It's almost time for the 2008 BlogWorld & New Media Expo . And yes, I will actually make it this year. Really. BlogWorld is happening September 20-21 (Executive and Entrepreneur option on the 19th) in wholesome Las Vegas, Nevada, at the Las Vegas Convention Center. You can check out the entire conference schedule here .

by Mike Krumboltz Think Harry Potter is over the hill? Think the boy wizard no longer garners fanaticism among his fans? Think again, muggle! Upon hearing that Warner Bros. would delay the release of the sixth film from November to June, fans turned to the Web to voice their displeasure in ALL CAPS. Warner Bros., eager to keep the herd of angry nerds from storming its gates, quickly responded. The president of the studio, Alan Horn,

Comscore has released figures showing that Google received a billion searches in June placing it number one with an 81% share. The largest local search engine was Rediff.com with a 1.5% share. India is a massive potential and growing market with 23 official languages but where English is the only lingua franca. Google Adwords is available in several - but by means all indian languages. via Searchengineland Google in India ,

Google may be the giant in the search industry, but they may have to much data to get you want you want to find. A previous session talked about semantic search and how it's being worked on, but if you can't wait, vertical search is something you can use today. Philip James from Snooth was the first presenter. He said that back when the web was smaller, regular search engines worked better as they had fewer pages to work with. Now, with trillions of pages,

For many business owners who have spent the better part of their business careers marketing offline through brochures and print ads the internet can look much like a foreign country. Most realize that the internet is very powerful and has to someday be approached but finding the time and knowledge on how to do it correctly is a task in itself. Pay Per Click advertising is one quick way to become visible very quickly but without the right guidance can be overwhelming.

Continuing the day's trend, I attended another landing page-related session to round out Day Two of SES San Jose. The Expert Roundtable brought together four 'knights' of landing page optimization, armed with their tips and tricks to achieving the 'holy grail' of pay per click ads: Landing Page Utopia. Moderator Ron Belanger, Vice President of Agency Development at Yahoo! Search Marketing, helmed this team of experts.

If you need to keep track of all latest news, rumors and (educated) theories behind Google penalties , you should frequent WebmasterWorld forum of course.

Vertical search seems to have been put on the back burner for many search marketers. With new buzz words like "Social Media" and "Local/Mobile Targeting", who could blame them? But let's not be so quick to forget about tried and true relevancy for shinny new promises. While vertical search may not be for every brand or market, if it fits, it can be your very best friend. At the vertical search session here in San Jose,

by Stoney deGeyter I don't need another t-shirt, pen, or breath mint. I don't want to "win" more telemarketing calls upon my return. I don't want another key chain, sticky pad, or knick knack. It's the same company's, same booths and same people that I talked to last year. I really don't need another squishy doll, lanyard or bouncy ball. I don't have room for extra luggage to carry it all home. I don't need another beer cozy, toy, or note pad. Last year's video still rocks.

by Claudine Zap ... Mum's the word. Political junkies are getting nada from Barack Obama on?his VP selection.?According to the New York Times , "Mr. Obama had not notified his choice - or any of those not selected - of his decision as of late Monday, advisers said." But even if advisors' lips are sealed, that doesn't stop searchers from vetting their own candidates. Surging today: " potential running mates ," " obama vice president ," and " obama running mate ." .