Last I checked, a web page had to be on the web in order for Google to crawl the page and serve it up in search results.  But then how does it crawl iTunes?

On a recent search for “implus iphone application” I came across the iTunes store page ranked at #8 in Google.

Yes, the iTunes Store may be built on WebKit, or some sort of web application on the back end, but how exactly does Google get there?  Does the Googlebot run iTunes?  Ohh there is a possibility.

I finally dug into GA? and figured out how to take it to the next level!

GA? now checks the entire HTML page to see if it contains Google Analytics code.  Prior to 1.0, it only checked for analytics code within the body of a page.

GA? is a Firefox extension that automatically detects if Google Analytics is installed on a web page and displays the result in your status bar.  For more details see the GA? - Is Google Analytics Installed page.

GA? is also ready for Firefox 3.

Ever want to search Plurk.com for topics or friends?  Well there isn’t a formal search yet, however you can search with Plurk Lurker, a customized Google search just for Plurk.com.

Plurk Lurker makes it quick and simple to find information on Plurk.  It is limited to what Google can see, but it’s better than nothing.  You can find posts or users as long as their information is public.

Granted, it’s pretty basic but it’s better than none; which is what I’ve found otherwise.  I’m sure as soon as an API opens up, someone will create a better Plurk search.

A few weeks ago I took control over my email.  Not only did I clean out my inboxes, but I also converted everything over to Gmail.  Why would I do this?

1. Always online and availabe to me.
2. Doesn’t take up space on my webserver.
3. The labeling system is fantastic.  I didn’t really know this until I really started using it.
4. Integrated nicely with Mail.app or other email applications like Thunderbird and Outlook.
5. I can send and receive email from multiple accounts via one Gmail account.
6. iPhone ready.
7. Email is up even if website is down.

Since I’ve made the switch from Thunderbird to Entourage 2008, one of my missing features is the ability to sync with Google calendar.

I tried using Plaxo, but they sync to your main Google calendar and not any others. This may work well if you only have one Google calendar to sync with, but that wasn’t my case.

I thought about some of the tools like Spanning Sync and gSync but Spanning says it doesn’t work right with Entourage and gSync doesn’t say anything. You’d think that since Entourage syncs with iCal, that it wouldn’t be that hard.

It shouldn’t bother me, and it really doesn’t, but I’ve been #3 in Google for Thomas McMahon for years now. I’m being beat out by a dead guy; twice.

Granted, I think that even being dead, he’s got better link love. He’s a Harvard grad that has written eighty scientific papers, two scientific books, had six inventions patented, and published three novels. Yea, well I’ve created like eight Firefox themes.

If you’d like to help me beat out Thomas McMahon (Harvard guy) in Google searches, link back to this post (or www.twistermc.com) with ‘Thomas McMahon’ as your link text. If you want to vote for the other guy, well that’s just rude.

A new version of Gmail is available. The only thing different I can see is a robust address book.

It also warns users if they have Firebug enabled. Yikes!

Have you seen any other improvements or changes?

Check your Gmail account now and you’ll know if your in the new version if in the upper right corner, after settings, there is a link that say “Old Version.” Clicking it will take you back to the old version and a “New Version” link will appear.

I’m still hunting for new more features.

The new version of GA? has been released. The Google Analytics detector now re-checks each page as you switch between tabs to ensure the status bar icon is kept up to date. This was a big enhancement for me as I’ve always got multiple tabs open.

However, with advancements comes a few more bug reports.

1. GA? doesn’t update the status bar icon when switching between windows . Actually this may be a non issue. I’m still thinking that one over.

Google Analytics is a great program, but add in Adobe AIR and it becomes even better with the Google Analytics Reporting Suite module. It’s a stand alone application that gives you direct access into your Google Analytics account with a few great features thrown in.

The first thing I love is the ability to have multiple profiles.

I have a handful of profiles and where as switching between each one isn’t to difficult in Google Analytics, it is a bit tedious. With Google Analytics Reporting Suite, I can save profiles (aka bookmarks) for each account I want to access. Then I just double click and I’m in. No more having to load the GA website, enter a password, choose a profile then a site and then getting to the stats. This is just so much simpler.

YouTube has long been the goto place to find anything you missed from TV, or just to watch things you’d never see on TV. However, lately, it just seems like it’s being spammed more and more.

In this example, I searched for Carrie Underwood and got a bit of spam instead.

Since YouTube is owned by Google, you’d think they could detect this. Tons of keywords strung together should be pretty easy to detect. Or what about noticing that a video is tagged with nude or porn but it’s not marked as adult? How hard would it be to detect that? Or what about videos that have the same title, same description, same running time and that were uploaded at the same time? Can we say duplicate content? It seems Google’s SEO rules are not in play at YouTube.