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What rules is Pinterest breaking? And what would it mean for Google to treat "all sites equally"?

by twblalock 9y ago

bambax 9y ago
Please read the link before commenting!
- twblalock 9y ago
  Don't assume people didn't read the link. It's against the guidelines here and frankly it's insulting. People can read the same article and still have different opinions.
  - Firerouge 9y ago
    The third sentence explicitly states what rule Pinterest breaks....
    - twblalock 9y ago
      That's not one of Google's rules, as far as I can tell. Here are some of Google's rules: https://www.google.com/search/howsearchworks/mission/open-web/ https://www.google.com/search/howsearchworks/mission/open-we... Some might say that Pinterest's behavior is covered under the "Spam and Malware" section on that page, but clearly Google does not agree with that interpretation of Google's rules or else the search results would have been removed by now. There are other sites requiring logins that appear in Google results, e.g. LinkedIn, and Google clearly doesn't see that as a rule violation either. If that was really a rule, Google would need to block a lot of major news sites as well, e.g. NY Times, WSJ, FT, Economist, etc. I'll believe Google's interpretation of their own rules, rather than someone's interpretation on Reddit.
      - endorphone 9y ago
        Cloaking -- presenting different content to a search bot than you would a visitor -- is against Google's rules, and many sites have been removed over the years for that reason. That they aren't currently removed hardly demonstrates that they've assessed whether it's allowed or not, and is specious logic. If the search results lead to frustration -- and every pinterest result does -- that doesn't help Google. Ergo, those sites eventually get removed.
      - purerandomness 9y ago
        > "Google search results reflect content on the web" That's what's being violated. The GoogleBot gets the content, but not a human visiting the site. That's not what a user expects. That's why Pinterest and LinkedIn should be removed from Google search indexes. Addendum We're not even talking about violating Google's T&C here. It's about how their ranking algorithm works. Try building a site and applying similar black-hat SEO tactics and watch your traffic disappear. Not for them.
        twblalock 9y ago
        You could make the same argument about the New York Times, WSJ, the Economist, FT, and many other newspapers of record: the Googlebot gets the content, and the users get a login page if they don't have an account. Should Google get rid of those as well? How can a search engine be useful if it doesn't include the most popular sites?
        jcranmer 9y ago
        Most newspaper websites let you read N articles for free every month (/week/whatever). The WSJ is the major exception I'm aware of, but IIRC, they do actually show you the content if you click from the google results directly.
        endorphone 9y ago
        News aggregation operates under a very different model, and Google is constantly negotiating with news vendors. >How can a search engine be useful if it doesn't include the most popular sites? News has a relatively tiny set of providers. Information has a massive set of providers. Hence why Google can call the shots if you want to be in their engine. Pinterest only recently started getting ranked highly, owing to a weighting change, and it is a negative result for almost everyone. You repeatedly keep citing the results themselves as validation that the results are correct. That isn't how it works, especially in the face of users saying "these Pinterest results suck and reduce my experience". Google constantly changes these things.
      - stordoff 9y ago
        Webmaster Guidelines - https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769 https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769 > Avoid the following techniques: [...] Creating pages with little or no original content [...] Cloaking arguably apply to Pinterest to varying degrees. Specifically: > Cloaking is considered a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines because it provides our users with different results than they expected. Different results than what I expect is 100% how I would categorise my encounters with Pinterest in Google results.
clort 9y ago
The rule they are breaking, is that when you google for an image and they show the image, then you click through to the page.. the image is not shown. If it shows a bunch of images and you scroll down to see more it requires you to login and I never got any further than that because its just annoying, but one of the reddit users says you even have to search for the image with the original search terms again but on pinterest.
- dahdum 9y ago
  Even if you're logged in there's a good chance you won't be able to find the image at all. Due to outdated Google index or some other issue I'm not sure...super annoying though.
Spooky23 9y ago
Pintrest is projecting Facebook attitude with an AOL product. They give the googlebot one answer and the user a different one. My understanding is that is a no-no. Pintrest and Quora fit in this weird category like Expertsexchange; they get high search ranking because of the questions, but don’t deliver the answers.
- Nuzzerino 9y ago
  Call me crazy, but AOL in its prime was a bigger deal than Facebook. Facebook was capturing an existing market, while AOL was creating one. It took the social aspect of the web to the mainstream, while Facebook merely streamlined an existing paradigm. Be kind to thy elders.
Coincoin 9y ago
The rule is simple. You can't present content differently to the crawler than to a user coming to your site from google. This is why expertsexchange always had the answer at the bottom of the page and why most paywalls are disabled if referred from google.

What rules is Pinterest breaking? And what would it mean for Google to treat "all sites equally"?

bambax 9y ago

Please read the link before commenting!

twblalock 9y ago
Don't assume people didn't read the link. It's against the guidelines here and frankly it's insulting. People can read the same article and still have different opinions.
- Firerouge 9y ago
  The third sentence explicitly states what rule Pinterest breaks....
  - twblalock 9y ago
    That's not one of Google's rules, as far as I can tell. Here are some of Google's rules: https://www.google.com/search/howsearchworks/mission/open-web/ https://www.google.com/search/howsearchworks/mission/open-we... Some might say that Pinterest's behavior is covered under the "Spam and Malware" section on that page, but clearly Google does not agree with that interpretation of Google's rules or else the search results would have been removed by now. There are other sites requiring logins that appear in Google results, e.g. LinkedIn, and Google clearly doesn't see that as a rule violation either. If that was really a rule, Google would need to block a lot of major news sites as well, e.g. NY Times, WSJ, FT, Economist, etc. I'll believe Google's interpretation of their own rules, rather than someone's interpretation on Reddit.
    - endorphone 9y ago
      Cloaking -- presenting different content to a search bot than you would a visitor -- is against Google's rules, and many sites have been removed over the years for that reason. That they aren't currently removed hardly demonstrates that they've assessed whether it's allowed or not, and is specious logic. If the search results lead to frustration -- and every pinterest result does -- that doesn't help Google. Ergo, those sites eventually get removed.
    - purerandomness 9y ago
      > "Google search results reflect content on the web" That's what's being violated. The GoogleBot gets the content, but not a human visiting the site. That's not what a user expects. That's why Pinterest and LinkedIn should be removed from Google search indexes. Addendum We're not even talking about violating Google's T&C here. It's about how their ranking algorithm works. Try building a site and applying similar black-hat SEO tactics and watch your traffic disappear. Not for them.
      - twblalock 9y ago
        You could make the same argument about the New York Times, WSJ, the Economist, FT, and many other newspapers of record: the Googlebot gets the content, and the users get a login page if they don't have an account. Should Google get rid of those as well? How can a search engine be useful if it doesn't include the most popular sites?
        jcranmer 9y ago
        Most newspaper websites let you read N articles for free every month (/week/whatever). The WSJ is the major exception I'm aware of, but IIRC, they do actually show you the content if you click from the google results directly.
        endorphone 9y ago
        News aggregation operates under a very different model, and Google is constantly negotiating with news vendors. >How can a search engine be useful if it doesn't include the most popular sites? News has a relatively tiny set of providers. Information has a massive set of providers. Hence why Google can call the shots if you want to be in their engine. Pinterest only recently started getting ranked highly, owing to a weighting change, and it is a negative result for almost everyone. You repeatedly keep citing the results themselves as validation that the results are correct. That isn't how it works, especially in the face of users saying "these Pinterest results suck and reduce my experience". Google constantly changes these things.
    - stordoff 9y ago
      Webmaster Guidelines - https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769 https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769 > Avoid the following techniques: [...] Creating pages with little or no original content [...] Cloaking arguably apply to Pinterest to varying degrees. Specifically: > Cloaking is considered a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines because it provides our users with different results than they expected. Different results than what I expect is 100% how I would categorise my encounters with Pinterest in Google results.

clort 9y ago

The rule they are breaking, is that when you google for an image and they show the image, then you click through to the page.. the image is not shown. If it shows a bunch of images and you scroll down to see more it requires you to login and I never got any further than that because its just annoying, but one of the reddit users says you even have to search for the image with the original search terms again but on pinterest.

dahdum 9y ago
Even if you're logged in there's a good chance you won't be able to find the image at all. Due to outdated Google index or some other issue I'm not sure...super annoying though.

Spooky23 9y ago

Pintrest is projecting Facebook attitude with an AOL product. They give the googlebot one answer and the user a different one. My understanding is that is a no-no. Pintrest and Quora fit in this weird category like Expertsexchange; they get high search ranking because of the questions, but don’t deliver the answers.

Nuzzerino 9y ago
Call me crazy, but AOL in its prime was a bigger deal than Facebook. Facebook was capturing an existing market, while AOL was creating one. It took the social aspect of the web to the mainstream, while Facebook merely streamlined an existing paradigm. Be kind to thy elders.

Coincoin 9y ago

The rule is simple. You can't present content differently to the crawler than to a user coming to your site from google. This is why expertsexchange always had the answer at the bottom of the page and why most paywalls are disabled if referred from google.