A Spot of International SEO News

Well, I was off this past week, so it’s time to catch up on the news and bring you some of the highlights that happened with the search engines at home and abroad:

• Google linking to free music in China. Everyone knows that Baidu is China’s biggest search engine, with about 60% of the market; Google has only 28%.  In an effort to capture more market and take advantage of the “phenomenal popularity of free music downloads,” Google’s new service “allows Chinese consumers to search for music, link to a Beijing company called Top100.cn, and download licensed music from that Chinese site, which has signed contracts with the music industry.” [Via the NY Times]
• Canadians love their social media. According to a new eMarketer report, Canada has an internet penetration of 69% and 80% of internet users spend at least an hour online a day.  Just under half spend more than three hours online.  But with the explosion of social media, Canadians are seeing their numbers of personal profiles explode as well.  The average internet user has seven profiles.  No wonder so many are finding it hard to keep up with each profile and network.  Hopefully, more will discover online productivity tools that will help them to aggregate and organize their online life.  What are some of your favorites?
• Moblie counts for 3/4 of the world’s messaging. The emergence of cell phones in developing countries and the abandonment of land line phones let to some astonishing growth in the mobile market. In January, 74% of messages were sent by mobile phone (up 15% from a year ago).  In emerging markets, that figure jumps to 90%.  In developed countries, the computer remains the most popular messaging tool, but that is slowly declining as well.  As more smartphones enter the market and costs continue to fall, more users will join the ranks of the 69% of North Americans using email daily on their phone.
• New insight into Singapore’s internet usage. ComScore has just published new figures highlighting the online habits of Singapore.  This tiny city state in SE Asia has 2.5 million online (out of a total population of 4.86 million), with an average time spent online of 21 hours per person in February.  According the report, “high broadband penetration, heavy engagement and the overall tech savvy of Internet users in Singapore make it an ideal market for the adoption of valuable existing and emerging digital technologies, including search, social media and online video.”  Singapore is already one of the world’s top business hubs.  Will it become a top Internet hub as well?  What do you think?
• Italy testing wireless broadband. Italian provider Aria is testing WIMAX, Italy’s first wireless broadband system in the mountainous region of Umbria.  In an area where traditional cables and fibre optics aren’t easily feasable, this is a great place to test the abilities and ruggedness of wireless broadband equipment and signals.  Hopefully it will go well and that WIMAX technology will soon be expanding.
• And for a bit of fun…Rand from SEOmoz recently went to Iceland for the Reykjavik Internet Marketing Conference.  He wrote a recap of his time and provided some pictures he took while out and about exploring Iceland’s stunning scenery.  Take a look and start planning your Icelandic adventure!

Happy Monday!