Google Losing Credibility With Webmasters

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Google’s latest plan to get webmasters to turn in “paidlink reports is not sitting well with the average webmaster, myself included. Since we all know Google has founded an empire on selling temporary text links to people, it seems highly hypocritical that they’ve went on the attack concerning the sales of permanent text links, or links that aren’t redirected.

A lot of people have weighed in on the subject, and some interesting points are being raised concerning this new anti-advertising initiative.

3. It’s impossible to define a paid link exactly. Paying cash is obviously what you meant, but is that any different than a link to a client or to a buddy who helped you submit your site to 1,000 free web directories?

If I’m right with that assumption, then it’s really about determining motivation. Humans cannot determine motivations any better than the Google algorithm. It’s a virtual coin toss!

Of course the number of reasons this plan is no good are countless. The biggest problem I see with it are 1) arrogance and 2) hypocrisy. Google is dominating every aspect of the online advertising arena yet they find time to go after an advertising method that existed long before their company ever did.

Coming on the heals of their takeover of DoubleClick, you can’t help but imagine anti-trust issues looming on their horizon. This company is now so influential in so many areas of the internet involving commerce that you can’t help but see things coming to a head.

Webmasters have been facing declining revenues in the Adsense program, and these latest heavy handed techniques are not bound to endear anyone to the company.

What do you think of Google’s paid link reporting plan?

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