If single web sites begin to pale because users are pulling data from RSS-type Yahoo feeds instead of visiting them, then advertisers on those single sites are going to see diminishing returns, and demand for online ads will falter. Who will want the “long tail” of vast ad networks if traffic is dying?

Let me explain another way: Yahoo, by limiting click-throughs to other sites, raises its own prominence as a portal. The only way you can thus get a clicks from Yahoo is by paying, so the demand for Yahoo’s ad inventory will rise.

Put it together and this may not be about providing more in-depth results for searchers at Yahoo. It may be Yahoo’s way of making its ad slots more attractive than those lousy competitors it has to pass traffic along to. Why give customers, and the advertisers chasing them, away when you can try to keep them all to yourself?

The irony is deep: A search engine stops searchers from searching further, and thus increases its value to advertisers searching for searchers.

Seriously though, I know this is a scary thought for many companies i.e. the dis-intermediation of content from corporate websites. As you point out in your post, however, if this is done right (and correctly branded) companies could benefit from much greater distribution IF they create good content.

Keep the good stuff coming!

Best,
Aaron (@astrout)

Thank you for your concise and moving pitch for integrating microformats. I am very interested to see how this changes searches.

Keep up the good work, Chris.

Personalized search, human-powered search and ideas not yet conceived will replace search as we know it today.

Nothing stands still, certainly not in cyberspace. Adapt or die.