Gomes on Search Engine Spam

Lee Gomes points out that self-service ad programs like AdSense fund the creation of junky low-value websites that constitute a new form of search engine spam. He hits the nail perfectly when he says:

“a kind of schizophrenia exists at search-engine companies. Half their engineering staff is busy trying to keep useless pages out of search results; the other half is busy coming up with tools that make it easier for people to create and profit from the useless pages in the first place.”

My own experience is that Google has been doing a pretty good job with the top results, but as I drill down, I find a lot of useless sites in the second half of their search results. I’m not especially bothered by this (so long as Google keeps the relevant stuff at the top, who cares what’s in the bowels?), but ultimately Google may need to tighten up its algorithm to make sure the useless sites don’t get into searchers’ attention sphere.

Thanks to Searchblog for the reference.