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steveb, I believe the 64.x.x.x data center has the change, but I'm not positive. We use different terminology inside Google. :)
Powdork, I'm not sure if you'd call it an update exactly (different algorithms play more of a role than different data). But I'm guessing the change will probably roll out over the course of the weekend.
What seems to be the heaviest areas of penalization so far?
Wow... Pretty dismal for me. The sites that stole number one from me for my key phrases are all redirects to porn, yay! exactly what my visitors wanted.
Send a report to GG as per request earlier in the thread - this is the kind of feedback I thing they need.
I do know that I rank better for terms that are relevant but that I have not heavily optimised for and that I am lower for terms that I have heavily optimised for. I have a few throw away domains that I have not done much with which are now my star performers...
The nice thing about this is I feel that I can now focus on content as opposed to rubbish to get people to the pages I really want them to see...
Well done google!
Thanks GG
I'm still #3 and #4 for my most important SERP, behind 2 pages on a site that is arguably as relevant as mine, if not more so. No whining here.
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Unlike Austin, the links are not as up to date. Look about two weeks old... which is in line with what Google Guy said about this not being an update like old dances as much as a shift, a data shift.
[edited by: steveb at 11:33 pm (utc) on Feb. 13, 2004]
I also have a question for anyone who has a valid answer. I would like to start following the datacenter serps on a regular basis, does anyone have a full list of all of the IP address of the datacenters and if possible a blurb about each ie, what its used for or what region its for?
Funny how G has suddenly gone from broke to never better!
GG and a few posters here (?SteveB) all said it was "work in progress" a long time ago.
I am noticing many sites that are doing well PR wise, are doing better than my site that they link to using those key phrases.
Example: Site about bears linking to my new site about frogs using "Froggy web site" but has no on page optimization for "froggy" but does have optimization for "web site" is killing my site for "froggy web site"
BTW GG, the results are far superior than those seen since November 16.
I would give your business plan some real thought.
I would rather be #8 surrounded by irrelevant c**p results than #1 surrounded by viable competitors. This update is going to cost me.
I pretty much have to agree, except that people are not very likely to sift thruogh 7 piles of ... to get to the real product.
I got hit pretty hard here, but my sites are new and were doing a lot better than I expected to begin with so I guess it's back to work.
Then you are being dangerously shortsighted.
If you have a high quality site, you better darn well want to be surrounded by the similarly high quality sites in your niche, because if this is the case it means Google is getting it right, and there is little (or much less) chance of you being accidentally or bizarrely lost.
People who want their sites to be jewels among doodoo have at best a one month vision, because at the next update they might be arbitrarily dropped and replaced by doodoo too.
What Florida and Austin and now Brandy have all done is value real, quality non-lightweight authoritative pages. Hopefully this is another step in the process where Google figures out how to better assign more niche relevance, as well as genuine niche authority.
If in my niche and all across the Internet great sites are ranking well, I for one sleep a lot better.
My only concern is that I see a lot of sites that have built themselves into an authoratative site with the push of a button, doing very well (dynamic and other generated spam).
..."balance of commercial and info sites"...
..."That’s the way, uh-huh uh-huh, I like it!"...
The upheaval can be very good for the people who are still there after their competition vanished, and many webmasters have recently had a taste of high rankings, even though they were previously buried.
If you have a high quality site, you better darn well want to be surrounded by the similarly high quality sites in your niche, because if this is the case it means Google is getting it right, and there is little (or much less) chance of you being accidentally or bizarrely lost.
Steveb, I was referring to a serendipitous turn of events that a choice few sites were blessed with after the Florida-Austin updates. I never expected it to last
I can't fault the sentiment Steve, but if you have a high quality commercial site and now you're top in Google with the rest of the top10 being high quality non-commercial sites (or manufacturers that don't sell to the public), then you're likely to do well.
Thank you ciml
To add some meaningful discussion (gossip?) the timing of this is coincidentally close to the date Yahoo is preparing to drop Google. Perhaps Google was doing some major algoritm testing at the expense of its largest partner? Perhaps G wanted to iron out the kinks before moving out on its own. Furthermore, they may have wanted to throw everyone into a loop and slow down competitors. Finally, what if this was a direct effort to get webmasters and SEO companies to remove spam, irrelevant links, and bogus design practices from their websites? I know many people who made drastic changes to hundereds of pages in blind hopes that they would be graced by good works.
This is what i love about search engine marketing. Reverse engineering based on pure speculation.
Rev up the conspiracy engine!
Anyone else seeing this?
Everyone is happy as he--
Not everyone. Looks like I will be hurt on two major single keywords, though I held up well overall.
On the other hand, the results are generally relevant, so I can't make any general complaints. Time to do some studying.
WBF
gg, what are you guys doing with the best *cities* + vertical. the uneven application of the algo logic with a bent toward the most important cities continues to raise our eyebrows.
sure we will take cincinnati, omaha, tampa, indianapolis, et al., but seattle, san francisco, chicago, nyc, et al. would be nice. even nicer, would be consistancy in the application of the algo. the contradications are painful.
this is how speculation begins.
