Comments on: Paid links: A scalable solution http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/08/paid-links-a-scalable-solution/ Terrible writing and mere conjecture Sat, 11 Oct 2008 20:14:44 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc By: John Honeck "JLH" http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/08/paid-links-a-scalable-solution/#comment-5244 John Honeck "JLH" Tue, 28 Aug 2007 13:49:18 +0000 http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/08/paid-links-a-scalable-solution/#comment-5244 The scalability factor was kind of tounge-in-cheek on my part, its scalable on Google's part because they don't have to do anything other than shut it down for a while as everyone updates their account! I'm trying to make the point that nofollow is a non-answer, just as crazy as the one I suggested. Here's the other issue they are combating, as the web ages, the older sites naturally have more links, but not neccisarily the better. By trying to keep the index fresh they need to keep an eye on sites that start to garner links fast as being more important than the old stale ones that already have links. This makes the system vulnerable to manipulation by artificial link campaigns. If they just relied on the sheer volume of links then old sites would dominate but it would be a lot harder to buy your way to the top. User behavior would be pretty easy to mimic however with click-bots running 24/7 on millions of random IPs. You think we have a computer virus problem now it would explode if that ever were a factor in ranking. The scalability factor was kind of tounge-in-cheek on my part, its scalable on Google’s part because they don’t have to do anything other than shut it down for a while as everyone updates their account!

I’m trying to make the point that nofollow is a non-answer, just as crazy as the one I suggested.

Here’s the other issue they are combating, as the web ages, the older sites naturally have more links, but not neccisarily the better. By trying to keep the index fresh they need to keep an eye on sites that start to garner links fast as being more important than the old stale ones that already have links. This makes the system vulnerable to manipulation by artificial link campaigns. If they just relied on the sheer volume of links then old sites would dominate but it would be a lot harder to buy your way to the top.

User behavior would be pretty easy to mimic however with click-bots running 24/7 on millions of random IPs. You think we have a computer virus problem now it would explode if that ever were a factor in ranking.

]]> By: dockarl http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/08/paid-links-a-scalable-solution/#comment-5243 dockarl Tue, 28 Aug 2007 13:17:23 +0000 http://www.jlh-design.com/2007/08/paid-links-a-scalable-solution/#comment-5243 But that's not an algorithm - that requires human intervention and honesty (exactly like nofollow) - and that's not scaleable, especially honesty. No matter how you change the system, if people know about it, they'll manipulate it to their own ends. Patches like nofollow acknowledge that and acknowledge to the world that the system is under strain. Do you folks have that silly television program 'numbers' over there? Ever seen how they depict every single complex real world problem as having a neat little mathematical solution? Unfortunately if you know anything about math the majority of stuff they say is CRAP - Unfortunately when real world meets theory, the two often don't make good bedfellows. There is no such thing as a free market, other than in the textbooks. Human nature is corrupting. Personally I think the answer is that they need to quit just looking at onsite factors and start looking seriously at user behavior.. who goes where, where they come from, how long they stayed, where they went. It's a pity they can't get that sort of information from websites.. hmm.. they COULD buy a few key switches around the place.. or you could buy a little webstats company like Urchin and rebrand it as a free service so that every man and his dog signed up.. What a wealth of information that would bring. That would help bring Google back to where it was in the early days - a real model of popularity on the net instead of a model of itself. Still wouldn't fix the paid links thing though - but who cares - if the site being linked to sucks, no-one would stay long anyway. I think there are some battles ahead. But that’s not an algorithm - that requires human intervention and honesty (exactly like nofollow) - and that’s not scaleable, especially honesty.

No matter how you change the system, if people know about it, they’ll manipulate it to their own ends. Patches like nofollow acknowledge that and acknowledge to the world that the system is under strain.

Do you folks have that silly television program ‘numbers’ over there? Ever seen how they depict every single complex real world problem as having a neat little mathematical solution?

Unfortunately if you know anything about math the majority of stuff they say is CRAP - Unfortunately when real world meets theory, the two often don’t make good bedfellows.

There is no such thing as a free market, other than in the textbooks. Human nature is corrupting.

Personally I think the answer is that they need to quit just looking at onsite factors and start looking seriously at user behavior.. who goes where, where they come from, how long they stayed, where they went.

It’s a pity they can’t get that sort of information from websites.. hmm.. they COULD buy a few key switches around the place.. or you could buy a little webstats company like Urchin and rebrand it as a free service so that every man and his dog signed up.. What a wealth of information that would bring.

That would help bring Google back to where it was in the early days - a real model of popularity on the net instead of a model of itself.

Still wouldn’t fix the paid links thing though - but who cares - if the site being linked to sucks, no-one would stay long anyway.

I think there are some battles ahead.

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