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Does Google Have an Anti-Linkjuice Flag?  (View post)

rick gregory [PersonRank 1]

Monday, July 10, 2006
17 years ago4,973 views

And if this is the case, why doesn't Google just tell us? So much of Google's rules are shrouded... Some of this is probably necessary for business reasons, but a lot of it simply seems to be secrecy for its own sake.

Also, what would happen if a webmaster didn't buy links from high PR sites, but rather did some legwork, made relevant sites aware if her own site, and asked for a link if the linking site thought it would be useful? No money trades hands, and Google would likely claim that this link is a valid 'vote', but does this vote have the same relevance as it would if the site owner hadn't been asked for the link? What if there are reciprocal links?

alek [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Google is kinda between a rock and a hard place here IMHO.

Like it or not, PageRank/Links has currency these days, so good old fashioned capitalism is coming into play. Philipp recently mentioned W3C's $1,000/year PR9 links – http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2006-07-07.html#n10 – that includes commentary from MattCutts (at Google) strongly implying that they would not pass reputation.

But this isn't anything "new" – remember the dust-up with O'Reilly selling links – http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2005/08/search_engine_s_2.html – and a LOT of mainstream media sites sell what looks, smells, and tastes (just don't step in it!) like keyword links – an example at the bottom of the main paper in Hawaii – http://starbulletin.com/

So while Google (and yes, OTHER search engines – we forget about them sometimes) want to maintain good relevant results, where exactly does it draw the line on passing reputation?

I'm not a lawyer (nor do I participate in link buying/selling), but I might ask the question that if Google shows page rank
on the linking page and shows a backlink to the linked-to page, but then does NOT pass reputation due to this "hidden" flag, that THEY might be liable for false representaton and could be named in a lawsuit.

Facinating to watching all the interplay at work here and shows some of the limitations of the basic PageRank algorithm people become aware an game ^H^H^H^H optimize for it – we live in interesting times! ;-)

Cristian Mezei [PersonRank 5]

17 years ago #

>> text links do lose some of their value

No Philipp. They will loose 96% of their initial value.

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I think it depends on the type of link, really. Some advertisers don't care about PageRank and want to advertise on a site to be seen, and there's a variety of options for that: banner ads, text ads, Google ads...

Adam Lasnik [PersonRank 2]

17 years ago #

Matt's already commented about this subject, but it's likely worth revisiting this line from the Google Webmaster Guidelines:
(http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769)
"Don't participate in link schemes <em>designed to increase your site's ranking or PageRank</em>." [emphasis mine]

* * *

Rick, in response to your note:
<blockquote>[...] why doesn't Google just tell us? So much of Google's rules are shrouded... Some of this is probably necessary for business reasons, but a lot of it simply seems to be secrecy for its own sake. [...]</blockquote>

...from my experience here at Google, we don't keep things under wraps just for the fun of it. Before we disclose information (about our algorithms, about what triggers certain actions, etc.), we have to take into account:
- Competitors
- Bad actors (and no, I don't mean Keanu Reeves)
- Upcoming and/or frequent changes in our algorithms, policies, etc.

With that said, I'm personally happy to see the company as a whole moving towards more openness (per Eric Schmidt's recent comments); it's all a fine balance, and I know we're trying to do the right thing here.

/pd [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Hey Adam, I think it is getting more opened . we can all see that happening here and with the interaction with google employees..

but what I think is also needed is a strong support for the CRM stuff..

Matt Cutts [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I think I've said somewhere in the past that sites that sell PageRank via links can lose their ability to pass PageRank in Google. I don't think too many people would be surprised by that notion.

Jojo [PersonRank 1]

17 years ago #

It´s nothing new that some websites aren´t passing Pagerank and linklove because they are apparently selling textlinks. This are mostly websites with a very high Pagerank.

graywolf [PersonRank 1]

17 years ago #

So if you can turn off the faucet on page rank can you turn it off on trust rank? are they seperate knobs like hot and cold or are they connected?

patrick slavenburg [PersonRank 0]

17 years ago #

Much of the focus on high PR is the logarithmic scale it represents. The assumption is the high authority site. But.. you can still use PR if you redefine what means a high authority site exactly. Personally I would not be surprised if a large amount of links from PR 4-7, which can still be achieved by natural links as opposed to buying text links, would count higher than a small amount of links of a PR9, 10 site. This is even aside from trustrank, which in combination with a specific theme would suggest a certain clustering.

Cristian Mezei [PersonRank 5]

17 years ago #

>> So if you can turn off the faucet on page rank can you turn it off on trust rank? are they seperate knobs like hot and cold or are they connected?

Matt did say that the websites which sell links for PR will loose their ability to transfer PR AND keyword (anchor) weight. Maybe I misunderstood what you asked ?

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Well, yeah a page (from what we heard now) can keep its PageRank yet at the same time lose its PageRank-passing ability.

Cristian Mezei [PersonRank 5]

17 years ago #

Yes. That's what I'm saying. Keeps all the properties by itself, but doesn't pass any to any external reference.

graywolf [PersonRank 1]

17 years ago #

I'm of the opinion there's internal page rank and published or toolbar page rank. I'm also of the opinion there's a trust rank score. Hard to say if trust rank is internal page rank or if they are just similar but different.

For example you could have lots and lots of link from sites that were untrusted, your page rank could go up but your trust rank would be low (overly simplified example for clarity purpose). Alternatively you could have a medium level page rank but all from high trust rank websites. This would allow you to rank for terms purely on internal anchor text (another overly simplified example but something I definitely see)

Cristian Mezei [PersonRank 5]

17 years ago #

Man, your post makes a lot of sense ..

Abhilash [PersonRank 1]

17 years ago #

Thanks, Graywolf.

That also answered my question that Cristian & MC's posts were begging: "If a site can lose it's ability to pass PR & Trust, then how does that affect the sites (& advertisers)? Would G then take it a step further to devalue the sites that are being *linked to* on those now-distrusted yet High-PR sites?

Unfortunately, your well-thought out post means YES, it's going to affect the sites that are linked to as well (via trust rank albeit not PR). I say unfortunately because this really opens the door for some websites to manipulate the trust rank of their competitors. It would be absolutely feasible then for a new sort of savvy albeit expensive sabotauge: "bowl for competitors' trust rank".

It's either that Trust cannot be affected by the sites that link are selling links (which seems to not be the case), or else the door is open for "trust rank bowling".

Some responses would be really appreciated here...

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