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Companies like Google care about and have responded to populist uprisings like this in the past (especially as it relates to search quality). I imagine that's t
by dschobel 17y ago
Companies like Google care about and have responded to populist uprisings like this in the past (especially as it relates to search quality). I imagine that's the actual goal here.
- earle 17y agoWhy would they? This generates revenue for Google. There's no excuse for them not having banning them from day one, like they do every other individual trying to capitalize on the same tactics -- only the sheer capitalization and size that Jason brought to the table allowed him to get away with this at scale. Shame on Google for having double standards, IMHO.
- houseabsolute 17y agoGoogle has made revenue negative banning decisions in the past. They have demonstrated that they recognize that the long-term quality of their index is more important than short term profits.
- earle 17y agoEvery banning is against revenue, yet Mahalo still is operational......... Google's lack of definitive action against Mahalo's outright spam is the clear example here.
- cynicalkane 17y agoGoogle ultimately generates revenue from people using their engine and ad server to find things. If the quality thereof goes down, you will see people flow out of Google. If you say, no, that won't happen, remember people have to flow into Google in the first place... it's not the default search engine for the majority of installs...
- minsight 17y agoIf mahalo were pulled from the rankings, other pages, most likely of better quality, would fill that space. There is nothing to prevent them from using adsense to monetize the quality of their (non-scraped) content.
- jacquesm 17y agoIf google cared they could switch him off in 2 seconds flat. And if they're not aware by now they're asleep at the switch.
- dschobel 17y agoYou're conflating Google's caring about the alleged practice and the public's perception of the practice. If people are qualitatively unhappy with search results, Google will care. These posts serve to highlight that displeasure.
- mlinsey 17y agoI think it's a mistake to think of large corporations as singular entities in these sorts of cases. Given what I know about big-company politics, I am positive that there are people inside Google who support banning Mahalo and others who do not. Political battles like these are not resolved quickly, and an ongoing visible public backlash is the best weapon those who support banning him have.
- jacquesm 17y agoIf mahalo is 'borderline' or even 'ok' to a large faction inside Google they have real problems.