Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
Lets just take a look at the famous George Bush (and now Michael Moore) Google Bomb. If you dont know...do a search for Failure in Google and then view the cache to find out the Keyword Density for those pages is a big fat 0.
[edited by: tedster at 8:19 am (utc) on Jan. 26, 2007]
try and Googlebomb a competitors legitimately ranked site out of the SERPS?
which is why G say that there is virtually nothing that a competitor can do to harm your sites ranking ..they dont say it's impossible ..'cos it isn't.
Essentially, we already knew this stuff.
I think an important aspect missing from that statement is that this tweak might be specific for uncommon phrases that don't normally have a relevant result.
I think you are spot on here MB.
I have a googlebomb working for a moderately competitive phrase. The page doesn't have the keyphrase text on it, only in the links pointing to it.
If they actually HAVE instituted the new policy, "WHY are they announcing it to the outside world?"
Maybe because the outside world includes non-SEO types who were critical of political googlebombs thinking they were "editorial commentary" from Google.
I can't help but think that this new defusing of G-Bombs has caused the collateral damage many webmasters are referring to as the 950 penalty.
Not sure I can agree here. One characteristic of a googlebomb is that the search phrase exists mostly or only in backlink anchor text. Not so with the 950 penalty, where on-page occuranceithe rule. Plus the 950 penalty predates the googlebomb fix.
I mean, don't the links that we webmasters get use targeted anchor text, just like a googlebomb?
Maybe because the outside world includes non-SEO types who were critical of political googlebombs thinking they were "editorial commentary" from Google.
This is exactly my point Tedster. (ergo, my China comment)
Others can choose to believe that something was done on a "scalar" level, but I don't buy it. If I can find 6,7,8 REAL googlebombs (ie "pranks" of sites ranking for irrelevant and meaningless terms that having NOTHING to do with the site and not appearing on the page)
AND have Google making a public "announcement" AND have an official G employee going out of his way to comment on this ONE issue when so many others are never "commentated" on, then something smells fishy.
If it's so "fixed" on an algo level, why are they asking for reports of other googlebombs they don't KNOW about? lol come on!
Again, like most PUBLIC G announcements, alot of bluster, little substance, and always some "other" agenda to scare and deter the unknowing reader.
But the "miserable failure" fiasco was never about a "problem" with the algo. In fact, the algo was working EXACTLY as it should be.
Sites "democratically" voting on describing 2 sites with appropriate (at least in the views of the sites pointing the links) anchor text.
If i want to describe Google as "the most corrupt company ever" and 5000 other sites agree and use the same anchor text, then that's my "democratic" vote, and I'll be darned if Google filters the results because Google wants to maintain some facade that they've created AI.
(or is afraid of political bodies putting pressure on them)
Google doesn't get it both ways. In court, either their algo is "determined by non-human interference" or it isn't.
You don't get to filter results because people get "confused" about how the algo works.
Are you evil Google or just without moral sense?
Nevermind, you go make that money...you never believed in "free speech" anyways.
So why would they start lying now, with the elections over and all that? I don't buy it. I say they made some moderately effective algo change, and they crowed about it a bit to make sure it got noticed -- but there are still loopholes in it. A hand-tweak would look a lot better.
Never forget, algos are written by humans to accomplish human ends. They still are algorithms, not hand fixed results. I would never claim Google doesn't hand-fix some results -- I'm nearly 100% sure they do. Just not in this case.
And give me a break, Google "lies" about all kinds of things. Sure they may have "adjusted" the algo to ensure no Fortune 500 or .gov sites rank for "meaningless" terms, but that's the same as manual intervention.
And it goes against everything the algo is "supposed" to do in the first place. Not to mention, is legally shaky when Bobswebsite.com goes into court and says G purposely tanked my rankings and G claims they have "no manual control" of how sites rank.
Good move on goog's part, some people took them literally and blamed google for "liberal bias" and so on.
Mr. Cutts never said it was fixed. In fact he made it a point on both blogs that it would simply reduce their effectiveness:
Google has begun minimizing the impact of many Googlebombs...We wouldn't claim that this change handles every prank that someone has attempted.
I ask a very simple question again. Why are they tweaking the results to begin with?!
Google tweaks their algorithm all the time -- weekly and even more often -- trying to improve the quality of the search results for their end user. That's what you do with any algorithm that isn't quite measuring up to its intended purpose -- you keep fine-tuning it.
Tweaking the algo to perform better and hand-fixing the final results are two different things. In this case, the google-bombed results were clearly not what they wanted to serve up, so they found an algorthmic fix, finally, after many years.
Yes, this issue probably got some extra attention because several googlebombs have been a kind of black eye, a PR disaster of sorts.
What if Michael Moore decides to take the whole cultural phenomena and creates a movie called "Miserable Failure"?
Will it be able to rank? Will his site rank? Whitehouse.gov? :P
Tweaking the algo to perform better and hand-fixing the final results are two different things. In this case, the google-bombed results were clearly not what they wanted to serve up, so they found an algorthmic fix, finally, after many years.
Considering the only people looking for the terms "miserable failure" are those looking to see where those two sites ranked, I'd call that anti free-speech.
You can defend G all you want, I UNDERSTAND the business reasons...
Doesn't make it morally right, politically right, nor any indication that G is NOT manually putting sites like Wiki in the results to boost Adwords (Remember that thread?! God, i was actually defending Goog.)
I'd call that anti free-speech.
Actually, it is very pro-free speech.
Google is not the government. Free speech is about freedom from *government* interference with speech.
Google is a private entity with the freedom to express their opinion (SERPs).
Just as when the moderators decide to edit your post because of a TOS violation or because they just don't like you. They are not violating your freedom of speech,because they are not the government.
<added>And don't get in a huff when I used the term "your post", it was a generic reference. If you are around here long enough you will have posts edited or deleted.</added>
[edited by: BigDave at 12:20 am (utc) on Jan. 27, 2007]
So Google created a way to make that manipulation harder to accomplish. If morals really can enter in here at all, it's not moral to allow yourself to manipulated, and probably even less moral to do the manipulating.
But putting an end to the manipulation? That's quite moral.
First, spare me the Google's Free Speech rant.
I've said in this and many other threads, you can only go so long claiming "free speech", purposely filtering results, and then claiming impartiality in court.
That's a legal argument that I'm SURE will bite them in the back in the future...oh wait, it already did. (Thank you Belgium)
And obviously you and Tedster aren't seeing the LONG-TERM picture.
With Y! and MSN clearly not capable of competing against G in the SE wars. How long before, the "conspiracy theories" of niche sites purposefully being filtered in favor of bigname-selleverything.com being hand manipulated(err..algorithmically placed) into the results for WHATEVER REASON? Be it political, financial, just because they don't like YOUR posts in this forum?
Yes, now tell us how G won't fall down THAT slippery slope cause we all know people with LOTS of power always do the "moral" thing and never try to screw the little guy to get more power and money.
This also answers questions - if google bombs are used for "commercial purposes" and "sending 5000 links to one page for the same term doesn't work anymore"...
So Google created a way to make that manipulation harder to accomplish. If morals really can enter in here at all, it's not moral to allow yourself to manipulated, and probably even less moral to do the manipulating.
Wow, what country to you live in?
Manipulated? Again, the algo was doing EXACTLY what it was supposed to.
The liberals chose to "vote" for the white house.
The conservatives "voted" for Michael Moore. (poor choice, IMO. They could have done much better)
Saying the SERPS were manipulated in the equivalent of saying that candidates who understand the popular vote vs. the electoral college and choose to go for MOST electoral votes v. the most popular votes are "manipulating" the political system.
As an SEO, I understand that I can link to my favorite widgets store as "click here", "cool", or "widgets store". I also know that if I use "widget store" they have a better chance of being found by others for widgets.
Using that knowledge isn't "manipulating" the SERPS, it's making an INFORMED internet vote for that store.
Just because Google doesn't THINK it's the best widgets store should have NO bearing.
Again, if ANYONE is looking for "miserable failure" they are LOOKING for the whitehouse.gov and michealmoore.com. Period.
I could careless about what political pressures G has come under.
That's the sign of a immoral and corrupt company that simply doesn't say, "Hey, these are the DEMOCRATIC votes for the site, we don't hand manipulate our results because you don't agree"
(An argument they LOVE to make in court when someone claims otherwise)
[edited by: whitenight at 12:58 am (utc) on Jan. 27, 2007]
So back on topic -- has anyone got a clue, from the bombs that still work perhaps, how this fix works in detail?
Back on topic ;)
It doesn't, if 10% or more of the googlebombs that I know about are appearing, then they haven't really fixed anything. They simply hand-edited the results.
Good move on goog's part, some people took them literally and blamed google for "liberal bias" and so on.
IMO It's an icy slope when you make special changes (bias?) to the serps in order to correct some percieved 'bias', that wasnt really a bias to begin with.
OK, I'm making my own head hurt. Hopefully the new algo change is for the better.
It's axiomatic that algorithms can't handle 100% of problems like this without doing semantic analysis. It's equally axiomatic that nobody has figured out how to get computers to do semantic analysis yet.
That's like saying, "My e-mail provider only stops 90% of the spam e-mails (which, by the way, is probably close to true for all of us) Therefore, obviously, they have a person manually selecting which spam e-mails we will receive."
No, it's obvious that neither Google nor any e-mail provider have the staff to manually check these things. They are running automatic processes which do NOT do semantic analysis, but are keying off of numerical characteristics common to many (but not all) spam.
[edited by: lawman at 11:58 am (utc) on Jan. 29, 2007]
This would leave many smaller pranks active but break-up large schemes.
Though, I've seen other changes in not-so-competitive areas. One of my favorite areas to watch isn't very competitive, and seldom changes much for almost any keyword combination. Big Google changes come and go, and nothing much shifts for years. They just did, which is fascinating. Top 5 sites typically shifted down 15-20 spots, though some disappeared. I doubt the sites changed, the algorithm more likey did. The ones moving down usually had worked to have matching keyword links pointing at them.
This is an extraordinarily misguided statement.
Sigh. How many Googlebombs are there?
The actual scale of this change is pretty small (there are under a hundred well-known Googlebombs)
lol so if i can find 10% of 100, that's STATISTICALLY HUGE.
We're not talking hundreds of thousands of terms.
Which illustrates my point AGAIN.
They hand-edited (by using the algo) the hundred or so they KNEW about.
And perhaps placed a little algo tweak for .gov sites, Fortune 500 sites, etc
Big whoop.
The argument has little to do with actual Googlebombing... it has to do with them "censoring" their results and claiming they have "fixed" googlebombing.
:yawn: Seriously, this is the "bought link" discussion all over again,
let me know when they actually fix something that matters.
------
Btw - my gmail filters at least 99% of "spam" so maybe their algo team should consult their gmail team....
[edited by: HayMeadows at 3:54 am (utc) on Jan. 27, 2007]
If they actually HAVE instituted the new policy, "WHY are they announcing it to the outside world?
