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Now, seiously, Google has changed part of the algorithm. A catastrofic change, that has wiped out most popular sites, replacing those with spamy sites coming from, mostly, Dmoz listed link farms, and Dmoz "rotten" cats.
This is the the change:
Links from non-dmoz sites donīt count any more.
Thatīs all. You may have hundreds of links, but those links donīt count at all, unless the sites linking to you are themselves linked at Dmoz.
So, this is more ore less, in a very simplify way, how it works:
- Your site has 200 links, 2 of them from two sites listed at Dmoz.
- Mr Spammer has 5 links, the 5 of them listed at Dmoz, thanks to Mr Spammer post as a Dmoz Editor.
Mr Spammer wins. He has 5 valid links, and you only have 2. End of the game.
All the other rules are still there. Title, H1, number of keywords, and so on, they still work more or less the same. Good content? Sorry, googlebot has no criteria. Hundreds of end user "voting" you, Linking to you from personal web pages? Sorry, those donīt count any more.
All your bases belong to Dmoz. :-)
[edited by: Marcos at 4:30 am (utc) on Sep. 29, 2002]
The topic I was searching on was in no way related to the content of my website, so I was searching from an average Google users point of view. I have to be honest and say that , what ever they have altered is for the best. The results seam a lot more on topic and I had a lot less clutter to cut through before I got what I wanted. I think on here we are all to keen to say how bad the results are, when we arent up there at the top of the serps. Algos change, we just need to live with it and evolve. Google's aim is to provide their users with relevant results, not to give the rest of the web free traffic. From what I see they are sticking to their aim.
Hi pmac, figuring out a small change is easy. Understanding Google is a full time job, and itīs not my job. You said "get some fresh links from sites", well, thatīs not my business. Iīm into generating content, not briding corrupt Editor.
SuperSoup, Am I mad? >:-)
>it is simply not true that only dmoz links are showing
That is not what I said. Dmoz links are showing, but the anchor text they have do not count any more, thatīs all.
Oh man, we gotta start marrying the dmoz editors?
>are you saying that the yahoo directory holds no sway now?
I donīt know. It may. In any case, a site linking to you must be linked from an "Authoritative" site to have any effect. That authoritaive site can be Dmoz, and maybe others. Yahoo, or sites with a +8 PageRank COULD be working, also. But most of your likely sites, personal web pages, small private domains and so on, donīt count any more, unles those are linked at a "Authoritative" site.
I never got hurt, but if all these people had excellent content rich web sites with no spam,and got knocked into oblivion, then Google has a problem.
People use Google to get results. If they start getting spam. Then Google will drop like a rock.
Remember New Coke, how long that lasted?. Well think of this as New Google. Next month during the updates it will be replaced by Google Classic. The month after that it will be back to the old Google, and everybody will forget this diaster (all those that are still in business, that is).
Google still remains the most relevant search eangine today, let face it - how difficult do you think it would be to still get sensible results with the Internet and the way it is today? Try the same search on some of the other search engines - do you get better results?
Who knows? The main categories are not affected. Only the "competitive" cats are affected, where Dmoz corruption is more likely. Those cats are now at the mercy of spurious editor, sometimes corrupt, sometimes clueless, no reliable in any case. In a way, competitive cats have been randomiced.
And, further more, Google probably think that is a good thing: If you are at a conpetive category, use Adworks! Pay Us! They may think it is a way to destroy the SEO market, discurage the small time webmaster, and cash in with Adworks. Less money for the SEO means more money for Adworks, they may. Think.
Of course, this course of action may back fire. Google keeps on being an excelent resource for geting academic info, or freee stuf. But is you are going to use it to find letīs say a good hosting provider, a insurance reseler, or a new house, you are now much more likely to end up at a scam artist site than ever. Browsing with google is still fun, but buying is now dangerous.
[edited by: Marcos at 3:26 pm (utc) on Sep. 29, 2002]
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I have noticed that H tags dont count that much this time.
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Is very easy to understand:
keyword + keyword = Good Results
keyword + keyword + "major Keyword" = unreliable results
That is because when you factor in the "major Keyword", the power of Dmoz spammers, concentrated on that "mayor Keyword", ruing the query, unmbalancing it with its now much more powerfull value.
[edited by: Marcos at 3:27 pm (utc) on Sep. 29, 2002]
Still I think Google is the best and I hope they will never put those paid entries in there search.
the only little cretic could be that they do bane to many harmless sites and some of the bad ones with all spam that exists is still in the index.
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>in some cases, majorkeyword1, keyword, majorkeyword2 is weird but
>majorkeyword1, keyword is fine.
That is because majorkeyword2 is affected by some Dmoz twiking, and majorkeyword1 is not. Not all Dmoz categories are poisoned, only a few. Those poisoned will poison your query, others will not. Until now, popular linking was able to reduce the impact of poisoned categories. Now popular linking donīt count, only abuse prone Dmoz linking, and popular links sanctioned by Dmoz. That is DRASTICALY reducing the chances of geting a non-manipulated result in comercial cats.
I think this is not just a webmaster/SEO problem. General public MUST be alerted. Comercial querys at google, usualy more or les reliable, are now stuffet with Dmoz scam-artist. They MAY have betrayed public trust, puting consumers in danger.
We, webmasters, geeks, have been voicing for years Goggles "reliability". If the new algo prevail, that course must be reverted. We must esplaing that, if you put your money where google results is, chances are you end up losing it.
- Chose a competitive Keyword, and search it
- If the top positions are ocupied by Pagerank 7-10 sites, Forget about it, they are beyong good and evil ;-)
- Take a look at how many links does the top 10 sites have, using "keyword" in the anchor text.
- Count how many of those "linking sites" are linked at Dmoz.
- Test the theory: The more "linking sites" listed at dmoz, the higher the sites ranks in that query.
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