futuresky - 5:52 pm on Mar 3, 2003 (gmt 0)

This link crap hurts a lot of folk. In my view Web sites should rise or fall based on their own merits not on links from other sites, many of which have questionable value themselves.

My feeling exactly too. Athough I like the AMOUNT of traffic I get from google, I've always detested the link-popularity algorithm. And now, just because of this algorithm, macneil (and others) have numerous sites junked by google. I'd love to do more cross-linking with my sites, not to inflate page rank, but because it makes sense to cross-link. BUT I'm TERRIFIED that google will penalise me because it thinks I'm artificially trying to inflate their precious page-rank system.

I have read Googleguy say don't be afraid to cross-link your sites (or something to that effect) but yes, I am afraid and macneil (and others) experiences seem to indicate I'm not being overly-paranoid. Sorry, but this stuff makes me mad.