nomis5 - 8:36 pm on Mar 29, 2012 (gmt 0)

Google's homepage falls into that category

Of course it does, so does almost every page Google publishes.

But they never have, nor ever will penalise their own pages. Never, never, never have they applied their own rules to their own pages.

So be quite clear, don't think the rules they apply to their pages might apply to how they treat other pages. It's not fair, it's just life.