PageRank Lives On

Proof is in the toolbar...

[HyperGeek]

The single reason why I think Google is NOT abandoning the PageRank is because of this one addition to the toolbar:

Options > More > FIX PAGERANK THROUGH PROXIES (Experimental)

Why would they abandon something they're stll trying to improve? They would retreat... not repeat. And "(Experimental)" means that they're working, at this very moment, to improve how the PR is calculated/delivered.

[4eyes]

Why would they abandon something they're stll trying to improve?

I don't think anyone would suggest that they are going to abandon it - but it seems to be playing less of a part these days.

Also, it is to their advantage to train all SEOs to believe that PR is the most important part of the algo.

Its the only explanation I can think of for PR being displayed on the toolbar at all.

Why on earth would they give a bunch of spammers information on a major part of their algo unless it was part of a shepherding' process.

Does anyone still believe the PR figures from the toolbar anyway?

Smoke and mirrors IMO

[Tropical Island]

I have to agree that some things with regard to PR are not logical. A site that was created in the last year, has 5 pages and one backlink from a PR5 page has been "awarded" a PR4.

If it was PR2 I could understand it - but PR4? Not logical!

[mayday9]

With age sites get more value in google.

Darko

[doc_z]

I have to agree that some things with regard to PR are not logical. A site that was created in the last year, has 5 pages and one backlink from a PR5 page has been "awarded" a PR4.

That's pretty normal follows directly from the PR equations (assuming that the number of outgoing links on the PR5 page is not too large.)

With age sites get more value in google.

PR has nothing to do with age (apart from the fact that normally the number of links grown with time).

[Tropical Island]

In other words it's not the number of backlinks you have it's the value of the one (or more) that are pointed to you.

In other words if this 5 page site had a PR6 page pointing to it it would be a PR5 or conversely one page PR7 would make it a PR6? That's not really equitable - it allows a webmaster who controls 1 high PR site to create multiple sites with automatic high PR - duhhhh! I've really being missing something. I thought it was content and multiple backlinks that counted.

[steveb]

Content and volume mean nothing. Pagerank is simply relative to other pagerank, and it makes perfect sense for a PR5 page to be able to make a PR4 page.

(Volume does matter in the context of rank itself, since 1000 PR5 links are better than one PR5 link. But 1000 PR1 links are worse than one PR5 link from a page with 20 or so outgoing links.)

[doc_z]

In other words if this 5 page site had a PR6 page pointing to it it would be a PR5 or conversely one page PR7 would make it a PR6?

Correct

[mayday9]

I never had first hand experience in seeing how a site gains PR from 0 to 4 or above. If for example there is a completely new (never indexed) 10 pages site, index.html links to main page, which links to subpages with content. There's pleny of good PR links to index.html which should make it PR5 eventually. When google spiders, indexes and then updates PR, will index.html jump from PR0 to PR5 or will it go slowly, first PR1 then PR2 etc..?

Darko

[doc_z]

Darko,

if there is (for example) just one incoming link from a PR6 page then PR will jump from PR0 to PR5. However, it can take some time until PR is displayed in the toolbar. If there are numerous links then PR can jump to PR5 in one or two steps because the links might be spidered (and taken into account) at different times.

[Dave_Hawley]

Has anyone compared PR from the toolbar with PR in the Directory?

RE: But 1000 PR1 links are worse than one PR5 link from a page with 20 or so outgoing links.)

What if each one of the 1000 links brings 2 people per day (that's 2000 hits) and the PR 5 link brings the same, or slightly better (that's 2+ hits).

Dave