Forum Moderators: goodroi
...the court finds that under Oklahoma law, protected speech -- in this case PageRanks -- cannot give rise to a claim of tortious interference with contractual relations because it cannot be considered wrongful, even if the speech is motivated by hatred or ill will.
This case was stupid, you can not profit off of someone else. if your selling lotto tickets for a company and that person doesnt win who bought it from you because your sources were wrong, you gonna sue the lotto? Im glad SK lost, lame cases for suits. We as SEOs have intentions to get people higher on the search engines or to get more traffic, we're playing a broken game, walken the line, rebels if you will. If google doesnt like us we dont whine, ok maybe we do, but we dont sue people because of us trying to CHEAT them and make profit off of it.
:D
[added] The above link apears to be available now
[edited by: MJR at 11:58 pm (utc) on May 30, 2003]
Regardless of the final outcome, I hope this isn't seen as defacto precedent setting case that may discourage others from taken action if they feel their rights have been violated.
Although Bob King lost this round, he did win a moral victory in getting Google to admit they had tweaked the PR numbers.
I see it from both angles also and see how this damaged them but they did play that fine line. Google doesn't sell how to get higher PR, your using the information you gained to achieve your positions, taking advantage of someones system. I do it, you do it, we all do it, and when google changes something, or gives someone PR0 either manually or automated they've pulled yer plug :D
Its a fun game, and yes it was fun to see google say they did tweak SK's ranking, something google seems to rarely admit to :) I think there will be much more lawsuits to come and many wont end up in the result this one did.
1. File litigation against SearchKing, Inc. (PR Ad Network) for using their PageRank system as a means for profit. I do expect that SearchKing will be served with a cease and desist order at the very least.
2. Completely devalue ALL of SearchKing, Inc. holdings and thus sites affiliated with SearchKing, i.e. their Portal Network. And consequently remove SearchKing and their holdings from their database.
It will be interesting to see what develops over the next few weeks :)
It is over.
That has now got me thinking, though. This could have serious negative impact on people operating in certain spaces who rely on the type of promotion that's link reliant which it's usually necessary to buy advertising space or text ads for - particularly those sites that are best left unconnected to other sites they're associated with.
What this suit inadvertantly did, though I'm sure it wasn't anywhere near the intention and probably not anticipated, was to provide a test case which ended in a precedent-setting decision that will decide the course of future suits if any should ever arise.
There are a few very high profile sites out there that use different linking and advertising formats and methodologies that we could see hit before long by Google. Now that this case has been decided, the way has been cleared for them to go ahead and do so.
>over
This one episode is over, but it might not be over for others doing the same thing, albeit on the quiet, now that this decision has been made public.
It would be naive to think that Google isn't aware of at least a good portion of the sites that are doing this, and it's possible that they've held off until now awaiting the outcome before taking action.
People personally affected will be unlikely to reveal it, but in the event a sweep has been waiting in the wings, the next few months should be very interesting to watch, although with all the PR aberrations we're seeing it will make it harder to detect if some sites happen to get hit amidst the general confusion.
With some it may well be not only possible, but possibly probable. For some it may just be starting.
we dont sue people because of us trying to CHEAT them and make profit off of it
Brings to mind a case where a thief enters a residence and in the process of ripping off the homeowner, injures himself due to "shoddy construction" and subsequently sues the homeowner for negligence. However, in this case the plaintiff wins.
>PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value.
>Google's complex, automated methods make human tampering with our results extremely difficult.
Above from: [google.com...]
Both of these statements are fundamentally untrue, and it appears, for right or wrong, protected because Google argued First Amendment privileges, thereby making them untrue.
Dismissed today, another battle for tomorrow.
I don't know how Google users are going to become as familiar with this subject as some webmasters....major news media are not likely to run it because the general public will not understand it in the allotted 30 second slot.
I don't like what SK did, but I like less the way Google is behaving!
Irony: MS got to where they are today because they weren't challenged early, about the only thing stopping Google now is MS (& possibly Yahoo!).
PageRank is an objective measurement, and it might not be an opinion when it comes out of the algorithm. Once Google decides to adjust it (apply a penalty), that penalty is an opinion.
This ruling is not a precedent that can be used in other courts. An order by a federal District court is not authority for other District courts ... you need an an appellate court ruling for that.
Not necessarily. The dismissal was based on the court's interpretation of Oklahoma law and the Jefferson County case, which is a 10th Circuit case. These factors would likely have almost no influence on a similar suit filed, say, in NYC.
>>PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value.<<
You told the world my site is unimportant , of low quality and lacks value..(and that cost me a bundle).
You're assuming other courts are going to agree that SERPs are merely opinions. This may not be the case.
private or public status is irrelevant
>> If you can't prove that there is an exact, correct objective order for the SERPs, they're an opinion
that's a good argument ... however, a creative lawyer might be able to argue that Google is not really commenting on sites, but rather providing access to information, and thus has a higher duty
what if google also decided to not allow searchking to buy adwords ... would that be ok too?
