I having been reading up on some other forums and Adam Lasnik posted in Webmasterworld and trying to get opinions of people on the Pagerank tool. Good Read: http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/014435.html http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/3416514.htm
The problem with getting rid of it is that people will just move on to some other method of judging a website's "Google value." Some might turn to the Alexa score, which we all know does not always correspond with PR scores. The Alexa score is skewed towards web development sites, as few non-web developers have the Alexa toolbar installed. I have no reason to believe that Google would stop using PR internally, so they are really just suggesting that they keep everyone in the dark because people are abusing the PR scores they currently have the ability to see. Abuse or not, I don't like the idea of keeping us in the dark. PR is one of the few ways we have to judge our website's worthiness and how well it is "liked" by others. I think removing would actually lead to more trickery and fraud, as some people would find clever ways to lie about their site's popularity.
That would be fun to watch. Tons of people will gone crazy if Google take it off (especially directory owner)
I think they should remove it publically. My personal reasons are that my site with 1000+ people a day, which has no PR value, can't get onto TLA because I wouldnt contribute any PR to thoes who buy links on my site, forget that I happen to have almost 30,000 page views a day... Though you could argue that I dont like PR because I dont have enough of it. Thats a fair statement. So look at it like this from googles perspective. People use the green bar to manipulate people to pay more money for links on the basis of property of which google gave to them for free. So all the millions of dollars going into buying and selling links based on googles PageRank, and google gets nothing but more hard work to filter out the people who try to manipulate the system. From googles perspective this makes perfect sense. It reduces their workload so they can focus on something else. Pierce
it would hit people hard. As a directory owner, i know my customers consider PR as one way for measuring the quality of a directory - how hard it is promoted. Without PR it could kill the directory market.
Removing the PageRank does make some sense if you see it through Google's eyes... No PR means less link buying and selling. And that's exactly what G wants and what G is starting to combat these last few months. So yes, it does make some sense if you see it that way Now they just have to find a way to stop SERP manipulation through link buying and mission accomplished...
Once it's gone we will realize how stupit the idea was : nobody will have to buy links and waste valuable time in worrying about PR
Even if they cut it out, they clearly state that their goal is to always provide some measure of webmaster feedback, even if it's not called "pagerank". So I think no matter what there's nothing for PR lifers to worry about.
I agree with you to a certain level. It will help G, but link buying and selling will still be there. I think without a Google TBPR, those buying links will just have to look harder to determine whats a quality site and whats not a quality site. Without even knowing a sites PR, the person buying the link from the site or buying the site itself, will have to do more due diligence. I think w/out the Google TBPR, will help those who can actually make real quality sites vs. those who can just get PR It'll be a whole new playing field...
And Google has to go all thru the difficulties of the Toolbar, Webmaster Tools and Firefox just for this. *cough*
Its all about perception. The toolbar PR is outdated information that at best gives you a enough information to make a quick decision as to whether a site is worthy of further investigation. (If I wanted a link) The Toolbar PR in no way effects your site. PR does, but that PR Google keeps secret. The public PR is just for entertainment purposes, IMO. But is all about perception...If this thread title was "PR Update" it would be 5 pages by now.
I don't think so, I beleive that one good thing the Toolbar does is keep this in check a little. Links will still be important and without this tool, even with its flaws, many new webmasters will be mercilessly taken advantage of. Again just my opinion but the link market would explode in growth.
If you read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank there are other alternatives to PageRank: HITS algorithm and TrustRank. Technically it is possible to switch, politically maybe they will not. I still think they will keep PageRank. Aside from all the link sales and all the inaccuracies of pagerank, 99%+ of internet user do no depend on Pagerank to trust google. PageRank was developed by the owners of Google and they are the core people in the company. Do you think the "search strategist" at Google will go to their boss (Sergey and Larry) and say, we will not trust what you originally developed on your thesis and we will remove it. So if google employees read this thread remember it was developed by your boss . Do not remove it.