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A glitch in the SEO matrix

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Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#31

Post by samwillis »

superasn wrote: post #21

It's so weird that Google still hasn't created the ability to block spam domains. I don't think it's a technical difficulty but rather a management decision to allow spam as long as they have their adsense ads and it baffles me they just don't care about their end users at all. I think being a monopoly with most competitors lagging a lap behind can make you this way, but with chatgpt catching up quick, Google better…

Most of these spam content farms are covered with ads supplied by Google. The incentive isn't necessarily there to remove them.

On top of that the worse the search results, the more likely the user will click an ad rather than an organic result. The Google of old wouldn't have been tempted by that incentive, but that Google is long dead.

Bad search result = more revenue from ads.

Obviously it's a fine balance, they don't want to loose users, but they will have the metrics to (religiously) work from.

As someone who used to run ad campaigns on Google until a couple of years ago, they are doing the same to advertisers. Users will happily click an ad, go back to the result and try another, many many times. Google have systematically made the advertising on search results worse, showing ads more regularly for poorer placements, removing control and visible auditing. It's all so they can extract more revenue from the advertisers.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#32

Post by safety1st »

ceejayoz wrote: post #5
whispersnow wrote: post #3

I am waiting for the era when SEO world is totally disrupted or destroyed by AIGC

The SEO world is gonna love AIGC. I'm sure it's already in wide usage there; it makes the convincing-but-fake review websites trivial to stand up in quantity. It's the real content that's going to get disrupted/destroyed.

Yes, I know a few SEO/SEMs. They're ecstatic at the moment with how much easier and cheaper AI has made it for them to pump out shitty content.

This is already underway and it's already the case that Google is sending you to a bunch of mediocre articles that were written mostly by an AI. The real question is what happens once that trend compounds over the next 2-3 years. It is working right now so it is going to 10x.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#33

Post by Regnore »

arbuge wrote: post #25
brucethemoose2 wrote: post #23

The root cause of all this madness: Ads. As long as there is even a marginal financial incentive to get human eyeballs on websites (as opposed to the viewers actually playing for services or, you know, just hosting websites for free because they are cool), this will keep getting worse. A genuine desire to help incoming traffic doesn't really matter either. Anything helpful will be infinitely cloned, as long as there…

No it's not just ads at all. SEO drives traffic. There are many ways to monetize such traffic, and ads are just one. A lot of SEO is driven by local business owners who hire SEO people with dubious track records that make big promises. They invariably clutter up their websites with 10,000 articles along the lines of "best plumber in dallas". It's funny you mention ads though. One reason that it's so hard to find an S…

The problem isn't that websites owners want to promote their website to the top of the search results, the problem is that Google's financial interests are aligned with those pages instead of its users.

If Google was putting significant resources towards combating SEO spam instead of encouraging it, the sites returned from a query (e.g. the sites that make Google the most money) would be the ones that the user most wanted, not the ones that maximally participate in Google's ad-extortion business.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#34

Post by titzer »

safety1st wrote: post #28
dazc wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was removed because it was being gamed from the outset. The workable alternative would be a 'Social Credit' system where some domains can be blocked if enough of the 'right people' want them blocked. Google running a social credit system may have unintended consequences though.

I realize this is anathema to Google, but they could always pay a human being to investigate the domains that receive the most spam reports, and make a decision about it based on human judgment. One wonders how much bullshit might have been solved through a .005% increase in Google's payroll...

Having worked at Google for almost 10 years, I can say that almost any solution proposed that includes "we'll have a person look at this with their eyes" would be instantly discounted as unworkable. The reality distortion field towards automatic everything with computers is intense.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#35

Post by cwkoss »

brucethemoose2 wrote: post #23

The root cause of all this madness: Ads. As long as there is even a marginal financial incentive to get human eyeballs on websites (as opposed to the viewers actually playing for services or, you know, just hosting websites for free because they are cool), this will keep getting worse. A genuine desire to help incoming traffic doesn't really matter either. Anything helpful will be infinitely cloned, as long as there…

Education is the path out of this: advertised products are ALWAYS worse value. You are overpaying to fund convincing the next sucker.

The market is pretty efficient, and there are always alternatives. If you aren't lazy, you can save a huge amount of money by not buying advertised products.

On the rare occasions I see an ad for something cool that I want, I search for it on aliexpress and 90% of the time find it for 1/3 the price.

Whenever someone tells you that they bought something because of an ad, you should make them feel a little embarrassed about it. There should be mild social punishment for admitting an ad hijacked your brain and made you get out your wallet - it means you're a sucker, a rube, a feebleminded lazybones.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#36

Post by izzymiller »

divbzero wrote: post #29

OP will soon be ranking for the exact phrase he discusses. (If we discuss “a comprehensive ecosystem of open-source software for big data management” enough, perhaps we can get this thread to rank too.)

I am really hoping so. my last paragraph:

    PS: secretly, I hope that this post starts ranking for “a comprehensive ecosystem of open source software for big data management”, which is why I have said it verbatim so many times and added a helpful callout at the top for students. To be honest, I'd settle for the 19th spot: just above highadviser.com.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#38

Post by coldpie »

superasn wrote: post #21

It's so weird that Google still hasn't created the ability to block spam domains. I don't think it's a technical difficulty but rather a management decision to allow spam as long as they have their adsense ads and it baffles me they just don't care about their end users at all. I think being a monopoly with most competitors lagging a lap behind can make you this way, but with chatgpt catching up quick, Google better…

> I don't think it's a technical difficulty but rather a management decision to allow spam as long as they have their adsense ads

It is absolutely this, yes. They tell people where to go, and they also profit from the ads they put on the places they tell people to go, and they have no real competition[1]. It has made them one of the most valuable companies on the planet. There is no incentive for them to rank higher quality results over ad-filled pages.

We need to break up big tech.

[1] https://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/un...

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#39

Post by guerrilla »

superasn wrote: post #21

It's so weird that Google still hasn't created the ability to block spam domains. I don't think it's a technical difficulty but rather a management decision to allow spam as long as they have their adsense ads and it baffles me they just don't care about their end users at all. I think being a monopoly with most competitors lagging a lap behind can make you this way, but with chatgpt catching up quick, Google better…

> they just don't care about their end users at all.

They do, a lot actually. We're just not the end users. The advertisers are. Thet don't need to care about us since they're a monopoly. Use Brave Search, DuckDyckGo or something elae to help change that. Get other people to too.

Re: A glitch in the SEO matrix

#40

Post by plagiarist »

titzer wrote: post #30

After having used computers for a few years (oh, about 30), and having grown up with the internet (first dialup at age 16 in 1996), I gotta say, Access to information should not have (ranked, optimizable, commercially-bent) search as its base interface. This is a cosmic, civilization-level screwup. Not only do you get the decades of SEO and advertising, but the whole system becomes lossy over time. You can't find wha…

Google was absolutely incredible when it first showed up. Now it is not great. When I want information all it gives me is shopping or listicles one step removed from shopping.
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