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Google Dance Esmerelda

Every month, Google takes the results of the previous month's deep crawl, and pushes the results up to the Google servers. This results in some weird and unpredictable search results as each of the thousands of Google servers receive the updates. This is called the "Google Dance." At WebmasterWorld this month, Google Dances were given names, like Hurricanes. As we write this, Esmerelda is hitting the Google servers.

The recent updates have been strange, though. This points to some major changes in the way Google works. In the past, Google has operated two sets of web crawlers: the "fresh" crawl and the "deep" crawl. The deep crawl is exhaustive, and runs once a month. The fresh crawl is superficial, and runs continuously. Recently, webmasters have noticed that the deep crawler has disappeared, and instead the fresh crawler is behaving like the deep crawler. The conclusion is that Google is moving towards a more continuous update process. Some speculate that Google's responding to the prospect of a Microsoft search engine as well as increased competition from the existing search services. Our pet theory is that PigeonRank is finally being implemented.

A more thorough explaination can be found at Kuro5hin.