It's yours, get to work :s&m:

;)

Cheating, are they really?
Anyone who says that a computer program is capable of judging which site is the best and has the best content is clearly wrong. Do a search for example for "Hotel", and Google guaranteed return several million results. How can Google determine which site has the best information about hotels? How can Google determine which site is the most aesthetically pleasing one? Of course Google can't.

So, let's say I have the world's best hotel site. It's not as big as the other ones, doesn't have as many backlinks as the other ones, but still mine's much nicer looking, has better information and way more user friendly! Still it doesn't even rank among the top 1,000! Would it be bad moral to use doorway pages, cloaking or whatever "black hat SEO" to get on top for the keyword "hotel" in that case? I think not! It's rather the other hotel sites who're "cheating" by making huge sites with mostly crap content and tons of backlinks?

Just for the record I don't use these methods myself since it could possibly give me a penalty, but I can fully understand the ones who do. It's not at all bad moral as long as your site's as informative and presentable as the other ones among the top 10. Of course, if a Viagra site turns up when I search for my hotel, then it's time to report spam :)

Just my opinion...

Trond.

I feel much the same way, though i wouldnt waste the 4mins it takes to report it... let G sort it out, it's their website.

The only time i'd feel compelled to report somthing is if somthing truly abhorrent turned up for an innocent search liek child p*rn for example. Even then, the last thing i'd do is use that silly snitch form....

Nick

I agree with Nick, if I see a site above mine using hidden text, links etc... I normally get even - I tend to focus on that key phrase and knock them off.

I don't bother with the spam reporting form, as Nick said its their job to clean the system of the crap.

So I've concluded, if I've got nothing better to do, then I'll report it - especially those Traffic Power users.

Better yet, I've now had all three websites email me saying 'Oooh...I didn't know what I was doing' - but the funny part is they are all apologizing and asking for SEO advice. So you know where I start..."How about putting a link from your site to mine!"

Rather then reporting to Google, I think emailing the webmaster telling them they are acting unethically seems to work best.

Are they generally your competitors?

It's not only works best (i presume) but it's a lot NICER, remember, these are all fellow webmasters. Bugger ethics, it's about $$$'s but your i agree with your general point :)

Good for you!

Nick

We don't share in the financial profits, no. But we do use their website to find useful information. If you are relying on Google to police it's own site, then don't complain that it does a bad job of taking care of spam.
It's like voting. If you don't vote, don't complain when you get screwed by the government.

I do have the right to complain because I DO report it. You on the other hand don't report it, so it's you who has no right to complain about spam.


I can understand the desire of individuals to want to spam, but that doesn't mean that I don't care if they do spam. I do care because it screws up the system for everyone else. Take meta tags for instance. Once upon a time, they were actually useful ways of telling a search engine what your site was about, now they are worth nothing because of Spammers.
That doesn't mean that it's wrong to optimize a site, it just means that by going too far, they've wrecked things for everyone else. And that is why I report spammers.

you only need to justify your complaints to yourself. I can complain about anything I want to.


spam is a concept which was created to push adherance to the search engines business models. even if people did not abuse meta tags search engines would have some other arbitrary things to complain about to show how evil other people are for thier algorithm not working perfectly.

I hardly ever complain about spam in the search engines. If I have a result I don't like, then I report it. If I find competitors are using spam I report them. And I have seen results that reporting actually works, because a large site that was everywhere ahead of us for many terms used a ton of spam to get to the top. So I reported them and a few weeks later they were out of there.

Like I said, I don't waste time complaining on forums about "spam this", or "spam that". My point is that if I did want to complain, I would have a right to, because I do my part, so if the SE's query's show spam results, it is up to the SE to tweak their algorithms.


If meta tags returned good search results, then why would google abandon them and switch to links as their main linking criteria? They wouldn't. But now that links have been manipulated by people through mass link exchanges and link purchases, I am sure that the search engines will need to need to find something else to weigh.
If google blames people for their algorithm working imperfectly, then it should also praise people for their algorithm working perfectly. What I mean by that is that their algorithm works better then any other search engine. That is why people use it more then any other search engine. So... Yes, Google doesn't like spammers, cause it makes their job harder. But on the other hand, there are millions of people that follow their guidelines when optimizing sites, making it easier for their algorithm to work properly.


If you're having problems with "Child P*rn" results showing up, then I'd turn your safe search feature on, and be thankful that Google doesn't factor in personal search history to provide "even better" results.
You must have been of those kids who did something wrong then made fun of other kids who told on you. Because I don't think adults view spam report forms as "silly snitch forms". But whatever.


Spammers know that they are spamming. If there wasn't a penality for it, we'd all be doing it. So what good does emailing a webmaster do, if there wasn't someone like google who can actually do something about it?
It's like robing a bank... If you told a bank robber that what he is doing is wrong, and you'd prefer him to stop doing it, do you think he's going to stop because you asked him to? Doubt it.
On the other hand, if you told him that his next bank robbery is a trap and police are waiting inside for him... he will think twice before robbing that bank.