MarketingVOX's roving conference reporter B.L. Ochman reports that the Search Engine Strategies conference got off to a low-key start. Much of the initial action occurred over the PR newswires, with sheaves of research releases sent out just prior to the opening. She noted that a session led by Jupiter's Gary Stein pointed to a direct relationship between blogs and other consumer-created content and search engines. With the explosion in blogging and discussion boards, more than a quarter of search results turn out to be consumer-generated. Stein positioned the vehicles as listening posts for companies to better gauge their audiences. SearchEngineLowdown points to additional research to be released later on in the conference, including some interesting search usability findings (yes, it turns out the highest-placed ads do get the lion's share of the clicks).