Atticus - 4:26 pm on Jun 4, 2005 (gmt 0)

1) There will be no 'serious update thread" because, for whatever reason, G no longer treats websites in a consistent manner. There is simply no way for us to compare our experiences and develop a new G strategy because there is no longer a single, identifiable, reasonable set of rules by which G ranks sites.

This may be because G wants it this way, or it could be the result of something like 302 hijacks/domain poisoning ripping the heart out of the G index. Who knows? It doesn't really make any difference, except that if it is G's plan, then no fix is coming and if it is a problem with their algo due to some sort of poisoning, G may be able to fix it 'some day.'

2) No need for government intervention. Adam Smith's invisible hand will drop G in the trash can if they deserve it. I for one no longer use G as my primary SE. I believe that G will continue to lose market share if they continue down the road they are on. Disagree? Fine. Whatever.

3) Whether G "owes" anyone anything is beside the point. If a drowning man screams for help, you might throw him a rope or tell him to kick his legs and keep his head above water, but telling him that "Hydraulics doesn't owe you anything," is more than useless and cruel, it is just plain stoooooopid.

4) Many websites give away bits of free information and earn a fraction of a cent per visitor in return. Does anyone really believe that a publisher should spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on billboard and TV advertising to get a .5 cent return on the investment? Of course not. And when the day comes that your tomatoes have fungus and you have to pay a gardening site a subscription fee to find out how to combat said fungus rather than getting the information for free as you can today, you can blame whoever put the small information farmer out of buisness with their screwy algo.