annej - 2:58 pm on May 24, 2007 (gmt 0)

I agree that the information we are looking at here would not be that useful for any specific SEO. I think this discussion is more general. We are considering if Google is shifting to a dramatically different method of search. There have already been indications that phase based methods are at least in play in specific situations.

Tedster, my impression is that in theory supplementary support would not be needed. The algo would just keep refining. Also a lot of words and phrases would be ignored. This goes back to my earlier concern. Would pages in some extremely niche topics be excluded because they would not have the predictive phrases necessary according to the algo?

But then I'm sure this would be a slow process to implement with a lot of adjustments along the way. There will be a collateral damage and we as webmasters will be frustrated with it at times. It wouldn't be like the original Google process where inbound links could instantly change the nature of search.

So even though we don't know specifics there are some things I am curious about. For starters I'm wondering what sampling Google would be using to sort out the good and bad phrases with all the refinements mentioned in the patents. Or perhaps it wouldn't be a sampling at all but an analysis of all the information they have gathered from the internet.