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Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

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Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#131

Post by damoncali »

magicalist wrote: post #32
damoncali wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government may some day think otherwise. Google's monopoly on search is substantial enough that they risk much by eschewing fairness in favor of quality. I would tread very lightly if I were in Google's shoes.

Good luck defining "fairness". That regulation is going to go really well.

I hate the word myself as it means little outside of sports.

However, there is a very real perception of "fairness", and often the status quo defines that perception. Whatever changes Google makes will be interpreted as unfair by someone, and given their dominant status - that could be a problem if enough people get nervous.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#132

Post by jacquesm »

mattezell wrote: post #121
jacquesm wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't particularly care what you call it. Back-links that were placed at your behest are spam to me.

Ah, I got you... So you were stating your personal opinion on back-links, rather than stating a factual observation about organic back-links being similar to unicorns... You're stance definitely makes more sense as an opinion - unlike factual statements, opinions afford space for both fact and fallacy (i.e. "it is either organic or you're building links.")... When stating things in a matter of fact manner ("...There…

The confusion is in your head, but I doubt I'm going to dispel it. Google managed to improve over altavista because it used something that wasn't abused by spammers yet: links. As soon as spammers (like you) realized that they could game the system once again and reduce search to a game of who most effectively manages to spoil the soup by introducing untold billions of meaningless backlinks into the game page-rank's days were numbered. So now we're more or less back where we started.

I personally don't think there is a metric that you could come up with that can't be gamed but it saddens me that the quality of the web is spoiled in such a crass way. Props to google for trying to combat it. I wish you much good luck at breaking some more windows.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#133

Post by rubinelli »

eieio wrote: post #98
rubinelli wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it ironic? Developers moved to the web to avoid becoming sharecroppers in Microsoft's fields, and now we are even more dependent on Google's goodwill. And what options are left? App stores.

Separate from the fact that a comparison between sharecropping and developing for Microsoft is absolutely absurd, pretending like the only jobs available in the developer community are dependent on either Google or app stores is ridiculous. It's not ironic, and it's not true. Being a developer gives more freedom and more pay than the vast majority of jobs. The fact that there are some developer jobs that are gasp dep…

It may sound absurd today, but there was a time when every small to medium-sized software company was trying to be successful, but not TOO successful, lest it attracted Microsoft's attention to its market.

And you're right that a developer/entrepreneur doesn't have only Google and app stores as choices, but the options don't go much further than that. Facebook and Twitter, perhaps? In the end, the company that controls your customer acquisition channel controls you.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#134

Post by kruipen »

Trapick wrote: post #83
ckluis wrote: post #3

Matt if you read hackernews. This is bullshit. Spam links should count for 0 value not negative value.

That's idiotic. If spam links counted for 0 (when caught) there would be no disincentive for everyone to use them. The appropriate way is for them to count negative but have some way of legitimate sites disavowing them at some kind of time or effort cost (oh wait, that's what the system currently is). If you have a better system let's hear it.

Is the disavow tool not available to those who tried to use spam links and got caught? I suspect the opposite actually. Those who automate link creation, also automate link disavowing. So the spam links probably have more penalizing effect on the innocent.

Still probably the right trade-off from GOOG's perspective, as long as black hat SEO has bigger negative effect on relevance than negative SEO.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#135

Post by tomkarlo »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #93
apalmer wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely get you from a human level. From a business level google's job is to sell ads, it sell ads by providing valuable search results 'for free', and one part of the intrinsic quality of the search results is that they are 'good' in the sense that you describe. Aside from that google really doesnt owe anyone anything, if tomorrow google found that showing small businesses search results negatively affected the…

Isn't it a bit scary that the entire internet (and by association a huge chunk of the overall economy) is effectively beholden to a company that "doesn't owe anybody anything"? I mean we wouldn't tolerate an energy supplier disconnected arbitrary supplies because they didn't feel like selling there any more.

In the case of subsidized, "merchant" (free-market, privately financed) energy suppliers, they do in fact disconnect when they don't feel like selling.

If you have a gas-powered merchant plant, and the spark spread isn't good, you turn it off until energy prices rise again. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spark_spread

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#136

Post by Caligula »

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #123

Note: this article is over a year old. The article makes it sound as if this is some new pronouncement, but it's really not. I've been using the language mentioned in this article since 2010, at least: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/calling-for-link-spam-reports/... where I said "we’ve said in the past that we work very hard to prevent competitor A from hurting competitor B." The change on the official guidelines come…

It just seems like such a bizarre game we are required to play. I am picturing you jeering at us to "dance monkey dance".

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#137

Post by lingben »

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #123

Note: this article is over a year old. The article makes it sound as if this is some new pronouncement, but it's really not. I've been using the language mentioned in this article since 2010, at least: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/calling-for-link-spam-reports/... where I said "we’ve said in the past that we work very hard to prevent competitor A from hurting competitor B." The change on the official guidelines come…

Matt, no amount of hand-waving will convince people when there is ample evidence of negative SEO, including meticulous case studies published online.

As well, the very fact that Google has given in and introduced the disavow tool, it is incontrovertible proof that negative SEO is effective.

Google had a good run but you have not been able to keep up with those who have striven day and night to beat your algos. The question is, can google play catch up? and do so in time?

Several billions of dollars are riding on that question.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#138

Post by saraid216 »

tomjen3 wrote: post #57
larrys wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The PageRank algorithm seems broken to me." Imagine thinking that the "honor system" would actually not be gamed! Pagerank was designed a long time ago and suffers from a way of thinking that academics such as Page and Brin have. The same thing happened with email once the cat got out of the bag on that. Or on craigslist.org - Bottom line is not anticipating what would happen when widespread use of a product occurs…

Well the cure is pretty simple. You can apply pagerank in to calculate the reputation of each site and then multiply that number with the value of the outgoing link, using normal page rank. How do you get the reputation information? Well you need a network of creators, people, so that you can capture the social interactions between them.

And over two years ago, Google began a major attempt to reinvent themselves. I hear it's called "Plus".

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#139

Post by hippich »

Matt_Cutts wrote: post #123

Note: this article is over a year old. The article makes it sound as if this is some new pronouncement, but it's really not. I've been using the language mentioned in this article since 2010, at least: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/calling-for-link-spam-reports/... where I said "we’ve said in the past that we work very hard to prevent competitor A from hurting competitor B." The change on the official guidelines come…

Two problems - this disavow tool is not prominent in webmaster tools, second - have no clue how long it takes. Recently I found TONS of obviously spam links pointing to my site and tried to use this tool. After two weeks - no noticeable results. I.e. no feedback.

Overall - whole no-feedback nature of your SE is what bothers me the most. Just put rules upfront, give some feedback to webmasters and ignore seo gamers.

Re: Negative SEO: Looking for Answers from Google

#140

Post by jlgreco »

nhebb wrote: post #126
arbuge wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really a "bulk" solution at all... "- Edit the file so it contains just the undesirable links." That's the part where intensive manual labor comes in, weeding through those links one by one.

Oh, I know. I guess we're supposed to be thankful for being able to submit a single file, though. I also noticed that the help page states " (the file type must be .txt and it must be encoded in UTF-8 or 7-bit ASCII) ". How many non-technical people even know what that means?

How many websites that are concerned with SEO cannot find somebody who can know what that means for them?

And what are the chances that if somebody doesn't know what that means they will mess it up? It is not like UTF-8/ASCII is something that you have to go out of your way to choose.. it is going to be what is defaulted to.

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