Danny Sullivan was in town over the weekend and on Saturday night, Vanessa Fox from Sitemaps invited Mystery Guest and me over to Google's Kirkland offices. We had a ton of fun and got to meet some new (and very friendly) Googlers. Just a few photos:
Mystery Guest and Danny share a Diet Dr. Pepper in the movie room
Danny authors Google's to-do list for the next week
The final list included the first 9 from me and 10-13 from Danny:
- Re-institute accurate "link:" command
- Add action tracking to Google Analytics
- Dis-mantle new Google-bomb protection algo
- New logo for Groundhog day
- Add true PageRank data to Sitemaps console
- Ban Digg.com from index (just to mess with Rose's head)
- Make results numbers precise(ish)
- Remove PageRank from the toolbar
- Change anchor text for title use to use any random anchor text
- Make site: command show all subdomains once again
- Ban SERoundtable.com just to mess with Barry's head
- Frame all Wikipedia links so clickthrough shows page with AdSense alongside
- Onebox to show alternative porn listings for any search
From left to right: Matt, Amanda, Vanessa, Trevor, Rand, Susan & Danny
Thanks a ton, Vanessa and crew. Let me know when I can return the favor at SEOmoz :)
Vanessa is pretty :)
yeah,i also like writing something on my whiteboard. maybe the job of next weeks, maybe the funny thought.next week, so much news would come out, good job
Alternative porn listing for all searches...
What would come up if you tried Search Engine Optimisation?
Something like this: :)
UK Road Trips Follow Marino and his motley crew on sex adventures through Enland! www.*******.com
It's amazing to see the pictures of the Googlers. I hope someday I will be a part of this great team :)
Psst.. if it's possible please don't remove Google Pagerank from the toolbar because it's very useful. thanks.
Greetings great whiteboard to do list there is a tiny bit of room left on the bottom for'fix links to your site data display' in web mustering tools :)) u know so we get all of them not just 4 out of 20! Course there might even be room for "develop the new 'Google Boutique' version of the search baby. Great stuff here folks and fun to read. Thanks.
I was recently at the Google Hyderabad Office and to be frank these offices have such a great ambience that i felt to close my web development office and join google as a adwords quality test representative :D, seriously how do guys work at google at such a nice place.
Wow, if I'd known my photo was going up on such a reputable forum I might have worn something a bit more low-cut. :)
It was great to get to meet you, Danny and Mystery Guest... hope we can do it again some time! (But maybe with the X-Files next time... I dunno if I could take another 4 hours of hellmouths.)
Congrats on your engagement, BTW!!
-Susan
Bah - I still find toolbar pagerank useful, at least for a few days after it is updated.
It gives you a nice overview of how well you are treating your old content with your relevant LSI based internal linking structure.
It isn't a professional tool, but the vast majority of webmasters don't need a professional tool to spot their devalued pages. It would be more beneficial if the export included all pages.
what worries me is that all the Googlers look very similar. Are they all brothers and sisters?
Is Google cloning their own Googlers in some freaky Matrix scenario...Mowhahahhaha...
Cute list. Time to press the delete key on Search Engine Land. ;-)
See that look on my face? That's the look of adoration - of absolute bliss. Because Danny Sullivan has his arm around me. Cry yourselves to sleep as you try to console your breaking hearts, ladies. That's what I'd do if I wasn't me. (p.s. - despite snowboarding all day, he smelled awesome. Like fresh pine and old Scotch. Cry, ladies. Cry.)
He's married mystery guest, he's married :)
Speaking of which... Where are you Lorna? The blog world needs you! I promise that if you leave a comment, we'll print it out, frame it on the wall and treasure it forever.
He's married? Nooooooooo!!!!!! (Actually, I knew that. It's the reason I cry myself to sleep each night. That, and my fear of mummies.)
Wow... I was looking at that photo and was thinking - "I don't think she wants to be there".
Then after reading your recent comment, I realized that it wasn't necessarily YOU in the picture that looked wrong... it was him.
Ack, for god sakes. Those are the guys I chase outa the bar with my wailing guitar solo's. hahahahha
If I lost a hottie like you to someone like that, I would cry myself to sleep. =)
Hear that, Danny? It's the sound of the Internet's population (channeled through Mr. Stitch) declaring Mystery Guest to be out of your league. Don't stand for it!
Actually, Danny's on a plane back to the UK right now, so it might be a while before he responds.
OMFGAM!! I'm SO scared.
WHAHHAHHAHAHHA ROFL
Well, I do some SEO... and I am single... *cough*
Admit it, you were just reaching round the back to get to that pack of salt and vinegar kettle chips ;)
Rand, I noticed you left Danny very little space for his section of the to-do list on the whiteboard... almost like you purposely started the list halfway down so that YOU and not HE would be telling Google what to do. Should we read anything into that in a competitive sense re: Mystery Guest? ;)
j/k. Looks like you guys had a ton of fun.
In the last pic... why does Rand have an evil grin? ...And what is he covering with his hands?
Haha, he totally does look like a little kid with a big secret, like he's holding a frog that he just caught and wants to stick it in Google's hair.
I think he's just smitten to sit at Vanessa's feet...
I'm so distracted by Danny I didn't even notice Rand. Why is Danny wearing two sets of pants? Is everyone in the picture wearing two sets of pants?
Hmm, there also appears to be some blue peeking out from under his shirt, as well. Perhaps he's wearing a full length Danny Sullivan blue body suit? I'm so confused.
Don't you wish you were cool enough to wear two sets of pants? I know I do ;)
I'm guessing that connects to the aforementioned snowboarding. Apparently, Danny came straight from the slopes.
I knew that wearing a double layer of brightly-colored socks and positioning them so that they were both perfectly scrunched and visible was cool, but I had no idea this extended to pants. I must go shopping!
Rand slipped a copy of Google's algo under his shirt >:-)
I wonder if he got out of the building with it?
Must have... SEOmoz has moved up for "SEO"!
At least now we have an idea what will be part of the new "paid" content ;)
Ohhhhhhhhhhh it must be fun to be with google. So sad i am not there :(
Most of us Mozzers missed out on the Sullivan/Google Kirkland fun, since we were up in Whistler over the weekend ineptly snowboarding down the mountain. Vanessa and Danny, don't think we snubbed you!
It's amazing how such a bunch of geeks together have such an impact on the search world :)