Philosopher - 5:08 am on Jan 15, 2003 (gmt 0)

I have seen several people post that it is ridiculous to even think of not following Google’s PR very closely - I say bunk - Show some example of why you believe this way - I have given examples of why I believe the way I do...

PR is only one factor, but it is an important factor. If anyone believes otherwise, I would love to see even one site that is currently under the PR0 penalty that ranks even close to decent.

Sure sites with lower PR can outrank sites with higher PR, that is, once again, because PR is only a part of the ranking algorithm, but in general, the rankings will follow the PR values of the pages.

A good example was posted by Brett today here

[webmasterworld.com...]

Follow his link to Jacob Nielsen's site and you will see the tiny text at the very bottom of the page. With only those instances of the various spelling possibilities of his name, his site is at the top for all but two of the them. Since they are only found in that one place and nowhere else on the page including the title tag (except for the meta keywords tag which is moot), the only logical conclusion is that it is because that particular page has a PR of 8, far above that of the other sites returned for the various misspellings of his name.

PR does matter and it is important to know that the site you are considering linking to is not currently being penalized and the only way to know this (unless the site is in the Google Directory) is through the use of the toolbar.