RustyBrick blogged (http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/000628.html) about a good WebmasterWorld.com thread (http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/24710.htm) on how if you search for Overture at Google, the Overture US official site doesn't come up first.

That raises some interesting issues, but what really caught my eye was the fact that the top site, goto.com, leads to the Ask Jeeves-owned My Way portal!

For those who don't remember, GoTo was the name (and GoTo.com the address) of today's Overture. The company changed (http://searchenginewatch.com/sereport/article.php/2164231) its name in October 2001. But despite the name change, the goto.com address still worked to take people to Overture.

I was amazed to find Overture no longer owns it. There are plenty of links still pointing at the site -- Yahoo reports (http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=link%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.goto.com&ei=UTF-8&fr=sfp&n=20&fl=0&x=wrt) nearly 300,000 of them. That GoTo address was very well seeded across the web.

Yellow pages directory service Go2 (http://www.go2online.com) appears (http://www.networksolutions.com/en_US/whois/results.jhtml;jsessionid=XICZRSL4V5VLACWLEALSFEY?w hoistoken=6&_requestid=125493) to have gained the name on January 13 of this year, according to whois records.

For the time being, Go2 seems happy to point that traffic over at My Way, which Ask bought (http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3337511) earlier this year. Getting that traffic from GoTo links may be one reason why I've noticed a rise in My Way-related traffic.

By the way, Google doesn't list the Overture US site first, but the Overture Germany site does show up fourth as a link-only URL. Overture blocks all spiders from accessing its site via its robots.txt file -- but the fact that Overture.de shows up shows that Google can still list sites just based off of link data.

Blocking Google is odd -- if Overture didn't do this, they'd almost certainly be first for their own name and not need to have what appears to be Performics placing ads on their behalf promoting "Overture: Official Site - $50 off Overture Search Advertising Reach 80% of U.S. Internet Users!"

Despite the block on spidering, Overture does rank tops at Yahoo for overture (http://search.yahoo.com/search?ei=UTF-8&fr=sfp&p=overture) -- which owns the service. It's a paid inclusion URL that's listed, then interestingly, the next four links also leading to Overture show signs of being hardcode to that query (see the SEW members version (http://searchenginewatch.com/_subscribers/articles/article.php/3369631) of this article (http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3369651) for more about apparent hardcoding at Yahoo).

I've got some emails out to see if I can find more about when the domain change happened and why. Will update, if I hear more.

Very interesting, I would like to hear the dates when you get them.

Also, I decided to test our the Search Engine Roundtable and when you enter that into Google, its not ranked #1. I am pretty sure it was a week ago. Plus it is ranking #1 for "Search Engine Roundtable" in Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, and MSN (old/preview).

Heard back from Ask Jeeves now. They believe that Go2 gained the GoTo.com domain name as resolution of a trademark dispute with Overture. Not had that confirmed or denied by Overture yet, however. I did find a reference to the dispute here (http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/4749.html), however:

GoTo is in the process of changing its name....The trademark infringement claim asserted by Go2 Systems was also a factor in the decision to seek a new name, the company said.
I also came across this page (http://www.overture.com/d/USm/specials/ ) that appears to have been set up last year as a landing page for those trying to reach goto.com for some period last year. I'm guessing that, because I first find the URL being associated with the goto.com domain as of Jan 22, 2003, according (http://web.archive.org/web/*/goto.com) to the Internet Archive. The month before, it pointed at the Overture home page.

That page refreshes quickly to lead to the Overture home page. Before that happens, it says:

GoTo is now Overture. Our new Web Address is Overture.com.
You will be automatically redirected to our new homepage in 5 seconds.
Please remember to bookmark the new page, as we will no longer redirect traffic from www.goto.com as of December 31, 2003.

Looking for Go2? Click here www.go2.com.

Bringing this back to Ask Jeeves, the My Way portal that goto.com is a cobranded version of the one Ask Jeeves operates at MyWay.com (http://www.myway.com/). Ask has no affiliation other than to power that site for Go2, which it says wanted to come up with a better search experience for those following the old GoTo links.

FYI, moved this thread to the Yahoo-Other category, as it seems most appropriate. Overture is Yahoo-owned, and the Overture PPC category isn't quite a fit.

Just heard back from Overture. They tell me the domain was transferred to Go2 Systems as part of a confidential settlement agreement back in April 2001. The agreement allowed Overture to keep traffic to goto.com redirected to Overture from then through Dec. 31, 2003.