Comments for Yahoo Inserts Facebook Profiles Into Search Results

Yahoo Inserts Facebook Profiles Into Search Results

2009-02-26T17:22:25Z

Google may be outperforming Yahoo Search in terms of market share, but with programs like Search Monkey and BOSS (Build Your Own Search Service), Yahoo is still trying to innovate in the search space. Today, Yahoo announced a new feature that integrates Yahoo Search with some of Facebook's core functions. Whenever you see a Facebook profile in your search results, you can now directly add somebody as a friend, send messages, see their friends, or poke them.

]]> ~~In order for this to work, you have to first activate the Facebook SearchMonkey app and be signed in to Facebook~~. Update: The SearchMonkey app is actually turned on by default for all Yahoo Search users now (but you can opt out at any time).

After that, whenever a Facebook profile appears in your search results, it will include this person's public profile picture, as well as an additional line with the basic Facebook commands (add friend, poke, send message, view friends). According to Yahoo, Facebook shared this structured data with the SearchMonkey app by adding semantic markup to its public profile pages.

Maybe more importantly, though, features like this show that there is still a lot of life left in Yahoo Search. As Marshall Kirkpatrick noted a few weeks ago, things may not be looking too rosy for Yahoo in business terms, but the company is at least trying out a lot of cool search-related technologies.

Comment from Alan Rawlings on 2010-11-11

2010-11-11T15:46:31Z

Going forward, I see Facebook developing a serious play on search given the vast amounts of shared data they process each month.

Ideally they should develop a browser toolbar that features integrated search and other social functions such as 'liking' and sharing.

The Open Graph API has already been widely used by third parties such as http://www.facebooksearch.us to develop innovative search tools and services.

Comment from business educators on 2010-04-20

2010-04-20T14:15:53Z

I have to say I am not very happy because of that but some people I know find it very useful. I don't like the idea that everyone who writes my name in Yahoo! will now find my account and the photo I don't necessarily want to show to all the people.

Comment from Devashena on 2010-03-23

2010-03-23T08:48:58Z

Comment from Ajay on 2009-11-25

2009-11-25T15:25:11Z

It doesn't appear anymore?

Comment from Sara on 2009-08-25

2009-08-25T14:53:27Z

Does anyone know if this is only for regular profiles or if this is for fan pages and groups as well?

Comment from odame julius on 2009-05-28

2009-05-28T08:33:54Z

yahoo is too great,i love to be in yahoo,find me a match

Comment from ACTransport on 2009-03-14

2009-03-15T02:48:41Z

Yahoo rocks. I can't wait for the day that it overtakes google.

Comment from Karina on 2009-03-09

2009-03-09T09:02:23Z

for me, this is "big brother wathing you" total!!!!

Comment from aaronhockley.com on 2009-02-27

2009-02-27T19:18:43Z

Yahoo thinks that "poking" needs to be on search results pages? Yikes.

Comment from prem ypi on 2009-02-27

2009-02-27T10:11:18Z

This is really interesting. Yahoo! is still trying new strategies to get into sub domains of search market.

I am yet to find facebook profile on yahoo search, but glue is already rocking!

Comment from James on 2009-02-26

2009-02-27T02:44:10Z

This was an interesting article on Yahoo's strategy utilizing Search Monkey and Boss. It's interesting and has a degree of interactivity between systems as demonstrated by the login choices given as options prior to logging in. When facebook connect was chosen it put the comment window here to be filled in, but additionally the line in the instructions about the option has strike through the text.
This is the actual text and strike through copied and pasted in for your viewing:
"In order for this to work, you have to first activate the Facebook SearchMonkey app and be signed in to Facebook."

The video was entertaining, but a little out of character for a media giant. Very Folksy though! :)

Comment from Paul on 2009-02-26

2009-02-27T00:22:18Z

Thanks for the great press RWW. Its always nice to see other people care as much about SearchMonkey as we do.

On a side note, if anyone that can ACTUALLY sing wants to redo the audio on the video, I'll send you the karaoke version of the song :)

Paul Tarjan
(|): Chief Technical Monkey :(|)

Comment from graham mudd on 2009-02-26

2009-02-26T23:13:45Z

Thanks Frederic! We're really excited about where SearchMonkey is headed and we appreciate as always RWW's support for open standards.

Cheers,
Graham Mudd

Comment from Adsense on 2009-02-26

2009-02-26T22:59:18Z

Comment from Frederic Lardinois on 2009-02-26

2009-02-26T18:51:02Z

Kevin - you are correct. I just updated the post. The FB searchmonkey app is actually now turned on for all users by default.

Comment from Kevin on 2009-02-26

2009-02-26T18:40:18Z

This feature was already turned on for me by default (i could opt OUT from the search-monkey options). This auto opt-in was how I felt Yahoo! portrayed it in their blog post