Google isn't some "great equalizer" that ranks content purely on its merit. There is an entire economy working behind the scenes that determines which pages end

Google isn't some "great equalizer" that ranks content purely on its merit. There is an entire economy working behind the scenes that determines which pages end up at the top of the search results. On top of that, there are a huge number of complex technical issues that regularly get in the way of worthy content being ranked. Understanding how this process works and how to best present your content is not manipulative at all. If anything, SEO is only going to grow as competition for rankings becomes more fierce and search becomes more complicated. I also think the author chose the wrong article to pick on. There are so many poorly written and poorly researched pieces of advice on SEO out there - the article they chose isn't one of them.