This is childish:

<<links.htm page filter: This filter penelizes a sites ranking determined by the use of a links.html page. Using reciprocal linking is a old technique that is not promoted by google anymore. This filter effects your ranking in the serps.

   How to work with this filter: Instead of using “links” as your page title and name try using something like “mynewbuddies” or “coolsites” as this will help get around this filter. Reciprocal links are old seo techniques and Google devalues reciprocal linking structures. >>

<<If your link is on a site who’s outbound links are related to casino’s and porn sites and your automotive site is an outbound link on this site then google will think your site is related to porn and casinos. Poorly constructed co-citation will damage your ranking and make it hard for you to rank well for the terms you are targeting.>>

I think most of this article is crap.. If this were true, I'd just have to start a casino links site and link to my competitors to watch them fall out of the rankings.

The same is true about what he says of link farms. It doesn't make sense to be penalized for having your link anywhere, because that's outside of your control. Sure, they can not count spammy links (like these).. but I can't see Google penalizing for things outside of a webmaster's control.

My answer is very simple:

Creat content, not to copy, if really like the articles, us "hand" not machine link to them.

Hey Ionut Alex. Chitu and Ryan,

There is an effect called co-citation. This was not created by Joe Whyte but he does sound like he does his research. Jim boykin knows about co-citation .. look here http://www.jimboykin.com/co-citation-understanding-how-it-effects-your-seo/

If you do not know about this effect then you do know but it is not something he made up on a whim. Do your research because your comment's make you sound like you know nothing about seo.

I found a nice thread over at webmaster world and lots of people think there is a filter on the links.htm page.

Check it out and learn.

http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/3110528.htm

*The helper*, I don't care about SEO. But it's silly to say that Google looks for files named links.html. It's just a name, and you shouldn't assume anything about it.

Helper, I'm not arguing about the point of co-citation..

I'm arguing that there probably isn't a penalty for it.

Instead, the penalty in this case would probably apply to the casino site that has all kinds of links to non-related sites.... NOT to the non related sites.

Example: if someshadysite.com links to my blog...

someshadysite.com could get a penalty for being a link farm (depending upon who else they link to)

My link on someshadysite.com wouldn't be given any weight. It would be ignored by the algorithm.

Any other way makes the algorithm very easy to abuse. If you don't belive me try it.

Purchase a ton of shady links for one of your competitors and see if it lowers their ranking. I bet it won't.

Phillip.. you need to change your comments. I can't say any words like p i l l ??

[quote=Ryan]Purchase a ton of shady links for one of your competitors and see if it lowers their ranking. I bet it won't.[/quote]

I've seen rankings drop by doing this. Have YOU tried it.

You guys are looking at these filters with WAY TOO MUCH WEIGHT. Take them with a grain of salt. These filters are something to think about when designing or implementing SEO. In the future, some of these filters might be applied more heavily, or not at all. But the fact of the matter is no one really knows, so just keep in the back of your head.

And also, please...if you have PROBABLY in your sentence, you should stop typing. Testing and "well...gee...i think" or "...it probably deoesn't/does" is bullshit in the SEO world. Have facts before you speak.

Adam.. there are no facts in the SEO world when talking about how an algorithm works.

how can you say stuff like "nobody really knows" in your first paragraph, and then lambaste me for using probably when I talk about how the Google algorithm works?

Did you even read your post? You just did something, and then yelled at me for doing it.

There are no facts to be had in this case. They're unobtainable. No test can even provide (with any certainty) an accurate estimate of how it works. There's no way.

The fact of the matter is that it can't be tested, it can only be looked at with common sense. It can't be tested because there are hundreds of factors that can't be stabilized – thus no scientific method will work.

Common sense says that it would be a bad thing for Google if your ranking could be penalized by forces outside of your control. (that's not to say it can't be rewarded by other factors... that also says that what you may percieve as a penalty could be the result of others being rewarded...ad infintum..)

Anyway, I'm done with this argument. My point is that this article says a lot of stuff that he can't back up, and that doesn't seem to pass the common sense test. If you choose to believe it, that's your perogitive. Good luck with it.

OK, we were debating this article in house here at work... so I'm not done with it.

I posted what I think is wrong with it on my blog, http://www.dotcult.com/common-sense-seo

Ryan = you give SEO's a bad name. Its obvious you do not know what you are talking about.

Helper.. please tell me how I'm wrong.

I do not see any evidence that I can get your site banned simply by linking to it from other places.

In fact, if you'd like.. I will set up a website specifically for you to get banned from google (without hacking into it, hijacking my DNS, etc..) simply by getting me links in bad neighborhoods.

I bet you can't do it.

That article was really not worth linking to. Anyone who doesn't know that TrustRank is a Yahoo! algorithm isn't a 1st-tier source of information in my SEO book.

[Agree with Micheal]

This article is pure drivel. Very few of the points hold up.

Ryan – it doesn't seem to me like you should waste time arguing with someone whose relationship to the original author is probably – ooops, I said "probably", I need to stop typing now... :-)

Great Article. Thanks for posting this Philipp.

[michael martinez]= can you prove trust rank is for yahoo?

I agree with the list. Nice job joe!!!

Ryan = You said you wanted proof of gaining links to fast to get banned by a search engine. Well aaron walls mentions this and gives proof. He is an seo guru so I would highly doubte you would give a contradictory response to someone like him.

http://www.seobook.com/archives/001550.shtml

I hope this helps you on your quest of learning SEO.