There’s a lot of noise around the ‘Net about Google’s update. No matter how many people say “Oh well, Google doesn’t matter…” you still can’t avoid the “The update is REAL now!”. I would be completely remiss if I didn’t jump on the bandwagon.

Actually, that’s not true. I’m not doing it because I want to be on the bandwagon. I’m writing about it because two of my blogs jumped in pagerank. One of the went from 0 to 3. Of course, I get no money from that blog, but that is not the point. This blog has gone from N/A to 2. I’m not really certain what all those datacenters are and which ones are important, but mostly I’ve got a 2 here and I’m happy with that.

Of course, reading about everything that’s been going on has made me think about what Google’s doing and what its motives are. Then I catch myself and wonder “Why do I care?” The simple fact is that it’s incredibly interesting to see all of the theories going about on the ’sphere. All the SEO guys and gals have decided that this is happening because of paid links or because of links that aren’t relevant to topic or because of really long blogrolls. I’m not so sure about that. The paid links I can get, but the links on blogrolls and to sites that aren’t completely relevant… Hmmmm.

So I did some surfing and did some completely unscientific analysis. Jon Swift has a very popular political blog and he links to anyone that links to him (to an extent: no porn or spammers). Some of his links aren’t relevant at all. And his links list is unbelievably long. Yet, his PR went up. My own political blog doesn’t have any paid links, but the links list is long (so long that I’ve split it in two categories) and that blog just got a Google juice injection- from 0 to 3. I link out a lot to other sites, as well. For instance, if I come across a quiz or article I find fascinating I’ll link to the site where I found it (as “H/T”: Hat Tip). I don’t worry about anchor text a whole lot over there because the sites I frequent from there don’t care about anchor text. I’ve seen other blogs (that I have on my other blogroll) go up in PR, too. None of them sell links, but they all link out frequently. As a matter of fact, it’s polite on that side of the blogosphere to use “H/T” or “Via” when something interesting is found through or on another blog (this is why I think it’s strange that this end of the ’sphere doesn’t do that). And that side of the blogosphere- the side that doesn’t use specific anchor text to link, though they do link heavily- doesn’t seem the least bit effected by the Google Smack.

I think this has everything to do with using keywords and phrases as anchor text. I mentioned on the forum today that I believe Google doesn’t care if I link “Check this out” but would care if I linked “the best mesothelioma site on the net”. See what the anchor text is in those examples? I think that Google is getting sick of seeing that kind of keyword rigging. Not so much the linkage, which doesn’t matter to some SEO experts, but the anchor text.

I haven’t really been all over the blogosphere looking to see if anyone shares my theory. I have seen a lot of thought about paid links and how to make them not look like paid links (by inserting “nofollow”, mostly). I haven’t seen anything linking the anchor text to the Smack Felt ‘Round the ‘Sphere™ and that kind of confuses me. I could get paid to write “This is the best site ever!” with a link to where ever. How would Google know it was paid? They wouldn’t, because the anchor text for that link is “This”. Now, if I wrote “Gambling Made Easy is the best site ever!”, well, Google’s going to raise an eyebrow and even, maybe, check that anchor text against other sites. And WHAMMO! Smack to the back of the head.

Perhaps someone needs to reconsider the importance of keyword anchor text as well as PR. I mean, if anyone is worried. Personally, I’m just going to keep on with whatever I’m doing. I’m still more concerned with PVs than PR. So, it’s all good in my world.

P.S.

I’m so over the drama. Good grief, I’m going back to politics. With politics the drama makes a lot more sense.

Looks like Google’s laying some more smack down and causing a certain amount of panic among paid bloggers. In the forums of one site some bloggers are advising that we should all strip our links to other bloggers, reinstate no-follow, and pretend we don’t know anything at all about getting paid to blog. Other bloggers are suggesting all out boycotts of Google to get it across to them that THEY DON’T OWN US!

Word.

I’m not in the camp of laying down at the feet of Google and doing all they ask. I can see how some bloggers feel that they should conform, though. Still, it’s a little much to ask, isn’t it? Blogging India suggests:

Try and utilize the time to try and firefight. Remove the links, or bargain with the advertisers to have No-Follow tags inserted. STOP all viral blog chains, like Technorati Faves and stuff. Put your efforts into blogging quality content. And have patience. Google can’t do this for ever.

I’ve only just started seeing these Technorati Faves campaigns, but I don’t see why they wouldn’t work. Technorati brings more traffic to any of my blogs than Google. That tells me that more readers frequent Technorati for content. This is wrong? Google probably doesn’t like it and that’s fine. But I’m not going to stop living my life to benefit Google. I do agree that quality content is important and have been questioning my decision to begin doing paid blogging. Still, I have some short-term goals and I need money to meet those goals. What to do? I’m certainly not going to stop linking. That just goes against everything blogging was born to be. Shoot, that goes against everything the WEB is about! We see a site that interests us, we link. We don’t put a "no-follow" in the link because we want the support the sites we like. That makes no sense to me. I like Beth’s (AFrogToKiss.net) idea a little better. She says:

Do as I did-stop using anything Google. Un-install Google Earth, Google Desktop, don’t use Google Reader, DO NOT for any reason use Google as your search engine. Do not use Adsense- we all know very few make money from it anyway, except for those who kiss Google’s ass and, well, Google. If you visit a blog or website using Adsense and you see a product you’re interested in- DO NOT CLICK THE LINK. Not only is the owner of the site making money, but Google as well. Back away, go to Yahoo, Ask.com, MSN, and do a search. Most of the “deals” on Adsense aren’t really deals and I can guarantee if it’s something you buy, you can find it cheaper someplace else.

Stop kissing Google’s ass. Don’t give Google the power. Google is feeling a pinch in it’s pocketbook from all the link adverts. And it’s completely understandable that they want to protect that bottom line, which means sucking juice away from sites that aren’t giving them the money. They’re a business and they need to profit. But they don’t need to control the Web and force website owners/bloggers to lay down and take it for them. They shouldn’t have that power. So, that means quit writing for Google! Don’t worry about Google. Another search engine is going to see a profit potential from what Google is doing and come in to reap the rewards. There’s big money to be made here and the people shelling out the money know this. They’re not going to let Google stop them. Why should we? I can’t stop using my GMail, though. I’m sorry, Beth. It’s way better than Yahoo! and MSN, so I’m stuck with that. I have already stopped using Google search and have never used BlogSearch (Technorati still rocks my socks for blogsearching). I don’t want to give my personal power to Google, but I don’t want to see them go completely away. Just, maybe, go down a couple of pegs. Because they don’t own the Web- we do.

Update:

Funny thing I just noticed. My political site is up from a PR 0 to a PR 3 since yesterday. That’s funny to me because until recently PR never mattered to me and the traffic I get there is minimal. It’s a deeply political blog that would never pass muster with some people, but I guess Google’s kind of fond of it.

Interesting, huh?