The documents reveal how Google Search is using, or has used, clicks, links, content, entities, Chrome data and more for ranking.
    • deweydecibel@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      6 months ago

      All it really details are the things Google gathers from sites. Potential data to be used in the algorithm, but just because they are gathered does not mean they are all used. Having a wide range of potential data points is useful for development and refinement, even if they’re not used in the live version.

    • BertramDitore@lemmy.worldEnglish
      01·
      6 months ago

      But it did expose all the lies google has been telling about SEO and how it works with their algorithm. Basically all the times google was asked “so are you sure you don’t do x, y, or z to prioritize certain sites?” They said no, emphatically, despite some very clever folks who had a pretty good idea of how things were working based on independent tests and experiments on SEO. So google was lying all along, while trying to convince the experts that what they were seeing wasn’t real. Pretty despicable if you ask me.

      • deweydecibel@lemmy.worldEnglish
        7·
        6 months ago

        Pretty despicable if you ask me.

        Despicable to lie to people whose entire jobs are to artificially raise the appearance of certain results, not based on what the user wants, but based on how much the site wants to be seen? People who primarily serve to turn search results into defacto ads by getting their clients to the top? People whose “expertise” involve the most effective ways to mislead people onto garbage websites?

        “Search engine optimization” is a bullshit name for an industry that fundamentally undermines search engines. Google is no saint but the whole SEO industry can take their indignation about this and blow it out their ass.

        • BertramDitore@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          6 months ago

          You’re totally right about the SEO industry. My comment wasn’t meant as an endorsement of SEO, I agree it’s one of the internet’s most fundamental problems. I’m just so frustrated by how consistently google lies about these things. Their first impulse, in so many different situations, is to immediately tell a bald-faced lie, then double down on the lie, and then when the truth comes out, they somehow always seem to get a pass. That’s what’s despicable to me.

          • Rekorse@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            1·
            6 months ago

            Its no different than them declining to answer if asked what their secrets are.

            Do you really think that if someone manages to ask a question in a very specific wording that they would be forced to give a straight answer?