Clamp-down on Cloaking – the Google scattergun

…and so the story goes that one day Cloaking-system.com came forth and boldly announced that they would violate Google´s almost canonical Webmaster’s Guidelines and more precisely the section about cloaking:

Cloaking refers to the practice of presenting different content or URLs to users and search engines. Serving up different results based on user agent may cause your site to be perceived as deceptive and removed from the Google index. Some examples of cloaking include: * Serving a page of HTML text to search engines, while showing a page of images or Flash to users. * Serving different content to search engines than to users.

Here’s how Cloaking System describe their method: (from IP-delivery @ Cloaking System)

IP-delivery is the type of cloaking we use at Cloaking System. IP-delivery means that content is delivered, based on different IP-addresses. IP-delivery based on country IP’s is used by Google. When you type in www.google.com in your browsers address bar, you are automatically shown Google’s page in your own language… At Cloaking System we use IP-delivery a bit differently. We take the IP-addresses from the search engines and search robots and show them the content of one page, and show a different content to the visitors – your visitors. They are shown the page on your website that you want them to see.

The observant reader will notice that Google’s guidelines and Cloaking System´s method have some discrepancies. Now, openly admitting to corrupting Google’s search results can be compared to entering a the arena for a bullfight. Brave Cloaker Happy Cloaker Somehow, these two images remind me of each other… So… expectedly, Google blocks Cloaking System from their index – but our heroes are not duped at all. Like true heroes, they stand fast on their right of way, defending their points of views. On SEO Ninjas some of the central people from Cloaking System have a say: Google Promotes Cloaking. Impressive! True bravery. They are almost on par with Sundance Kid and Butch Cassidy. Now, putting ourselves in the place of the bull/Google, what course of action can be taken do when their first attempt to still the rebels has failed? But of course – find customers who have bought services from Cloaking System – and if unsuccesfull – find out where the rebels work and kick them out of the index too. And so ReFocus, the white hat-chapter of Cloaking System, was also booted out of Google’s index. That’ll teach them… Maybe someday we will see ReFocus back in Googles index – but until then they’ll have to follow the wise word of the Bible: “And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also.” (Luke 6:29) And so it seems this time round, the bull won… Sad Cloaker

Another one bites the dust

Ohh, how I just love seeing this page:

Spamreport

What’s the difference between a raised and a pointed finger?

Klovnehat seo – et ukendt men udbredt fænomen

Der er de to kendte modsætninger white hat seo og black hat seo – idag skal vi se på en af de mere ukendte, men desværre meget udbredte klovnehat seo

English version:
Stumbling upon a site that reeks of either poor understanding of the seo-thing or just plain lack of skills, I coined the term clown hat seo in order to have a category in between black hat seo and white hat seo. Anyhows – here’s the initial example of clown

I see that I must have been inspired by this post on Matt Cutts blog. But I like the clown hat seo title so much that I actually consiered starting clown-hat dot something as a place for pointing your fingers at clown hat seo practice.

Maybe a clown image could brand the bugger and help me on the way:

Update:
It seems that Google-bombs are most effective on a short time span basis. My attempts on Google Bombing creates fast but short lived results on the actual search phrase. This indicates that the effect of single google bombs (my findings are only based on my own google bombs) ‘wears off’ quite quickly.

Radikales websted

Jeg regner med at stemme på radikale venstre tirsdag d. 8. Men for søren, hvor deres websted stinker! Nu har jeg brugt 10 minutter på en relativt god internetforbindelse uden at opnå andet end irritation over deres flash-løsning og langsomme load-tider.
Til gengæld får jeg de samme svar på alle spørgsmålene i valgprogrammet…
Der er sikkert et reklamebureau et eller andet sted der har skrabet en del knaster ind for at lave flashmonsteret med filmklip og hele baduljen. Der lugter af at der er mere form end indhold her.

Hvis man går ind på de radikales ‘normale websted‘ kan man se at radikale har lanceret Radikale.dk som et valgkampswebsted. Jeg ville ønske at Radikale havde holdt fast i deres oprindelige websted; det fungerer, det virker troværdigt og jeg får ikke en følelse af at der lefles for mig.
De kunne nu godt bruge en lille overhaling ifht brugervenlighed og standarder for opbygning af hjemmesider. Men lad det ligge for nu – de kan jo henvende sig her, hvis det er… ;-)

Men det er da lidt sjovt at venstre kører en adword-kampagne på ordet radikale?