Heres my take. Its complete BS and if they enforce it they are looking at getting in trouble from law suits. The key and only reason is "You dont have control of who links to you and what method they use." So that means I can go make statik links for all my competitors and report them as purchasing links? Dont think so.
This is a good idea but then people would need something else to obsess about....maybe they'll move on to alexa... you can't sue google for this...if you don't want to follow the guidelines then remove your file from the index...did we forget how kinderstart got embarrased with their lawsuit?
It is not difficult finding major sites whose primary purpose and reason for existence is buying and selling links. Google does not have to do much to de-value these sites, and I don't think anyone can make a legal or ethical case against this. It is their search engine and they can choose to provide results in any manner they see fit. Actually, I think Yahoo is much more "selective" in their search results which is why I think they have lost the premier spot to Google. Google, as a long term proposition, maintain its leadership role, and if they find that poor results are creeping into their search pages, they can - and probably will - look for ways to maintain the integrity of their search engine results. On the other hand, I think that their technology is becoming a bit worn and there is probably room for a new search engine with a new approach to enter into the marketplace. Particularly if the results are better tuned to their users. Rich
How are they gonna know that a link is paid or not? Does anyone not see the potential for this to be complete BS? I mean, you can't buy links anymore, so where have you gotta go? You got it - Google themselves. Personally I am going to completely ignore this and pass it off as scaremongering
We can see who likes sucking brown out of Matt Cutts rectum now can't we. Yes fall in line like a good little shrink [SIZE=-1]menstrual[/SIZE] You go for it everytime don't you?? I love setting you up lol........ Hey wait I said this to you before ....... You'll catch on when??? For everyone else build your business and don't worry about Google.... Google does not grant business licenses
Lawsuits that are about discounting (NOT penalizing) paid links so that they don't pass PageRank do not have a hope in hell. That is not the point I( was raising. Where I think Google may get into trouble is if they attempt to apply a penalty of any kind to advertisements - banners, links, or anything else - that don't use javascript or nofollow. If they simply discount the PR value, that's fine - they have a right to do that. If they penalize any site anywhere for publishing ads that are not nofollow or javascript, I'd say advertisers have a legitimate complaint and a legitimate basis for litigation on a restraint of trade basis, since that may cost the advertisers some of their publishers and/or reduce the value of the sites they are legitimately advertising on.
You do have a way of publicly demonstrating your maturity level and your wealth of knowledge, Sem. I'll let your words speak for themselves.
That's what infuriates me about these proclamations from Google -- it's as if they feel they own the 'net & all the sites on it ... that we've all been naughty for playing the game that they invented & now they want their ball back ... I appreciate what they're trying to do, but still....
Yes and you let your complete lack of common sense and constant harrassing attitude I and others have seen from you with your self inflated ego that you have a fake dr,s credentials you are thereby smarter than others. Fucking Wrong !! Now for the common sense approach. At the most the site will lose its inflated PageRank. It will not lose natural link PageRank since they would have to devalue all page rank equations built into the algorithm already. Secondly banning sites that bought links would probably with a best guess scenario lose 50% or more of their index. The next issue is since free sites make up the breadth of where googles own link sales take place and the results of such are shown they are not going to ban the very sites that make up the display advertising pages. Google is doing as they have always done and like much of your post are.. More Rhetoric To Scare People PS You also know when I say were done........
Yes and they also said they do not allow hidden text or hidden links or keyword stuffing and blah blah blah BUT Each and everyone of us knows of a site that has and is still doing the above and they are not banned. Remember chicken little and the boy who cried wolf are merely parables...... Much like them Matt Cutts is a good little liar too
I don't think Google needs to use a hammer to accomplish what they want to do - which is basically provide better search results. All they have to do is devalue certain sites and their links, they they deem to be using tactics/techniques that are creating issues in their search results. I think that they are giving fair warning to webmasters that their efforts and money that they are investing may become devalued. TIt is not a certainty that every paid link will be devalued. In fact, it is probably that most paid links will remain in place. However, it is possible that major sites will be affected and Google is letting webmasters know about this ahead of time via Matt Cutts and other blogs. I think this approach is much more ethical than let's say other vendors (e.g. Yahoo, MS), that do things in a complete vacuum without any warning or guidance. Rich
The author has been banned, of course, but for the record there is nothing fake about my Ph.D. or my credentials as a psychologist or my curriculum vitae which lists my accomplishments over the course of my career. They are a matter of public record.
Well Google can and will do what it wants to is a true statement. can they be sued the answer is yes.. Can the person or comany suing win? who knows depends on there case. However with that said google is running a buiness for the public and must abide by some rules and laws. discrimination is one of them...I dought there is really anything to this purcased link thing but I will say this many of us purchase links every day and guess from who? GOOGLE it is called Adwords.
Pity it's only temporary... I had thought he was getting better, but still seems a bit whacked out when he gets on a roll I guess. I blogged about the reporting thy neighbors thing. Matt mentioning it on his blog is one thing... making it policy is more like chumming the waters if you ask me. Toss it out there and see who smells blood. -Michael
Insted of this BS why don't they just not consider links. They can just ignore the links and go by the content. That way no one will talk about them any more. Looks like they want to kill TEXT-LINK-ADS.com Probably they did not want to sold to google? Big Brother can get you LOL
Those links end up on publishers' websites as javascript links, which is what Google is trying to dictate to the rest of the world. In truth, I don't have a problem with that personally, but I do anticipate some legal challenges from other advertising services and this is something I don't think Google can win. Indeed, Google has been recently whining about Microsoft shipping Windows with MSN Search and MSN Messenger as defaults. If I recall, that one failed because it really isn't difficult to change those defaults. But if they attempt to force a specific format for ads on their own competition for advertising, that is not going to go over well with the antitrust people. For one thing, Google is rolling in unfettered cash these days and the Justice Department seems to take a dim view of rich corporations playing with antitrust issues these days.
Under the current administration, Google has nothing to worry about with anti-trust issues. If, however, the political scene changes dramatically in 2008, they could have serious problems. I think Google is going to sooner or later piss off the wrong company; a company with deep pockets and lots of lawyers (maybe even Microsoft?). It'll be amusing to watch the fur fly as the big boys duke it out. Maybe a true alternative to Google will emerge from the scrum.
Well they can discount the link they think is purchased or they can reduce the value of it but I don't think there is anyway that it can hurt a sites ranking in addition to that. Otherwise you could just buy links for your competitors and bury them....
I don't believe Google is forcing anyone to do anything on their site. They are just warning webmasters that if there are advertising links then in order to preserve rankings they have to be labeled in a certain way. Google is totally within bounds to do anything they want to do with their algorithms and webmasters can do anything that they want with links on the sites. However, what Google is saying is that certain links will no longer provide much value - so be forewarned. There is no "law" that says that Google has to treat all links equally in their algorithm- and I don't think either a Republican or Democratic Congress at this time is going to make such a law a high priority. Google can do whatever it wants. What it is doing - extra - is warning everyone. No need to do this from a legal point of view, but it is good business practice and good manners. Rich
Google talks alot of shit! LOL at google's 'webmaster guildlines'. I'm tired of people acting like the internet doesn't exist without the fascist MIDDLEMAN google. So stop acting like we are the culprits by trying to advance in the system you created. How is a video site going to be able to compete with youtube without doing things like buying links? I'm not one of these webmaster's who's going to be controlled by google. Tell Matt and Google to shut up already. All you guys care about is your ad revenue and now you are trying to dictate policy that's geared towards your profit margin. You want to end all of this, then offer random results for every search done. That way every site gets a chance. Don't give me this most relevant results crap. I'm tired of seeing Wikipedia being the first result time and time again when the information isn't even accurate. You guys are probably planning on buy them too ha ha. You guys are going to keep screwing around and you're going to force webmasters worldwide to revoult.