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That is to say, should one be checking to see if the sites are out of the sandbox regularly or only when they know there is a major Google update? :)
Thanks
Mc
How many regular people with regular web sites have active link development programs? Do a search for "submit url" + widgets, and you will find sites from the spammy side of the tracks soliciting reciprocal links. If Google forces people to resort to solicit a specific type and quantity of links just to get their sites activated, it is encouraging SEO tactics. And, for this dubious accomplishment, it essentially sacrifices a large amount of new content. It just doesn't compute.
A whole new topic, but whatever style of site they show at the top of the serps, the spammers will replicate. Spam has been a part of business since advertising was invented. Big highstreet supermarkets 'spam' towns, car manufacturers 'spam' tv ads... etc. etc. Free listings on google will always be a target and in 50 years time people here will be complaining of spam because spam is life itself. Google will never remove spam because spam is advertising which is what google provides. Personally, I think most spam is brilliant and I wish I could do it. :)
If all new sites are sandboxed, how is an authority site ever going to find them, much less link to them?
A very important observation Vec_one.
This whole situation most certainly does not compute. Whenever Google come up with any important new feature they shout it from the rooftops. It's easy for them to do this, they don't have to pay for advertising ;) All we have had on this situation for the last nine months is a deafening silence.
Repeat after me ... this is a defect. There is no way that this is intentional.
This is a defect. There is no way that this is intentional.
This is a defect. There is no way that this is intentional.
This is a defect. There is no way that this is intentional.
...
A whole new topic, but whatever style of site they show at the top of the serps, the spammers will replicate.
And this is where MSN offers new hope...each user will have the flexibility to change the style of site that appears at the top by adjusting the filters. While MSN is still in Beta, I am certain these filters, and the way you control them, will be refined and improved.
Google offers a search based on one set of variables.
MSN allows you to change your variable set (esp. the weight of 3 variables)
Google is backed into a corner, and the sandbox is evidence of this. I have always liked Google, but I sure hope they can start to offer more control for the user, or I fear they will have a poor showing in 2005.
You have always needed a link to your site to get noticed by Google. In the past, any links in would help you rank. Now only specific links in which are on theme really help you. That stops the seo tactic of exchanging links with anyone and stops webmasters covering hundreds of sectors with pr gained in only one sector. That is surely progress?
To gain quality links in on a theme you need to start producing sites that more discerning and perhaps non seo webmasters are happy to link to. You especially have to attract one way links. This makes seo harder and brings us all down to the level of a webmaster who has no concept of seo. In otherwords, we have to rely on unsolicited links in as a result of our site content.
We all need to keep thinking as if we work for Google. In reality their solutions are often very simple and logical. The spider cannot 'read' or 'understand' websites, so it has to rely on humans who have done so and cast a vote (a link). The more discerning they can be about the links they acknowledge, the more quality they will detect.
Google has embarked on this new proceedure with a long term view. The system will not immediately produce amazing serps, but with time, only good sites will rise in the serps. Older sites, including spammy ones, are still showing. But as I said earlier, new quality sites can catch up. This will mean that eventually good sites will dominate. Spammy sites may have many good links at the moment relative to new quality sites, but their position will probably have peaked, with quality new sites continuing to rise over the next year or so.
Its a long game google are playing, which is fustrating for new quality sites. But if they hang in there, their time will come. Its all about the internet returning to the real world, where a business takes years to establish itself.
The system will not immediately produce amazing serps...
And the system only allows for one set of results, which I believe will prove to be a limiting factor as MSN offers more (sets of results).
Google is adapting to reality. In the real world business's take time to grow.... now the same is true on Google, and we are talking years not weeks like the good ol days.
Never underestimate how stupid people are when using the internet. I think this system will fail miserably because no one will understand it. Give people a choice and either they will make the wrong one or they will suspect they have made the wrong one. Eitherway they will feel uneasy and not use it.
To gain quality links in on a theme you need to start producing sites that more discerning and perhaps non seo webmasters are happy to link to. You especially have to attract one way links. This makes seo harder and brings us all down to the level of a webmaster who has no concept of seo. In otherwords, we have to rely on unsolicited links in as a result of our site content.
Mhes as Vec_one so rightly said this just does not compute. If a site is well and truly sandboxed there is no way that it can be found in order to generate these unsolicited links. This is a Catch 22 situation and it is obviously not intentional.
I have put up two or three sites with excellent content during the last few months and none of them are featuring. The owner of one these sites provided me with highly unique, useful content that anyone searching for her keywords would have been delighted to find. Google does not see it this way so Google has a problem! It is failing to find just about all the new sites, good or bad. It's broke, plain and simple.
Get the press onto this. It's the only way we'll get a solution, or perhaps more accurately a resolution.
Never underestimate how stupid people are when using the internet.
Yes, it took people a while to realize Google offered a the best search.
If that sort of logic works, then we should lock up all newborn babies until they can convince us they won't grow up to be criminals. :>)
So? You have to earn your rankings that now takes many many months... tough.
>The owner of one these sites provided me with highly unique, useful content that anyone searching for her keywords would have been delighted to find.
Good, in a few years you may be ranked well.
>Google does not see it this way so Google has a problem!
No, you have a problem. Your problem is that you think your site should be ranked highly and it isn't. Until you get enough people to agree with you and link to you then you will continue to have a problem.... this now takes time.
>It is failing to find just about all the new sites, good or bad. It's broke, plain and simple.
No, it can find them, it is now waiting for people to link to them with relevant and mature links. Google is in no rush to rank new sites highly. Its been there and done that and that is how all the spammers made a lot of money.
>Get the press onto this. It's the only way we'll get a solution, or perhaps more accurately a resolution.
The story would be like a new book shop in deepest Africa complaining that no one is giving it free advertising within months of starting. Google is just being cautious about ranking new sites... fair enough, they owe you or me nothing.
If the nephew knows that it will take sometime for his site to rank, he should buy adwords or use another advertising medium. Established sites would carry the story anyway, which is probably a better signal to google that the claims are legitimate. The nephew is really dumb to just rely on a new site via google free listings for such an important discovery.
Why on earth does Google have to take the blame for all these ridiculous scenarios? Google is just a website like yours.... I bet you don't put a google search box on every page of your site and give them free advertising. You just put stuff on which you think is good..... so do they. They've been hit with spam and are trying to deal with it, probably just as you would, with caution and not being bullied into putting up unproven new sites just because they are new.
After your lecture, i surely need to reconfirm that this forum deals with SEO ... and help people in learning as ow to rank well on serach engines like Google.
In Google'd eye anybody who do extraordinary efforts to manipulate the ranking of any website is a Criminal and as good as a Spammer.
Few years back crosslinking was not spamming, now to some extent it is...
Let the spider in + a few basics and that is more or less it.... if you eventually get good rankings it will be because of good content and natural linking.
The problem is that legit sites with some SEO are being dropped down, while spam with very little content for the human visitor and massive SEO is rising to page 1 like never before.
You make it sound like only the cream of the crop are going to rise to the top, but you are wrong.
GoogleNews exposes the story to everyone on Earth, before the nephew is even finished stuffing his meta-tags.
(They send out email alerts, too ;) )
The cream will rise to the top..... and everybody else will call it spam..... business as usual.
If you think I'm calling good sites spam, just because they are page 1, you are wrong (again). To imply that I call some sites/results spam because I'm bitter is insulting.
You seem to think quite highly of your own opinion, which might make it hard to see that everything you say isn't correct.
Spam is spam, by definition a bunch of crap that nobody wants, and Google has a bigger problem with it than ever from what I can see.
I'm talking about self contained networks of useless garbage, not well established information sites with natural links from other on-topic sites, patiently built up over time.
Some webmasters will think they know everything despite evidence to the contrary, business as usual.
>Google does not see it this way so Google has a problem!No, you have a problem. Your problem is that you think your site should be ranked highly and it isn't. Until you get enough people to agree with you and link to you then you will continue to have a problem.... this now takes time.
I'll mention again...the consensus here seems to be that google needs to explain the sandbox effect or fix the problem. Failure to do so will adversely affect their relationship with webmasters, who provide the content they index.
So did I.
Sorry if you feel insulted, I didn't mean to. :)
The problem I see is, since the time of the sandbox, I've noticed a lot more clutter. It seems that for some terms, one person (or one team) can fill 20 pages of SERPs with their computer generated junk pages on throwaway domains, while good sites are spread thin throughout.
The first page used to be full of very informative or authorative sites exclusively in sectors I use for hobbies etc, now I don't see that as much.
Having to dig down to page 10 for relevant sites is something I'm getting used to, but I don't like. I know that good sites are down there though, so I do dig that far.
Why? Their share price looks fine, they had better than expected results recently and if everybody's website that contributed to this thread disappeared I doubt it would have much effect on google..... oh, hold on, apparently everybody's website has disappeared.... and it didn't effect the share price :)
Joe public won't know about sandbox or apparently care's. Lets have a reality check, Google has its own agenda and to assume they have a problem that they will fix is pure wishfull thinking. They have a policy of secrecy, which is their privilage.
I can see no reason why they should rank new sites highly just because they are new. It makes sense to me that they err on the side of caution and only when they are good and ready start ranking them.
Presumably, with sandbox, they will have a problem in the future. Which is why I believe the sandbox is there. These sites are getting lucky now, but no discerning webmaster will link to them, so in the long game they will be overtaken by the 'cream' which will attract the quality links.
Its a brave move by Google, and they can't announce "oh yeah, we know we have poor results at the moment but we are playing a long game..."
I can see no reason why they should rank new sites highly just because they are new.Do you think there is even one surfer anywhere who is hoping that Google won't show him the answer to his query simply because it resides on a new domain? It's not that we want a bonus for having a new site. We just want our sites to be judged based on the quality and usefulness of the content, same as our old sites.
They have a policy of secrecy, which is their privilage.Yes, that is their privilege. But it is a policy that is rarely, if ever, rewarded.
These sites are getting lucky now, but no discerning webmaster will link to themWhy wouldn't a webmaster link to them? After all, they are apparently the authority now.
I doubt there is a query that cannot be answered by an existing established site. If the search phrase is non competitive then a sandbox site will appear anyway. However, the issue is that Google would rather show sites it trusts, than new ones with few links in and/or natural 'recommendation'.
>Why wouldn't a webmaster link to them? After all, they are apparently the authority now.
Clever :) But in truth how many know about 'authority' and in the grand scheme of things most will not link to them out of principle.
I don't think he's around as much as he use to be when there were problems.
I can see the tempation to believe that Google is fully in control, Google continues to enjoy some degree of what they called 'teflon' in the USA during the reagon years. However, if you reject the assumption that google is fully in control currently it tends to create a scenerio where almost all the observed events can be explained, not just the ones that make the company look good.
"has googleguy said anything"
Who cares what googleguy says? What he says will be one of the following:
1: true
2: false
3: contain some truth, just enough to make it convincing.
since I can't know which it will be, I ignore everything he says.
[edited by: lizardx at 9:56 pm (utc) on Nov. 28, 2004]
That is completely backwards. Getting high quality links is the worst thing to do in terms of sandboxing. If you want to fight the sandbox, step one is to not get *any* links from the top 100.
(The low quality way to avoid the sandbox seems to be working less well this month, but high quality links still are the kiss of death.)
