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YouTube Passes Yahoo As #2 Search Engine

Posted by timothy on from the your-safe-search-is-showing dept.

Dekortage writes "According to the latest ComScore rankings, YouTube's search traffic for August surpassed Yahoo's. The latter dropped roughly 5% in traffic from July. Among other things, this means that Google now owns both of the top two search engines. AdAge further speculates on Google's experimental 'promoted videos' cost-per-click advertising on YouTube, suggesting the obvious: more money."

19 of 125 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah, but... by InvisblePinkUnicorn · · Score: 4, Interesting

    But how much of this is RIAA/MPAA-run robots searching for song/movie names?

  2. "Search engine"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Calling YouTube a "search engine" by comparison to Google and Yahoo is...interesting. I mean, I guess it's technically true, but it's about as relevant as comparing Google with Slashdot site search.

    1. Re:"Search engine"? by PitaBred · · Score: 4, Interesting

      A lot of people search the videos for information, talks by Richard Dawkins, car reviews, whatever. I think it's perfectly valid to call Youtube a search engine, even though it's a very specialized one.

      --
      My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
    2. Re:"Search engine"? by corsec67 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Would "grep" be considered a search engine, then?

      I use it to find stuff at work all the time.

      --
      If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
    3. Re:"Search engine"? by DancesWithBlowTorch · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's a rubbish use of the term. I guess Amazon might even be a bigger search engine than YouTube. Some of the big DNS servers are probably pretty big search engines as well.

      What a useless way of using words.

    4. Re:"Search engine"? by jonbryce · · Score: 4, Insightful

      video.google.com might be a search engine, because it can find videos from multiple sites, but mainly its own and youtube, but youtube is just a website with a search facility.

    5. Re:"Search engine"? by 4D6963 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      By that standard any site with a search feature is a search engine. A search engine is really something that provides search results from other sites, not its own site.

      --
      You just got troll'd!
    6. Re:"Search engine"? by Rary · · Score: 5, Insightful

      youtube is just a website with a search facility.

      Google is also a website with a search facility.

      YouTube is a website with the ability to search its content. Google is a website with the ability to search other sites' content.

      Basically, Google is a search engine, and YouTube has a search engine.

      --

      "You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein

  3. YouTube is not a search engine by alex_vegas · · Score: 5, Insightful

    People who search on yahoo are not looking to stay at yahoo. People who search at youtube are looking to stay at youtube. This story is bogus.

    1. Re:YouTube is not a search engine by ajs · · Score: 4, Funny

      I actually search for all of my Web needs on YouTube first. I find that it really reduces the number of Wikipedia links I have to surf past ;-)

    2. Re:YouTube is not a search engine by Facegarden · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The story isn't bogus... If a general purpose search site that searches the whole web, and used to be number one, now gets fewer searches than a single-purpose video search site, it really underscores how low yahoo has fallen!
      -Taylor

      --
      Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
    3. Re:YouTube is not a search engine by Rary · · Score: 4, Informative

      People who search on yahoo are not looking to stay at yahoo. People who search at youtube are looking to stay at youtube. This story is bogus.

      It should be pointed out that the article doesn't call YouTube a search engine. It lists rankings of the 5 major search engines, then it does a separate ranking of "search activity", which includes any kind of searching within a website, and includes such searchable sites as MapQuest, MySpace, and Amazon.

      --

      "You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein

  4. Competition by Wiarumas · · Score: 4, Insightful

    But is YouTube in competition with Yahoo? This is apples and oranges. Nothing to see here folks, move along.

    --
    I will bend like a reed in the wind.
    1. Re:Competition by hansraj · · Score: 5, Funny

      But is YouTube in competition with Yahoo? This is apples and oranges.

      I say that comparing the comparison of yahoo with youtube to that of apples and oranges is comparing apples with oranges!

      -------
      I wish I had something useful to say.

  5. Without porn?!? HOW??? by philspear · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm inclined to doubt this. Youtube doesn't host any porn. That's easily 70% of the internet right there.

    You mean to tell me that people are now more interested in videos of people getting hit in the nuts and TV clips that are not SNL or daily show than they are in sex? LIES!

  6. What? by clarkkent09 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When I am on Youtube I typically perform several searches and stay on Youtube the whole time. On the other hand when I go to a search engine I typically perform one search and click on one of the results and leave the search site. As somebody else pointed out the media company bots must be constantly searching Youtube for certain keywords to identify copyright violations. The whole comparison is nonsense.

    Last I heard Yahoo still beats both Google and Youtube in total number of unique visitors and that is the stat that matters to advertisers.

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  7. Re:Without porn?!? HOW??? by Wescotte · · Score: 5, Informative

    There is a special keyword to use on youtube to get to the porn section. You must not have elite access. Just email them asking for elite access with a hacker resume of sorts and you should be able to gain access. Just keep it on the down low though.

  8. Re:Without porn?!? HOW??? by melstav · · Score: 5, Informative

    If porn is what you're looking for, there are sites very similar to YouTube where that's all they do.

    http://www.youporn.com
    http://www.pornotube.com

    Just to provide two examples.

  9. Re:Not Suprising..... by Futil3 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A picture says more than a thousand words...