When Google's Hot Trends are really hot

There really must have been a surge in traffic for this particular keyword that made Hot Trends slip, as Google does its best job in keeping "unethical" searches off its suggested search terms, related searches, or in this case the Hot Trends. If it wouldn't do this we all know what would be the hottest searched keyword on Google (starts with "s" and ends with "ex").

Live Search gains in simplicity over Google Search

The Live Search design team has been playing around with a new interface for both the main Live Search page and the Live Search results page, and I must say that they're not doing a bad job. While Google always primed over MSN (now Live) and Yahoo in terms of a simple interface, I must say that Live Search is better - at least from this point of view. See below a comparison between the main Google Search interface and the Live Search interface:

I told you, while the Live Search page shows you only the search box and a link here and there way at the top (or bottom) of the main page, Google Search shows way too many links closer to the search box giving you the impression of a crowded place. As for the search results page, Live Search wins again:

Live Search results page

Google Search results page

While the Live Search page is still undergoing design changes (sometimes you can see a Change setting checkbox) I must say that I like the direction they're going. Unlike Google that seems to want to make you use iGoogle more than the main search page, Live Search chooses simplicity.

Google News offers related news searches

When searching for a keyword in Google News you'll see (if you scroll all the way down) a list of related news searches. This is a new feature that will suggest other search terms based on some automated algorithms, making sometimes connections between specific stories. Example, searching for guns will show the following related searches:

This related news searches feature also shows connections where you wouldn't think there would be any. For instance one of the suggested related searches for guns is OJ Simpson - because he was accused of robbery with a firearm - so Google News already made a connection between guns and the robbery. Plus, Las Vegas hotel is mentioned there too, because that's where the assumed robbery took place. Smart isn't it.

Doing another search for Obama, Google News shows these related searches:

The related searches seem somehow normal, however only 2 of the six related searches actually contain the keyword Obama. I know that people searching for Obama are interested in news about Hillary and McCain, but why do these related searches on the Google News page are so different from those displayed on the normal Google Search page (see image below)?

On the normal Google Search page the related searches are actually popular keywords but closely related to the original keyword you used - however on the Google News page the related searches are keywords that are somehow related with the original keyword, but popular in the Google News search.
Here's an example, when doing a Google Search for Obama you see Obama Muslim as a related search. When doing a Google News search for Obama you don't see Obama Muslim as a related news search, mainly because the other related news searches are more popular than this one. So on Google News related searches primes the popularity in the News section, while on Google Search primes the connection with your original keyword.