If you haven't already heard, Google's Matt Cutts and Bing's Duane Forrester recently did a SXSW session with Danny Sullivan where they addressed questions from the audience. About 1/3 of the way into the audio though, Matt let slip a comment about an upcoming rankings change designed to target "Over Optimization" in an attempt to .

"Why are our hamburgers square? Because we don't cut corners." - Dave Thomas A long time ago I did an article on my personal blog comparing airline cuts to the fast food industry. I accused them of using something I call sesame seed economics. Three years later I'm still seeing that type of thought process .

By now you've most assuredly read about the Google Chrome fiasco. You know that Google threw Essence, their video ad agency, under the proverbial bus. You've probably even read that Google gave themselves a penalty and reduced the PageRank of the chrome page. They also removed all of the sponsored posts and admitted responsibility. In .

There's been a lot of fearmongering talk lately about Google's human quality raters and just exactly what they're used for and how their ratings are used internally at Google. Discussion was running rampant at Pubcon where I witnessed several SEOs grill Matt Cutts about the subject, and seems to have spread like wildfire across the .

Hey #pubconners it's snacktime again so that means I'm doing what everybody else is - rushing to the conference room so I can snag a seat next to a power outlet. A snack sounds good though, so if you're coming to salon F I'm at the last row of tables and I've saved a seat )and a power outlet( for whoever brings me a tasty treat. If you bring me 2 treats I might even give you link "> here.

Welcome back to #pubcon. It's been a long night playing blackjack )and an even longer night playing craps after that( but we're back and semi-conscious enough to jump back into it. Up next is the Convergence of analytics and SEO featuring Alan K'necht, Tom Critchlow, and Mark Knowles. We're going to try something new this time and attempt to use my CoverItLive subscription. Here goes nothing. Crap this isn't working.

Ok guys and #girlsofpubcon Here's the session you've been waiting for. Black Hat Tactics and and Preventative Measures with Ziv Dascalu - and if you don't get here in the next minute or so you won't have a seat.

Welcome back to day 2 of #pubcon liveblog coverage. There's a lot of rocking sessions going on right now and it was extremely tough to choose between this one with Kate Morris and Joanna Lord, Chris Winfield's session or the algorithm proofing session going on. To be honest, I couldn't really pick so I chose the one with the open electrical outlet and it just happened to be Salon B - also, there's still an opening here so if you need power come hang out.

Up next we've got the enterprise level local search panel with Brian MacDonald, Will Scott, Chris Tolles, Alan Bleiweiss, and Arnie Kuenn.

Welcome back to Pubcon! Lunch is )almost( over and everybody's heading back to the sessions. First up is the state of personalized search with Brian Combs, Greg Boser, and Christine Churchill. It's scheduled for 1:30 but we're starting late due to lunch stragglers. Brian is up first. 6 months ago he said we were at a crossroad, but it's more like a maze. Things are changing. In fact,

Is it just me or has Google's panda update become the scapegoat for poor SEO? It seems like every day I come across an article where some website I've never heard of is blaming Panda for a loss of traffic/revenue/rankings and crying about how Google is unfair. If you are thinking about calling the New York Times or complaining to congress about your site's rankings, STOP. It is NOT Google's fault your site isn't useful.

I hate the term "Mobile SEO." What exactly is it? Besides being a buzzword thrown around at every conference, seminar, and new business pitch it's a topic that nobody seems able to accurately explain. Google it; the results are all over the place. In a perfect world, there would be no need for mobile SEO at all. It's an emerging topic that, thanks to smart phones, is dying off quicker than it emerges. Like most buzz words though,