed Google promises to tackle illegal images as a “significant step forward”. Microsoft is expected to follow suit

Bing has announced a renewal of its long-standing deal with Twitter to include tweets in Bing’s search results. The Bing-Twitter partnership began in 2009 and was renewed in 2011. Tweets are primarily available and searchable at Bing’s social search page, bing.com/social, but they’re also showing up in Bing’s main search results.

The idea that made Google the world’s greatest search engine was all Larry Page and Sergey Brin. But the idea that set it on the path to becoming the world’s greatest company wasn’t theirs originally. It was borrowed, with some key modifications, from their biggest early rival.

Google has unveiled an upgrade to the way it interprets users' search requests. The new algorithm, codenamed Hummingbird, is the first major upgrade for three years. It has already been in use for about a month, and affects about 90% of Google searches.

Microsoft's Bing search engine has become the first to introduce pop-up warnings for people in the UK who seek out online images of child abuse.

15% of internet usage is done on a mobile device, and that's expected to climb to 20% by the end of 2013. Review the facts to build the best mobile site you can, whether it's a separate mobile site, a responsive site, or a combination of the two.

So here we are again huh? It was just a matter of time. There's been a lot of chatter recently (what took 'em so long?) about guest posting as a means for getting links. Much of it revolves around the fact that Google is seemingly cracking down on it...

It might be the world's most popular search engine, but here are 10 other surprising facts about Google.