MSN Live Search is definitely catching up. It has a pretty decent site index and cache, a nifty IP search tool (just type in ip:ip.address.here in the search box), and a nifty way of seeing your backlinks using linkdomain:site.com. (Anyone want to add some more to this budding flower?)

The most recent addition to live.com seems to be its linkfromdomain:site.com functionality. This feature allows users to see what kind of outbound links are on your site.

This is a great tool for webmasters and SEOs to get an idea of what your competitors are linking to. Furthermore, it’s a great tool to detect which sites have relevance to the same topic you may be working on.

First, it was blogging in motion which first place out of 54 teams in Yahoo!’s Hack Day. The concept was a purse equipped with a camera phone that would upload pictures to Flickr based on the number of steps you’d take (yes, it is equipped with a pedometer as well).

Then, Google bought YouTube in a tremendous 1.65 billion dollar investment, indicating that video is the beginning of a new era in social marketing.

Yahoo! jumped in the game and opened submissions for a time capsule, allowing users to submit writings, artwork, photos, and videos.

And now, Pure Digital is jumping on the game by allowing users to upload their video to Google at the push of a button. Even more video sharing is imminent.

Sounds like video networkingis the new phenomenon? You’re probably right. And with API access to Flickr and YouTube, a programmer can easily get on the bandwagon before the market grows with other competing startups.

The blogosphere is big enough for people who can share their writings, but also to share familiar sights and sounds. Social marketing is taking a turn into the multimedia realm, and it’s going at full-speed.

Big bucks for anyone who posts their reviews on products or services for ReviewMe. Aaron Wall of SEOBook has partnered with Andy Hagans and the concept is something out of a marketer’s dream (and a shopper’s, too!)

ReviewMe is not yet launched but is expected to be up within the month. Bloggers will get paid to write unbiased reviews on products or services, and they will get paid to do so, no matter which way they swing their opinion. The advertisers pay, and the bloggers get to disclose that they are reviewing the product or service available.

What’s the result? More exposure to products and more honesty with fat payouts!

Update 11/9: ReviewMe was launched today, but my blog missed the mark due to not meeting minimum acceptance criteria. I’m working on that readership as this blog is still new, so I will review ReviewMe when I get a chance, and that will hopefully be soon!

I don’t know why, but I still use Hotmail as my primary email provider (well, 97% of all my Internet accounts are tied to my Hotmail address). I’ve had a few gripes with spam management, primarily in Microsoft’s inability to whitelist email address that I time and time again continually add to my whitelist. (I have my spam protection on low, but apparently that’s an abnormal thing to do because everytime I go to my Junk Email folder, Microsoft asks me if I’m sure I want to stay on that setting.)

Perhaps Microsoft finally decided to roll out something that will improve upon its lousy spam data mining algorithms, or it was more concerned about making an enhanced GUI that likens Microsoft to Gmail and Yahoo! mail (both of which are superior, and the latter of which is in its own beta program as well).

In any event, the new interface feels like Outlook Web Access, a feature for Microsoft Exchange. Fortunately, it also feels like OWA for Exchange 2003.

I’ll play around with it a little more and give my opinion, but so far, I am beginning to like this new interface and only hope Microsoft can fix their spam detection; it’s worse than having no spam protection at all!

There has been a lot of controversy in terms of SEO lately. First, there’s this scathing article by Daniel Dessinger about the SEO industry, which prompted a lot of questions, many of whom are wondering if Daniel is on the money, or at least close, but others who have tried to invalidate the claim. I give Rand another thumbs up in terms of his excellent refutation, but I can’t help but wonder from the standpoint of a SEO newbie (if I’ve even made it there yet): with more people like me who have the interest in SEO, will the market get oversaturated?

Let me rephrase the question. As more and more people become more educated with what makes a good SEO, we can face two dilemmas:

1. There will be more Aaron Walls, Barry Schwartzes, Danny Sullivans, and Rand Fishkins in the world. Will the industry be able to handle them all? Better yet, is there even room for newcomers to move up?
2. Is the current industry too competitive? Will more and more people get better at SEO, forcing it to collapse entirely? Will the exposure of more and more individuals to correct SEO strategies ultimately cause the SEO as we know it to change — possibly to even eliminate it?