Posted on January 9, 2007 - by Justin Hartman
Seriously, Google is starting to scare me
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I know I run a competing website to Google however it has to be said that I am growing very worried at some of the decisions being made at Google. I am(was) the biggest fan of Google and the boys at Mountain View inspired me to start my own search engine but a recent anomaly in Search Engines being removed from Google page results are a growing concern.
In January 2006 Tectonic reported that local search engine Jonga had been removed from the Google search results for about 10-days. When I first read it I wondered about this but now a second similar incident (that I know of) has happened in the US which has now resulted in a lawsuit against Google.
KinderStart a parenting site/vertical search engine complained that it’s ranking has been intentionally lowered by Google and while I normally would have brushed this aside it is all starting to look a little fishy on this front.
On reading and investigating a little further I found that in July 2006 a Google lawyer was explaining Google’s PageRank technology. The lawyer decided to argue that Google’s index was subjective – i.e., that Google made editorial decisions about each site’s quality.
When I first read this I was astonished because this is certainly not the perception Google want us to believe and in their Technology Overview Google make it very clear that “PageRank performs an objective measurement of the importance of web pages” and that “there is no human involvement or manipulation of results, which is why users have come to trust Google as a source of objective information untainted by paid placement.”
Sounds about right? Well read on.
David Kramer, a Wilson Sonsini attorney also representing Google, said the search giant's PageRank system is subjective, using a combination of reviews into whether a Web site is adhering to its guidelines and is worth a user's time to view."Google is constantly evaluating Web sites for standards and quality, which is entirely subjective," Kramer said.
The judge probed Kramer on the topic of whether Google engages in misleading behavior, and whether it uses objective criteria to evaluate sites--rather than solely relying on subjective reasoning.
"What if, say, Google says it uses facts one through 10 to evaluate a site, but actually uses number 11 to decide its rank. Isn't that misleading?" the judge asked.
Kramer, however, said Google readers understand that the site's ranking system is subjective and based on Google's opinion about whether a site is worth viewing.
Ok, but that aside, let’s assume Google are in their best intentions trying to keep search engine results objective and not subjective. Why then do I see a subtle, yet alarming increase in questionable decisions made by Google?
Stefano Sessa recently blogged about Google’s latest Tip box being blatantly deceptive and in his post any search for the word blog in Google brings an advert for their Blogger.com service disguised as a tip.
And finally let’s not forget how Google agreed to work with the Chinese Government to censor certain websites on the google.cn website.
People ask me why I’m not trying to make money out Grabble – here’s your answer.
12 Comments
I'd love to hear yours!
I am the MD and co-founder of 
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January 9, 2007
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Justin keep up the good work with Grabble!!
Personally I believe Google has the right to show tips to punt its own products. Even though now I believe they have been removed.
China is a huge economy and a big market and I’m sure Google makes a pretty penny out of China with its advertising on the search engine, so in order for Google to keep that revenue coming in it has to play nice with the Chinese government.
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January 9, 2007
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Hi there, I just had a quick look at http://www.grabble.co.za and must say its ten times better than that Ananzi eye sore.
I hear you and I believe that the more search engines there are the better for all of us. I did a few searches and had some international results (notably Poland) but from your about page it says you only crawl South African sites, how do you enforce that? What about South Africans that post abroad on blog services like Blogspot how would you include their sites?
Keep up the good work.
Visit My Website
January 9, 2007
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Justin keep up the good work with Grabble!!
Personally I believe Google has the right to show tips to punt its own products. Even though now I believe they have been removed.
China is a huge economy and a big market and I'm sure Google makes a pretty penny out of China with its advertising on the search engine, so in order for Google to keep that revenue coming in it has to play nice with the Chinese government.
Visit My Website
January 9, 2007
Permalink
Hi there, I just had a quick look at http://www.grabble.co.za and must say its ten times better than that Ananzi eye sore.
I hear you and I believe that the more search engines there are the better for all of us. I did a few searches and had some international results (notably Poland) but from your about page it says you only crawl South African sites, how do you enforce that? What about South Africans that post abroad on blog services like Blogspot how would you include their sites?
Keep up the good work.
Visit My Website
January 23, 2007
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also curious about bropa’s question, same applies to muti…
and what about south african sites with .com or .net etc. domain names?
still, grabble rocks!
awesome
Visit My Website
January 23, 2007
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also curious about bropa's question, same applies to muti…
and what about south african sites with .com or .net etc. domain names?
still, grabble rocks!
awesome
Visit My Website
January 23, 2007
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Hi bropa and Andre
Sorry it’s taken some time to get back to you on these questions but I’ve been working hard on Grabble2.
Basically at the moment we can only index domains in the ZA namespace. This means that any site with a TLD (.com, .net, .org, etc.) will unfortunately not be indexed in the current version of Grabble.
This is apart of why I’ve been working so hard on the next version of Grabble. Not only has the technology been re-written but V2 is faster and more flexible and allows us to include other TLD names.
The most noticeable area where this is problematic is with blogger.com. We have hundreds(thousands?) of SA bloggers using Google’s service and I can’t index them.
If all goes well Grabble2 will go into beta by the end of January and I’ll post a link on my blog for everyone to test it out.
Visit My Website
January 23, 2007
Permalink
Hi bropa and Andre
Sorry it's taken some time to get back to you on these questions but I've been working hard on Grabble2.
Basically at the moment we can only index domains in the ZA namespace. This means that any site with a TLD (.com, .net, .org, etc.) will unfortunately not be indexed in the current version of Grabble.
This is apart of why I've been working so hard on the next version of Grabble. Not only has the technology been re-written but V2 is faster and more flexible and allows us to include other TLD names.
The most noticeable area where this is problematic is with blogger.com. We have hundreds(thousands?) of SA bloggers using Google's service and I can't index them.
If all goes well Grabble2 will go into beta by the end of January and I'll post a link on my blog for everyone to test it out.
Visit My Website
January 24, 2007
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sounds awesome, eagerly awaiting :- )
Visit My Website
January 24, 2007
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sounds awesome, eagerly awaiting :- )
Visit My Website
January 29, 2007
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Hi Justin
Keep up this awesome work, creating a search engine on your own is, I am sure no easy task and don’t worry about Google. I look forward to version 2 although version 1 is already very usable, is fast and has relevant results.
Regards
Visit My Website
January 29, 2007
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Hi Justin
Keep up this awesome work, creating a search engine on your own is, I am sure no easy task and don't worry about Google. I look forward to version 2 although version 1 is already very usable, is fast and has relevant results.
Regards