PerfectMarket

So many online skirmishes.

There’s Yahoo and AOL vs. DemandMedia. And then there’s always Facebook vs. Google.

That’s the thing about techno-capitalism, it sets up some exciting rivalries. Facebook vs. Google is the new Apple vs. Microsoft (unless, of course, Steve Ballmer suddenly steps up.)

The latest development in the saga occurred this week, when Facebook confirmed (as reported by Nick O’Neil of AllFacebook.com) that “all Open Graph-enabled web pages will show up in search when a user likes them.”

A lot of people are calling this a “declaration of war”– the beginnings of Facebook’s “search strategy.”

Nick O’Neill even has a very fancy term for this: social semantic search engine (try saying that three times fast).

AllFacebook argues that it’s time to start optimizing for “Facebook SEO,” adding yet another wrinkle to the publisher’s battle to optimize their content for search.

Greg Sterling of SearchEngineland, however, does not see Facebook’s threat as particularly dangerous for traditional search engine.

Facebook’s user experience, in terms, of search he argues, is too cluttered and unwieldy to truly undermine the search giants. “Google, Yahoo and Bing (proper) provide a much more coherent and complete user experience when people really need information.”

Based on the domain names under which these authors write, (SearchEngineland vs. AllFacebook) it comes as little surprise that both would defend their respective platforms.

Time will tell whether or not this is truly a “blitzkrieg” by Facebook (as O’Neil argues) or more of a “sitzkrieg.”

Publishers, however, do have a wonderful opportunity to become early adopters of Facebook SEO and get their content maximum exposure on the platform. They’ve been struggling to catch up in the search engine world, it would be a shame squander a second chance with “social semantic search.”

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— Lee Glandorf

On Twitter: @LeeGlandorf