over the weekend big changes at Yahoo!, according to Marcia

Robert Charlton added in:

I generally haven't watched Yahoo closely, but since the update in late July, where many inside pages dropped like rocks, I've been following some selected niche searches. My thought at the time was that there was some sort of "filtering" in place (and I'm probably using the word inaccurately), much like there was after Google's infamous Florida update.

What seemed to affect some searches and some sites didn't seem to affect others... there was talk of over-optimization penalties... and results just didn't feel right. After Florida, I felt that Google would have to fix it, and eventually they did. I've felt that about Yahoo since the July update, but it hasn't happened yet.

The Yahoo serps are Florida-like in one respect that I haven't seen discussed... nonsense exclusion strings in the search query seem to return to search to an approximation of pre-July normalcy. Add -asdf to a search a bunch of times and you'll see what I mean.

some sample Yahoo! searches:

• [search engine marketing]

• [search engine marketing - adfas]
• [SEO]
• [SEO -adfas]
• [viagra]
• [viagra -adfas]
• [poker]
• [poker -adfas]

What have you noticed different at the big Y! ? Whats with the -blah? Why do the ads not show up when you do an advanced search?