Computing Hot Topic

Computing Reviews, an online archive of published reviews on the newest material related to computing, has published its latest Hot Topic. Hot Topics focus on new ideas within the genre and are available online. From the press release, the newest release is described as follows:

Written by Dennis Fetterly of Microsoft Research, this Hot Topic essay focuses on how search engine results can be manipulated by content providers. By using methods such as adding unrelated content to meta tags, duplicating information, and cloaking content so it is indexed differently, Web pages can improve their result rankings. While the economic incentive for achieving high rankings is significant, manipulated results undermine the trust of millions of users. Fetterly suggests research into link-based spam detection and the identification of spam blogs, and advocates the development of a clear set of rules for search engines.

Access is available at http://www.reviews.com/hottopic/hottopic_essay_06.cfm