We Have Been De-googled • Hacker News Board

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#21

Post by nfnaaron » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:39 PM UTC

nicara wrote: post #6

[deleted] wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

This isn't about IMDB, it's about Studio Briefing. And regardless of whether you consider it garbage or not, it might have had value to other people - which is why they were using it, I suppose - and it appears Google has been unreasonable in taking it off the index / shutting down the ads. Either that, or we're just hearing one side of the story.

"Either that, or we're just hearing one side of the story."

And likely that's all we'll ever hear.

Ads are bad enough, but to be de-indexed, with no way to know why or how to fix it is scary from a business point of view. It could, and does, happen to anyone.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#22

Post by FreeRadical » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:41 PM UTC

aditya wrote: post #17

nailer wrote: post #7

Is the title perhaps vague or misleading? studiobriefing.net appears to have been delisted, not IMDB itself. Saying 'we', given the domain, kind of implies IMDB - I appreciate it's a quote, but it's out of context.

Which begs the question as to why this is on imdb at all? Is imdb syndicating their "film news"?

Maybe just raising awareness

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#23

Post by protomyth » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:46 PM UTC

Studio Brief had a much more prominent place on IMDB in the news section. It consists on little snippets of news about the entertainment industry.

For an example entry: http://www.studiobriefing.net/studiobriefing.net/FILM_NEWS/E...

The page has a title, selectable text article, ad column to right, and user comments. It is much like a digg page (heavier on article, less clutter).

The only real thing I see wrong with the page is the empty title tag. I wonder if this set off some issues. It certainly makes it hard to have multiple pages in tabs.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#24

Post by zen53 » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:46 PM UTC

With potentially the worst meta title tag of all time "" on all news pages...they had no chance of been indexed.

Fix this and the URL structure - back in the game (dont know if that is positive for anyone though - couldn't see any value in the posts).

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#25

Post by swombat » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:47 PM UTC

Move along, nothing to see. Flagged this, as it's non-news... "crappy spammy-looking site gets delisted from Google". The only notable aspect of this is that somehow IMDb is syndicating this trash.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#26

Post by anigbrowl » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:49 PM UTC

My heart bleeds. If you've ever tried to remove or alter one's personal information in IMDB (I am aware that this article references a blog operated by IMDB rather than the IMDB itself), all you get is a boilerplate non-response, even as a paid subscriber to the pro version. A company which declines to allow its users any control over the privacy of their information has no business whining about being fobbed off by Google.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#27

Post by zachware » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:49 PM UTC

Have they checked website optimizer? Google isn't a call me and let's talk about it company. It has very efficient and streamlined tools to help people figure out what is wrong.

There's a good chance there is an indexing problem that could easily be rectified if they just check webmaster tools.

(PS. Ditto on the misleading URL)

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#28

Post by Readmore » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:49 PM UTC

I had the same sort of thing happen to my blog. Google refused to show my ads due to 'landing page or ad quality' but I couldn't ever determine what the problem was or get anyone to review the site after that.

If Google has an achilles heel it's definitely lack of customer service.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#29

Post by rbanffy » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:56 PM UTC

Readmore wrote: post #28

I had the same sort of thing happen to my blog. Google refused to show my ads due to 'landing page or ad quality' but I couldn't ever determine what the problem was or get anyone to review the site after that. If Google has an achilles heel it's definitely lack of customer service.

Same with my blog. It appears on search, but one day they decided something fishy was going on with the ads and simply terminated the service. The automated e-mail said I could appeal and the appeal resulted in a "yes, it pretty much was something fishy" automated message. No further information, just silence and a warning that they would ignore messages about this subject from that point on.

AdSense needs competition. Badly.

Re: We Have Been De-googled

#30

Post by Frazzydee » Wed, Dec 02, 2009, 7:59 PM UTC

Maciek416 wrote: post #19

gvb wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, they claim google is no longer indexing their site: "Not only did Google delete the Adsense advertisements appearing on the blog, but it diverted its spider from the site as well. As a result, StudioBriefing.net ceased being cited in Google search results."

The original article is one giant PNG file (i.e. no actual plain text), so perhaps Google's bots don't see much content on the site. It's rather amazing that the site owners do this and yet claim to be mystified by Google's actions -- really?

The site seems to be pretty high-profile, and I seriously doubt they are "mystified." Looks to me like they're trying to drum up support and/or attention, and this post making it to #1 of HN indicates that their strategy may be working.