Except that is exactly how PageRank worked in the beginning. Heavily linked pages were deemed more popular/useful while those at the edges of the network were l

Except that is exactly how PageRank worked in the beginning. Heavily linked pages were deemed more popular/useful while those at the edges of the network were less so. As for your last point, metadata is all about addressing these issues. The context has to remain canonical, otherwise God knows what sort of legal issues would arise.