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It IS interesting. But I still disagree with the premise under which Gargle operates - that the most relevant page to your search terms is THE MOST POPULAR - i.e., the page with the most links to it. To my mind, that has absolutely NO bearing on its relevance.

This has actually done great harm to my business, which I spent a great deal of time optimizing so it would show up at the top of all of the major search engines. This is because I made it highly relevant to people searching for equipment I sell in the telephone industry.

And then Gargle tweaked its algorithm to increase the weighting for popularity. And my traffic has plummetted. With Google, you have to be the most popular, with tons of other places linking to you - which is hard in the business end of things, since everyone in my field is a COMPETITOR who is about as likely to link to me as X-42(i) is to emulate Helen Keller.

Of course, Google perhaps had a profit motive in mind - you can still BUY your way to the top with Google AdWords, but the days of getting there on your own relevant merits are over.

Michael

this won't make you feel better, but you (and anyone interested in the science behind google) might be interested in:

The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine, by Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page at:

http://www7.scu.edu.au/programme/fullpapers/1921/com1921.htm

"And then Gargle tweaked its algorithm to increase the weighting for popularity. And my traffic has plummetted. With Google, you have to be the most popular, with tons of other places linking to you - which is hard in the business end of things, since everyone in my field is a COMPETITOR who is about as likely to link to me as X-42(i) is to emulate Helen Keller."

In my field, too, but....I maintain a very large link list to my competitors' sites, and get reciprocation from them, as well. Competition doesn't scare me. I offer excellent merchandise at highly-competitive prices. That, plus fast, efficient order-filling, and I get to keep my customers and attract new ones.

The result? My site is number 2 on three different Google keyword searches that are the most appropriate for the site. Number 3 on Yahoo's new search engine. I don't care if folks visit my competitors' sites. They'll be back.

Sorry to hear of your business woes.

Nevertheless, it seems like Google returns the page containing the information I'm looking for at the top of its results list 99% of the time, and it's almost never deeper than 2nd or 3rd. Granted, I think the quality of search terms has a lot to do with it.

Now, if you're selling ink jet cartridge refill kits, you're probably SOL.

Froogle.com should be useful to consumers, but I have yet to see how.

Oh, well. Sooner or later, Google will be bought out and soon afterward morph into just another load of cr*p. Perhaps the only reason it hasn't yet happened is the lack of a non-compete clause acceptable to both sides.