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That's a no-no. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355?hl=en https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355?hl=en

2_listerine_pls 9y ago
I went through the whole thing and it seems, from the video, that they could avoid cloaking by redirecting non-paid users to the sing-up page. This way WSJ would be showing the same (www.wsj.com/Bezos-with-hair) to every user. *based on the video
- jacquesm 9y ago
  > sing-up page. That's a new one. Buy a subscription to the WSJ now for a song.
- squeaky-clean 9y ago
  In the video, he stresses pretty hard that all forms of cloaking are disallowed, even if not malicious or deceiving. Unless the Googlebot has a paid subscription to WSJ that's still cloaking, as you're showing Googlebot a different page than a regular user. Google's rules and help documents are spread all over, but here's some from Google News about subscriptions: "If you prefer this option, please display a snippet of your article that is at least 80 words long and includes either an excerpt or a summary of the specific article. Since we do not permit "cloaking" -- the practice of showing Googlebot a full version of your article while showing users the subscription or registration version -- we will only crawl and display your content based on the article snippets you provide." edit, forgot link: https://support.google.com/news/publisher/answer/40543?hl=en https://support.google.com/news/publisher/answer/40543?hl=en
nso 9y ago
I guess what this one infact states is that what they were doing was okay. In the video the guy explains that while you are not allowed to treat gbots request in a way no other people are treated, it is okay to differentiate between "boxes" of users. In their example it is the country USA, but if you define a "google user country" and let all users of google in it is ok to bundle the gbot with those. Grey area for sure, but might makes right.
- squeaky-clean 9y ago
  From the video "So geolocation, that is, looking at the IP address and reacting to that-- is totally, fine, as long as you're not reacting specifically to the IP of just Googlebot, just that very narrow range". Also, they will crawl you from an unusual IP using a user-agent that doesn't say it's Google. And when that happens, and you deny access to undercover-Googlebot, but allow Googlebot in full uniform, you'll be penalized for cloaking.
  - nso 9y ago
    I guess they in that case could argue on the wording if they don't JUST react to gbot, but gbot and anyone coming from the google homepage. They would have to react to just gbot when constructing the special google urls when the bot is crawling the site, tho.
    - squeaky-clean 9y ago
      > but gbot and anyone coming from the google homepage. This how they were originally handling it, before February. It would display if you visit the link from Google, or set your refer to it looks like it (this is why HN has the "web" link under articles), even if you weren't a subscriber. It's allowed, because regular users coming from Google do see the same thing as Googlebot. WSJ have since changed that, so only subscribers can view articles, and you no longer get a "free click" coming from Google Search as Google calls it. They now show a short snippet, and are following guidelines to be labeled a “subscription” service by Google Search. This caused their rankings to drop below being a "free" news source though. But it's not nearly as bad as if they had cloaked Google.
oconnor663 9y ago
You just say bingo.

2_listerine_pls 9y ago

I went through the whole thing and it seems, from the video, that they could avoid cloaking by redirecting non-paid users to the sing-up page. This way WSJ would be showing the same (www.wsj.com/Bezos-with-hair) to every user. *based on the video

jacquesm 9y ago
> sing-up page. That's a new one. Buy a subscription to the WSJ now for a song.
squeaky-clean 9y ago
In the video, he stresses pretty hard that all forms of cloaking are disallowed, even if not malicious or deceiving. Unless the Googlebot has a paid subscription to WSJ that's still cloaking, as you're showing Googlebot a different page than a regular user. Google's rules and help documents are spread all over, but here's some from Google News about subscriptions: "If you prefer this option, please display a snippet of your article that is at least 80 words long and includes either an excerpt or a summary of the specific article. Since we do not permit "cloaking" -- the practice of showing Googlebot a full version of your article while showing users the subscription or registration version -- we will only crawl and display your content based on the article snippets you provide." edit, forgot link: https://support.google.com/news/publisher/answer/40543?hl=en https://support.google.com/news/publisher/answer/40543?hl=en

nso 9y ago

I guess what this one infact states is that what they were doing was okay. In the video the guy explains that while you are not allowed to treat gbots request in a way no other people are treated, it is okay to differentiate between "boxes" of users. In their example it is the country USA, but if you define a "google user country" and let all users of google in it is ok to bundle the gbot with those. Grey area for sure, but might makes right.

squeaky-clean 9y ago
From the video "So geolocation, that is, looking at the IP address and reacting to that-- is totally, fine, as long as you're not reacting specifically to the IP of just Googlebot, just that very narrow range". Also, they will crawl you from an unusual IP using a user-agent that doesn't say it's Google. And when that happens, and you deny access to undercover-Googlebot, but allow Googlebot in full uniform, you'll be penalized for cloaking.
- nso 9y ago
  I guess they in that case could argue on the wording if they don't JUST react to gbot, but gbot and anyone coming from the google homepage. They would have to react to just gbot when constructing the special google urls when the bot is crawling the site, tho.
  - squeaky-clean 9y ago
    > but gbot and anyone coming from the google homepage. This how they were originally handling it, before February. It would display if you visit the link from Google, or set your refer to it looks like it (this is why HN has the "web" link under articles), even if you weren't a subscriber. It's allowed, because regular users coming from Google do see the same thing as Googlebot. WSJ have since changed that, so only subscribers can view articles, and you no longer get a "free click" coming from Google Search as Google calls it. They now show a short snippet, and are following guidelines to be labeled a “subscription” service by Google Search. This caused their rankings to drop below being a "free" news source though. But it's not nearly as bad as if they had cloaked Google.

oconnor663 9y ago

You just say bingo.