According to the google keyword tool, approximately 368,000 people search for the exact phrase [search engine] each month worldwide, and 135,000 in the US. I wonder what those people are really expecting to find when they search Google for search engine. I would think the Wikipedia result would be the most relevant.
Well, it seems Altavista somehow has a PR of 9. The only other site with the PR of 9 on that page is Yahoo but Yahoo's page doesn't seem to mention "search engine" as explicitly as Altavista, so the ranking makes sense.
How in the world Altavista has a PR of 9 is a mystery though.
"...the ranking makes sense."
PR and rank are often correlated, but PR is not a good predictor of actual rank.
"How in the world Altavista has a PR of 9 is a mystery though."
A large volume of natural links is probably the explanation here. altavista.com probably ended up in some trusted repository as well, which may render it relatively immune to "penalties" or other dampening factors.
It's not a result of being logged in. I was logged in, and signed out, and dogpile was still above altavista when I refreshed the page. However, when I cleared my cookies, Altavista and dogpile switched places.
Hm I think this is Google making sense: why display itself as a result? You're obviously not looking for Google if you're using Google to find a search engine.
