The first new thing to appear on my radar today is MyBlogLog’s new tagging system that I didn’t ask for. This is coming on the heels of the Twitter add-on I didn’t ask for either. I’m one of the stubborn user personas they aren’t aware of yet. I know this because to get to any task that matters to me, I have to scroll down the page and wait for it to appear.

For usability, it’s never a good thing to put everything I don’t want or care about above the page fold. Did they do any user testing before throwing this out for those of us who paid for the service? In true Google-like fashion, MyBlogLog and many other popular sites like them, simply change things around, put them up and count all the articles and blog posts that cover their new toy. Angering customers and site visitors is fantastic publicity.

This new tagging system MyBlogLog added takes up a big block of space on the page. This is to leave room for the expected droves of people who want to play the game of tag. Your fellow members classify your blog. They can report you for spam by calling you “schmoe” and there’s nothing you can do about it. MyBlogLog tracks all the “schmoe” tags, investigates their account and then will “take the appropriate action.” So, if you have any enemies, too bad. Be prepared to defend yourself, even if you’re innocent.

MyBlogLog members have little say in this. You can’t turn it off, exactly. You can make tags public or private. You can let everyone tag you or just friends. For those who love to have an opinion on their neighbor, they’ll love this. In addition, site owners can see who tagged them. This just sets up more reasons to kill my self esteem because nobody has tagged me yet, and then I remember I was all powerful and strong in my own identity and don’t need to be tagged to know what others think.

Aside from the grumpy things that bug me, it has a redeeming fun spot. This is the “Hot Member” tag. MyBlogLog writes that they’ll track Hot Members every week and “let you all know about one of them.”. We strong in our identity blog owners don’t necessarily need this but heck, do me anyway.

There’s a page that lets you see who was tagged by community or member. You may be able to exclude your profile or blog from it in settings by remaining private or viewed by your friends.

I’d like to know this for sure, because if I feel like being naughty, I’d like to know I can act up in the privacy of my own blog that used to be something whose destiny and reputation I had control over.

Apparently I need to get hip with the program.

I recently read a story on relationships that came to mind today as a possible way to understand why search engines are desperately spending Millions and Billions in Acquisitions.

The story was about a man who met a woman on a plane and they got to talking about relationships. He asked if she was in a relationship and she said no, that she hadn’t found the “right man” yet. He asked what she was looking for and she replied she wanted someone “smart, good looking, funny and who has a lot of money”. She went on to list about 23 qualities in all. She complained that she could never find one person with all of them.

The man then asked whom, among the men she knew now, was “smart”. She thought for a moment and replied, “My boss.” Then he asked her who in her life was “funny”. She had a co-worker who was funny. When asked who had a “lot of money”, that she might know now, she again replied, “My boss.” As for the good looking requirement, it turns out her ex-boyfriend was hot, but stupid. She admitted she paraded him around but advised him to never say anything.

The man on the plane explained that somewhere along the way she had become afraid of being with just one man. She sub-consciously defended her fear of commitment by surrounding herself with many men who met her idea of the perfect mate. Even though she was getting what she wanted, it wasn’t good enough because of how it was packaged, so she kept on searching for the perfect combination and pushing it away at the same time.

If you’ve been keeping up with Microsoft, Google and Yahoo!, you know each mammoth company is trying to find the perfect relationship that will sustain it for the future. Instead of creating each one’s heart’s desire in-house, they’re spending billions of dollars buying up “smart”, “good looking”, “makes lots of money” and “funny”.

We no longer recognize them anymore. We may even get fed up with trying to keep up with their latest dramatic acquisition, firing, hire, or merger.

One thing may be the most telling of all.

Their fear of commitment may one day mark their demise because someone else may come along who is the perfect choice for search.

It occurred me this week, after seeing my old rant against Digg still pulling in traffic to this blog, that I would be nice and just act normal for once. I’d write a humorous 10 Tips article on usability and see if it inspired any Diggs. Maybe this time I’d have a positive experience because I swear all my friends just rave about the place.

Turns out, some of my SEO friends couldn’t Digg it. They had to refrain from telling anybody about my post at their Digg home. Why?

I have the evil abbreviation for search engine optimization, “SEO”, in my blog title.

So, even though the topic has nothing to do with search engines, optimization or search marketing methods, it couldn’t be dugg by my friends in the SEO industry because they’re usually in the Digg Doghouse for one reason or another.

My friends are forced to censor themselves and limit what they link to at Digg. I’m penalized because I associate with uncivilized, naughty marketing people who run or work with companies that promote the use of social media sites like Digg to their clients.

Which certainly calls for a drink and makes this Digg Rant Number Two.

SiteLogic’s Matt Bailey, while in Boston delivering a presentation at the Direct Marketing Association’s ACCM conference, managed to sum up three basic SEO truths (he calls them “mistakes”) into an article and as an added bonus, tossed in a 48 page power point presentation as well. He’s posted the whole party in The Basics of Search Engine Optimization.

I’d tell you what the 3 biggest SEO mistakes are that businesses make, but that would totally ruin the fun. Go see for yourself.

And Matt? You’re allowed to sleep once in awhile.

As a judge for this contest, I couldn’t wait to see who won. Andy Beal has just released the results and standings of winning entrants for the SEM Scholarship Contest, worth $10,000 in prizes and cash. The winner is Jeff Horsager who wrote an article called Increase Conversion Rates with the Google Website Optimizer?

I can vouch that deciding was tough because I was tough on the entries. Andy’s announcement includes how each article ranked as far as traffic and popularity as a result of marketing and promotion efforts. They were, however, voted on the basis of content alone. Judges were not given access to analysis data.

I’m proud to say that Cre8asiteforums has donated $100 cash to the winner from our ad revenue, in our continued committment to supporting education for search marketing.