Earlier quoted context omitted.
TravelSupermarket have been doing this as a long-term strategy and get away with it. http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!searchin/webmasters/... I'm hoping someone from Google can explain, or at least commit to investigate why the leading brand in our niche (travel) has escaped a Penguin 2.0 demotion. It may come across as sour grapes as yes, we were demoted following Penguin 2, due to links built by an SEO agenc…
Algorithmic penalties could be already in place for this domain. I would be surprised if google places any weight on these type of links you posted. However due to their overall activity they may be getting a lot genuine stuff their way too, which could be a reason why they still rank above others in this "black-grey-heavy" industry.
Re: Google SEO Starter Guide [pdf]
#61I hear what you are saying, but if a site can rank position 1 for almost all relevant search terms with an algorithmic penalty then clearly the penalty is not severe enough. They really have our niche by the balls so I can't believe there is a penalty. It's disheartening to know that google simply will not acknowledge this. We've reported on WMF a few times and made various other attempts to make them aware of this blatant 'cheating'. Why can't they (Cutts himself viewed this thread) at least say what you have said. "They have a penalty, but we still rank them higher than everyone else" or as is more likely the case "they are a HUGE adwords customer so we wouldn't want to upset them". It stinks.