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Cracking the Google Code... Under the GoogleScope
jglazer75 writes "From the analysis of the code behind Google's patents: "Google's sweeping changes confirm the search giant has launched a full out assault against artificial link inflation & declared war against search engine spam in a continuing effort to provide the best search service in the world... and if you thought you cracked the Google Code and had Google all figured out ... guess again. ... In addition to evaluating and scoring web page content, the ranking of web pages are admittedly still influenced by the frequency of page or site updates. What's new and interesting is what Google takes into account in determining the freshness of a web page.""
So will this make it easier or harder to find porn?
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
Now I'll see more Get ranked #1 in search engines" spam.
http://www.anologger.com/
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
To crush artificial link inflation and hear the lamintations of search engine spam
The linked article is slashgoogled. It's a googlewar. Googlers are all googling.
You can't handle the truth.
Cracking the Google Code... Under the GoogleScope
...if you thought you cracked the Google Code and had Google all figured out ... guess again.
... guess again.
Google's US Patent confirms information retrieval is based on historical data.
Publication Date: 5/8/2005 9:51:18 PM
Author Name: Lawrence Deon
An Introduction:
Google's sweeping changes confirm the search giant has launched a full out assault against artificial link inflation & declared war against search engine spam in a continuing effort to provide the best search service in the world... and if you thought you cracked the Google Code and had Google all figured out
Google has raised the bar against search engine spam and artificial link inflation to unrivaled heights with the filing of a United States Patent Application 20050071741 on March 31, 2005.
The filing unquestionable provides SEO's with valuable insight into Google's tightly guarded search intelligence and confirms that Google's information retrieval is based on historical data.
What exactly do these changes mean to you?
Your credibility and reputation on-line are going under the Googlescope! Google has defined their patent abstract as follows:
"A system identifies a document and obtains one or more types of history data associated with the document. The system may generate a score for the document based, at least in part, on the one or more types of history data."
Google's patent specification reveals a significant amount of information both old and new about the possible ways Google can (and likely does) use your web page updates to determine the ranking of your site in the SERPs.
Unfortunately, the patent filing does not prioritize or conclusively confirm any specific method one way or the other.
Here's how Google scores your web pages.
In addition to evaluating and scoring web page content, the ranking of web pages are admittedly still influenced by the frequency of page or site updates.
What's new and interesting is what Google takes into account in determining the freshness of a web page.
For example, if a stale page continues to procure incoming links, it will still be considered fresh, even if the page header (Last-Modified: tells when the file was most recently modified) hasn't changed and the content is not updated or 'stale'.
According to their patent filing Google records and scores the following web page changes to determine freshness.
The frequency of all web page changes
The actual amount of the change itself... whether it is a substantial change redundant or superfluous
Changes in keyword distribution or density
The actual number of new web pages that link to a web page
The change or update of anchor text (the text that is used to link to a web page)
The numbers of new links to low trust web sites (for example, a domain may be considered low trust for having too many affiliate links on one web page).
Although there is no specific number of links indicated in the patent it might be advisable to limit affiliate links on new web pages. Caution should also be used in linking to pages with multiple affiliate links.
Developing your web page augments for page freshness.
Now I'm not suggesting that it's always beneficial or advisable to change the content of your web pages regularly, but it is very important to keep your pages fresh regularly and that may not necessarily mean a content change.
Google states that decayed or stale results might be desirable for information that doesn't necessarily need updating, while fresh content is good for results that require it.
How do you unravel that statement and differentiate between the two types of content?
An excellent example of this methodology is the roller coaster ride seasonal results might experience in Google's SERPs based on the actual season of the year.
A page related to winter clothin
It just occurred to me that, as Google changes its algorithms, it'll just create more business for the Search Engine Optimization consultant. When web sites drop in the Google rankings, they'll want to make changes to move back up, and will hire the SEO again to do so.
Have you read my blog lately?
Its obvious Google and Yahoo are moving on to trust-based (or perceived trust) ranking for sites based on what they see users clicking on through the web accelerator, Yahoo's MyWeb, etc. Hopefully this will help grade down the obvious spam...although you only find out its spam by going to the page...we'll see.
But when I search on Tiger, a mail-order company's site still comes up above Apple's. Is anyone at Google listening?
you will be googleated. Or googleaten. Whichever.
Borgle.
You can't handle the truth.
It's about your right to not see search results filled with complete crap.
...that google is still a "not evil" company? This proxy "web-accelerator" thing really still has me freaked out. Am I just paranoid or is there legitimate reason for concern?
The article is not written by a Google employee, nor did the author speak with anyone at Google. It's simply his analysis of the patent document filed by Google.
Also, at the bottom of the article after the author's name, there's a link to some search optimization service's website.
There are 2 kinds of people in this world. Those that can keep their train of thought,
I use google quite a bit to check on recent spyware/malware (used it this morning) and with all due respect, the first few links typically are for spyware products that don't work, domain parking sites (search engines themselves), requiring some amount of diligence to get to the "real" sites that have information.
If this claim is true, I guess we'll have to wait the typical "four to six weeks for delivery."
The "war" metaphor really is cute. Geeky competition in search relevance is really a lot like bombing cities, shooting ranks of soldiers, and destroying bridges and railways. Burnt, bloody bodies everywhere! And clean datacenters with mathematical algorithms.
--
make install -not war
One of the most interesting (and obvious) effects of Google's changes: The company which once ranked first for the phrase "search engine optimization", SEOinc, is now nowhere to be found -- even a search for the company's name doesn't bring up the company's website. SEOincs response has been a -- somewhat ineffective -- try to bring those reporting on its fall to "cease and desist".
Google United - Google Patent Examined
Google's newest patent application is lengthy. It is interesting in some places and enigmatic in others. Less colourful than most end user license agreements, the patent covers an enormous range of ranking analysis techniques Google wants to ensure are kept under their control.
Publication Date: 4/7/2005 7:41:24 AM
By Jim Hedger, StepForth News Editor, StepForth Placement Inc.
Thoughts on Google's patent... "Information retrieval based on historical data."
Google's newest patent application is lengthy. It is interesting in some places and enigmatic in others. Less colourful than most end user license agreements, the patent covers an enormous range of ranking analysis techniques Google wants to ensure are kept under their control. Some of the ideas and concepts covered in the document are almost certainly worked into the current algorithm running Google. Some are being worked in as this article is being written. Some may never see the blue-light of electrons but are pretty good ideas so it might have been considered wise to patent them. Google's not saying which is which. While not exactly War and Peace, it's a pretty complex document that gives readers a glimpse inside the minds of Google engineers. What it doesn't give is a 100% clear overview of how Google operates now and how the various ideas covered in the patent application will be integrated into Google's algorithms. One interesting section seems to confirm what SEOs have been saying for almost a year, Google does have a "sandbox" where it stores new links or sites for about a month before evaluation.
Google is in the midst of sweeping changes to the way it operates as a search engine. As a matter of fact, it isn't really a search engine in the fine sense of the word anymore. It isn't really a portal either. It is more of an institution, the ultimate private-public partnership. Calling itself a media-company, Google is now a multi-faceted information and multi-media delivery system that is accessed primarily through its well-known interface found at www.google.com.
Google is known for its from-the-hip style of innovation. While the face is familiar, the brains behind it are growing and changing rapidly. Four major factors (technology, revenue, user demand and competition) influence and drive these changes. Where Microsoft dithers and .dll's over its software for years before introduction, Google encourages its staff to spend up to 20% of their time tripping their way up the stairs of invention. Sometimes they produce ideas that didn't work out as they expected, as was the case with Orkut, and sometimes they produce spectacular results as with Google News. The sum total of what works and what doesn't work has served to inform Google what its users want in a search engine. After all, where the users go, the advertising dollars must follow. Such is the way of the Internet.
In its recent SEC filing, the first it has produced since going public in August 2004, Google said it was going to spend a lot of money to continue outpacing its rivals. This year they figure they will spend about $500 million to develop or enhance newer technologies. In 2004 and 2003, Google spent $319 million and $177 million respectively. The increase in innovation-spending corresponds with a doubling of Google's staff headcount which has jumped from 1628 employees in 2003 to 3021 by the end of 2004.
Over the past five years Google has produced a number of features that have proven popular enough to be included among its public-search offerings. On their front page, these features include Image Search, Google Groups, Google News, Froogle, Google Local, and Google Desktop. There are dozens of other features which can be accessed by cli
sigs, as if you care.
What do those guys actually *do* in any case? I mean, legitimately. I guess you can tweak things a bit, but... how much does that actually get you if you simply aren't a popular site?
Almost any algorithm can be spoofed fairly easily: inserting very small text that's the same color as the background. Then whenever they want Google to think they've updated, they change the text. The viewer doesn't tell the difference, but the source code changes. Or they could just use comments in Javascript, or just create Javascript that never gets used.
Also, a page with frames might get penalized since its content doesn't change, although the content of the frames may change frequently.
Original server is /.ed. Coral cache link here.
That's an interesting interpretation. Here's a review of today's submissions, translated to your perspective:
Broadway Awards Spam is about your rights to watch Spamalot, nominated for 14 Tony awards.
IT: More on Last Years Cisco Source Code Theft is about your rights to read about a theft of proprietary source code.
IT: What Does a Spreading Worm Look Like? is about your rights to visualize what a spreading worm looks like.
Games: Gameboy Emulator Released for PSP is about your rights to play Gameboy games on a PSP.
Newest Star Wars Reviews Suprisingly Positive is about your rights to be surprised that Lucas Finally Got It Right(tm).
Wow, with your new scheme, we can get rid of all other topics!
"You have the right to search in silence. If you give up the right to search in silence, anything you say can and will be modded down in a court of public opinion. You have the right to be listed on google. If you desire a seo and cannot afford one, you will spare us all a lot of unwanted search engine spam, and a metamod will be obtained for you before final moderation."
Starsucks
Is it the case that Google's search dominance is a direct result of it clinging onto a patent for PageRank ?
Their search dominance is a direct result of PageRank. That they have a patent on it prevents other companies from copying the idea or hiring their employees away (Microsoft is notorious at doing both these things). So yes, the patent is important.
Sorry kids, but patents and "Do no evil" are mutually incompatible concepts.
You're retarded if you think that.
Note that Google is now looking at domain ownership information. This may result in a much lower level of bogus information in domain registrations. It's probably a good idea to make sure that your domain registration information, business license, D&B rating, on-site contact info, and SSL certificates all match.
"Domain cloaking" will probably mean that you don't appear anywhere the top in Google. So that's on the way out.
Well, considering that it isn't .NET's fault that they didn't properly implement exception handling I would say no. Also, combine this with the fact that that exception is caused simply by a server overload and you get a total nonissue.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
Google has millions upon millions of click history on their search results that say what it is people really are looking for, as well as which ones appeared good fodder for first clicking.
No one else has such a large database of what humans have actually picked.
Such a click history and search term history asset is worth even more if it gets correlated with Evil Direct Marketing information from the cookie traders.
Although, it seems possible that large ISPs could also grab and analyze their members Google interactions to figure out people's tastes, assuming such interactions remain unencrypted.
I have to wonder how many companies with static IP addresses have, unbeknownst to them, built up extensive history logs at Google showing their search term preferences and click selections. If I were a technology startup with a hot idea to research I'd be a little more paranoid about something like that.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Yes, patents ARE a violation of google's do no evil policy, as it gives them a monopoly on the good search engine algorithems.
So they have monopoly. What's your point?
When did a monopoly by google become ok?
Sometime around the 1790's when the patent system was created in the US to give inventors an temporary and artificial monopoly on their inventions so as to encourage them to innovate. Google has not violated their policy of "do no evil" by properly utilizing the patent system, and it has had the intended side effect of preventing Microsoft from using their corporate muscle to crush Google.
but why support one companies attempts to cripple their opponents through legislation instead of competition?
Why should a company with more money have a right to crush me with my own invention?
The primary reason why the patent system sucks is that "invention" is far too loosely defined. Many patents get granted in cases where the patent office's own rules state that they should throw them out.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
What does that mean? At the highest level, it means that most of the Google algorithm is constructed by a machine. You give the machine human-constructed examples of how to rank a sample set of pages (notice those want ads where Google is hiring people who can inspect and assess the quality of web pages?) and it then uses essentially brute-force techniques to test every possible combination of your ranking variables to find the simplest formula that ranks pages the same way the human did.
There is no human at Google "twisting dials" to alter individual parameters of a formula. The machine constructs the algorithm, and it can therefore easily be so complex that no human can understand it. Tweaking the algorithm becomes a process of changing or adding to your "training set" of human-ranked pages, and letting the data mining process come up with a revised algorithm.
For example, Google could invent a new variable called "category", and identify each page as belonging to category Astronomy, Botulism, Country, [...] and Other. Once that variable is thrown into the mix, then the Google "aglorithm" is essentially free to vary wildly from one type of subject matter to the next. For example, you might see someone with a Real Estate site swearing up and down that inbound links are no longer as important, while someone with an Astronomy site might swear that, no, inbound links are more important than ever. You can see exactly this kind of bickering in most of the forums that people who hope to do Search Engine Optimization frequent.
The other big mistake people make in trying to see how to game the Google algorithm is "delay". In studying how people manage (or fail to manage) complex systems, psychologists learned that people generally would fail if a delay was introduced between their actions and the results of their actions.
In one very simple test, people were charged with trying to stabilize the temperature in a virtual refridgerator. They had one dial, and there was exactly one piece of feedback: the current temperature in the fridge. However, they were not explicitly told that there was a delay between moving the dial and when the results of that action would stabilize.
The responses of those test subjects was eerily similar to what we see in Google-gaming webmasters these days. Some people swore up and down that some human behind the scenes was directly tweaking the results to thwart whatever they did. Others became frustrated and decided that nothing they did really mattered, so they would just swing the dial back and forth between its minimum and maximum settings.
What does this have to do with Google? These days, Google can change their algorithm relatively frequently, and the algorithm can vary by the relative date of various things. The net sum is, there's a delay between when your page is first ranked and when it is likely to arrive at a relatively stable ranking. This can drive webmasters nuts as they think they've done something clever to rank their page high, but then it drops a week later. Although it doesn't occur to them, the important question is: did the change cause the high ranking or did it cause the sudden decline?
The few people who did master the simple refridgerator system? Well, they sounded more like some of the people who are more successful at gaming Google. Those folks tend to say things like: "just make one change and then leave it alone for a while to see what happens."
Can you still game the Google algorithm? Undoubtedly in specific cases. But it's getting harder. The Google algorithm was always complex, but what's changing is that the days when a few variables (such as inbound link count) generally swamped the effects of all the others is drawing to a close. We are approaching the day when the best technique to rank highly with Google will be: sit down at your keyboard and make more good content every day.
There seems to be a lot of weight put on web page freshness. I host a friend's site containing the collection of poems by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. She lived in the 1800s so one cannot expect to see any new material from her.
The site is mostly static but is rich with cultural value. It's currently the number one hit on Google. I'm hoping that Google's emphasis on "freshness" won't make his site fall in ranking.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
I say F-A-Q not FAQ. I pronounce IRC I-R-C not Irck. It makes me go irck when somebody says erck for IRC. I pronounce MySQL as My-S-Q-L not My Sequel. #$*#@$%&)(@#&%()*#@&%)(*#@% However, I do pronounce LASER as laser the word. Laser is no longer just an acronym.
Isn't this "page update frequency" hullaballoo a bit premature? If Google wants relevant results I can only see update frequency being but a minor factor in any page rank determination algorithms. For example: Informations sites (historical information, dictionaries, encyclopedias, collections, etc...) are often at once the most relevant (if info is what you're looking for) and the least updated sites. I can't really imagine the Oxford Faculty meeting every week to decide new words for their dictionary to retain their www.oed.com pagerank. Just imagine what it would do to the English language : )
Seriously, this little article is going to get Webmasters thinking a little more but I don't see anything to panic about. Not yet, anyways.
No, no sig. Really.
ThePromenader
It seems nobody has asked the question: what if a spammer wants to lower the rank of more reputable companies? If a spammer link spams a site that is already fairly popular, couldn't it harm the page rank of a company that has nothing to do with the spam?
MacroHard - Boning you in a big way! (TM)
"The history of SQL and relational databases traces back to E.F. Codd, an IBM researcher who first published an article on the relational database idea in June 1970. Codd's article started a flurry of research, including a major project at IBM. Part of this project was a database query language named SEQUEL, an acronym for Structured English Query Language. The name was later changed to SQL for legal reasons, but many people still pronounce it SEQUEL to this day."
http://www.provue.com/proVUE/Fact_SQLServer.htmljust a bit of history.
"if i'd known it was harmless, i'd have killed it myself"
I like the pronunciation Fah - cue.