Five things worth sharing from the last week or so, brought to you by a different member of the Browser Media team every Friday.
This week’s My Five is by Will.
1. Google’s Webspam Report 2019
Preventing webspam from appearing in search results is one of Google’s toughest tasks. Each year the search giant releases an overview of how they fought spam in the previous year to help support the webmaster community, here are some of the highlights of 2019.
With billions of pages indexed and countless search queries being carried out every day it’s impossible to combat all spam. This is highlighted in the fact that over 25 billion (25,000,000,000) pages discovered each day are considered to be spam. While that may sound a lot, according to Google over 99% of visits from their results pages are spam-free.
The main difficulties and problems for Google came from spam links, however, they are taking steps to manage the issue. Google’s systems have captured over 90% of spam links including paid links or link exchanges. Ultimately, they are taking great strides to reduce the amount of spam appearing in SERPs.
Check out the full report here for more information.
2. Twitter is challenging retweets
Be honest, how many times have you retweeted a link or post without actually reading the full thing? Hopefully, it’s not a common occurrence, but by the looks of Twitter’s newest potential feature, it looks to be a serious problem.
Twitter is rolling out a prompt, on Android only initially, that will ask users if they are retweeting a link without actually opening it. Kayvon Beykpour, product chief at Twitter, provides a perfect explanation of why this new feature is so crucial.
It’s easy for links/articles to go viral on Twitter. This can be powerful but sometimes dangerous, especially if people haven’t read the content they’re spreading. This feature (on Android for now) encourages people to read a linked article prior to Retweeting it. https://t.co/qdYZ8w9e27
— Kayvon Beykpour (@kayvz) June 10, 2020
Personally, I think it’s a brilliant addition and something the platform is screaming out for due to the conversational nature of Twitter. The feature is currently being tested on Android and there’s no indication of when it will be fully rolled out, but below is an example of how the feature will look.
3. Netflix is suing the US Army
No, you didn’t read that wrong, Netflix and the US Army have been in a legal battle over the trademark of the term Spaceforce. The Netflix original comedy Space Force, based around the new branch of the military launched by Trump secured the naming rights before the US government.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office typically grants trademarks based on a “first-to-use” basis and with Netflix filing for the trademark as early as January they pipped the government to the post. Whether there will actually be any confusion between the two is unlikely and the US military isn’t too concerned about it.
4. #BikeIsBest
So the challenge this week was to write a coronavirus free My Five, and although this is a result of lockdown, I’m not counting it so I’m chalking it up as a success.
During lockdown, a lot of the population have increased the amount of exercise they are doing to fill their days. Whether it’s a home workout, running, or just getting out in the fresh air for a walk. Cycling is a pastime that has become extremely popular over the past few months, I got sucked in to purchasing a bike and it’s the best thing I’ve done!
This week a group of cycling companies have teamed up to help inspire the new cyclists by creating a brand-neutral campaign – #BikeIsBest. The campaign aims to take what has become the ‘new normal’ during lockdown and turn it into the everyday once we are ‘back to normal’ (if that will ever happen). I personally think it’s a great idea; where possible, get out in the fresh air, and do some exercise – it’s a win-win!
5. How to kill five minutes
If you’re looking for a light-hearted way to waste a bit of time, then Twitter is usually the go-to place. In today’s episode of how can you spend too much time on Twitter looking at pointless things, I present you with a challenge… find the cat!
Today in find the cat pic.twitter.com/P6soGOv8k1
— Kate Hinds (@katehinds) June 7, 2020
No cheating!!
