It is unreasonable inasmuch as it is bullying site owners in to compliance, forcing them to disclose information. I think that this is the case. The central effect of flagging a site as spam is not a quality assurance issue. It is influencing these sites' behaviour. The use the fear of Google taking away their traffic as a way of forcing compliance. That is what I have a problem with.
As an internal policy or part of their algorithm, do whatever you want. But that is not what they are doing. The point of the policy, the point of this publicly declared part of their secret sauce is not to recognise and flag spam sites, it is to intimidate sites into stopping a practice which hurts Google. It is the effects of the intimidation not the effects of the flagging which are substantial. I think it is also safe to say that they are the purpose of the policy.
> Sure it is, spam makes search less useful for users, keeping it out is most definitely a quality assurance issue.
Not exactly. Site X with text links on it is not (necessarily) less useful then a site with declared ads on it. The quality assurance issue is the effect these have on Google's ability to analyse the web. Google's way of preventing site X from doing this is by intimidating. They are not removing the site because it is so spamy that they don't want it on their search results (a case that is equivalent to HN deciding to ban a site). They are doing it because they want these sites to comply with some sort of practice. It is the publicity and threat of these penalties which are their 'raison d'etre.'
I have no problem at all with Google using whatever policies they want to make up the search results. Including kicking sites off. I do have a problem with Google threatening to do so in order to achieve some other goal.
> Which hurts Google's users as well, spam hurts us all, spam sucks. Google is correct here in removing sites which partake in such practices.
Perhaps. But it is doing so by exercising its power to shut down the internet (for that site) to enforce a standard. Google decided at some point that all paid links need to be marked in a special way. This is the standard for disclosure. They then use their power to enforce it.
I'm not sure if I have been downmoded because I have been misunderstood, so I will try again.
I think that the policy of enforcing Google's nofollow guideline by removing sites from their index is not directly about keeping their index free of spammers. It is about enforcing a standard for disclosure specifically designed for their purposes. It's not about disclosure to users, it is about disclosure to search engines.
I don't want anyone purposely deceiving the search engines. I have a problem with the way Google is enforcing this. I think this hints at the issues with having such a powerful Google.
> Google's way of preventing site X from doing this is by intimidating.
Again, so what. I don't care how they do it, but I'm glad they do. The idea that Google is doing something wrong by using their size to try and make a site comply is simply absurd to me; of course they are, that's what they should do.
* The point of the policy, the point of this publicly declared part of their secret sauce is not to recognise and flag spam sites, it is to intimidate sites into stopping a practice which hurts Google.*
The practice hurts Google because it hurts Google's users, so of course they want to stop it. As a frequent Google search user I want them to stop it as well. Buying your way to the top of Google results should be made as difficult as possible.
Sure. I agree with everything you say. They have good reason to want their page rank measurement to be accurate. But they are not allowed to do whatever they want to achieve this.
Sure. I agree with everything you say. They have good reason to want their page rank measurement to be accurate. But they are not allowed to do whatever they want to achieve this.
I think Google is allowed to remove sites from their index. Is that what you mean by 'whatever they want'?
I'm going to parody. Can they threaten to remove sites from their index if you don't write "I love Google" on the top of every webpage? Can they threaten to remove your site if you do not ban the bingbot? I think we would agree that would be abuse of power.
If they want to remove sites from their index because those sites are no good for their index, etc. ..Fine. But, if they remove sites for reasons other than 'We don't want these sites in the index or in the SERPS,' that is a problem. In this case, I am arguing that they don't want to remove those sites from their index. They want those sites to comply with their nofollow policies. I don't even have much a problem with these policies. I have a problem with Google being able to set policies and enforce them directly with the threat of removal from the index. It is almost equivalent to the threat of removal from the web entirely due to the way people use the internet and Google's role in that. Many sites get more traffic from searchers Googling the name of a site then direct traffic.
If they don't survive, it will not be because of damage to their quality, but because of an outcry. There would be in outcry in that case because it is bad and obviously.
There is not a perfect marriage between what is good for Google and what is good for the world.
As an internal policy or part of their algorithm, do whatever you want. But that is not what they are doing. The point of the policy, the point of this publicly declared part of their secret sauce is not to recognise and flag spam sites, it is to intimidate sites into stopping a practice which hurts Google. It is the effects of the intimidation not the effects of the flagging which are substantial. I think it is also safe to say that they are the purpose of the policy.