One day I threatened Google with symbolic retaliation. Why?
It was for their poor treatment of publishers and the open Web.
Yet my idea back then was still somehow metaphorical.
Fast forward a few years and there is a tool for that!
You can use a simple WordPress plugin ever since.
What does it do actually? It declares that you don’t trust Google.
Let’s take a step back and take a look on what it really does.
Does the nofollow attribute hurt websites you link to?
When linking out to other sites, do you hurt them by adding the nofollow attribute to the outgoing links?
When Google and other corporations came up with the nofollow attribute it was to mark untrustworthy sites.
SPAM was a huge problem back then already.
So links that weren’t really editorial ones were meant to use nofollow instead.
Why? To prevent authority flowing to sketchy sites.
Sometimes you also had to link something while not trusting it or disagreeing with it.
Then the nofollow attribute could also be applied to mark sites that are
- controversial
- unethical
- fraudulent
A few years later Google disclosed that authority would simply evaporate on links using nofollow.
They never admitted AFAIK that nofollow hurts other sites directly.
Yet at least passing of authority is being withheld.
By now the importance of nofollow has been limited.
There are also new attributes called “UGC” and “sponsored” to differentiate between the use cases of nofollow.
Yet you still can tell Google that you don’t trust the sites you link by using them.
So yes, to some extent you hurt the sites you mark with the “nofollow” attribute.
At the very least the links do not pass significant value.
As Google grew so did their negative impact
Over the years Google grew exponentially to become one of the dominant tech monopolies.
With power there comes abuse and thus Google policies have become increasingly harmful.
So what can a fringe blogger like myself do about it other than give up and become desperate?
I said I will “nofollow” Google that is devalue outgoing links to Google using the nofollow attribute.
Google forced publishers to use nofollow or UGC whenever users get invited to participate.
Google wants you to add nofollow or UGC to cripple links added by others.
This way it stifles debate and discourages people from quoting sources.
nofollow everything, kill the Web one step at a time
Yes, many sites add nofollow to every single outgoing link!
Over time Google not only wanted you to add nofollow to
- text link ads from Google competitors
- comments or forum postings
- or sites you simply can’t vouch for.
No, Google wants you to cripple links from
- guest blogging
- widgets
- infographics
In short Google wants you to fix their algorithm by hurting
- yourself
- your sources
- and your supporters.
Why? As they are apparently not competent enough to do it themselves.
While at it they wreck the whole foundation of the free Web, hypertext.
That may be sheer stupidity but also strategy.
As super smart as the Google overlords often get pictured I doubt that they are harming the Web by accident.
After all they are geeks themselves. They want to control it for their own gain.
nofollow is just one of temporary means to achieve that control.
Thus I decided to use their own control mechanism, nofollow, to strike back in a symbolic way.
It’s about sending a clear message to Google: we don’t trust you.
How to nofollow Google
I wanted to add nofollow to all links leading to Google.
That’s a daunting task in case you want to do it manually.
After all you not only link to Google inside your posts, you have all kinds of Google widgets on your blog.
Also you have to consider all the other properties Google has like Blogger, YouTube and the likes.
Think about it, do you really want to endorse a corporate criminal just because you like a blog post or video hosted on their platform?
By now many people are disgruntled with Google and are looking for solutions.
Andrea Pernici has created a WordPress plugin that adds nofollow to all outgoing links to Google.
In its latest version it even adds nofollow to other Google sites.
Endorsing content doesn’t usually mean endorsing the hosting behind it so why should Google be an exception?
They aren’t the friendly start up they were 25 years ago.
Google is a huge behemoth endangering whole industries.
I’m not talking about the stale “SEO is dead” meme here.
I hope other similar add ons from popular platforms like Drupal or Joomla will follow.
Are you adding unnatural links to Google?
Linking out to Google properties dozens of times from your website is very unnatural on a side note.
Just think about it for a minute. Why link one site or company over and over again? It looks fishy!
What other company beside your own gets so many links from you?
Most of the links you add to Google are redundant. Everybody uses their services anyway.
- Are you linking out to Microsoft all the time because so many people use Windows?
- Are you endorsing Facebook with dozens of links from your site because your friends use it?
- Do you link out to Amazon below every single post because you buy your books there?
Then why all these unnatural links to Google properties then?