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Comment by White_Wolf | Hacker News Reader

I'll be the unpopular voice here (not defending g for the,imho, monopoly though): - Google is not killing anything and don't owe you traffic; - You don't get traffic because your website is less algorithm oriented than other sites (among a ton of other things).

if you want to unserstand how and why certain websites rank and all that sort of stuff just lurk on black hat SEO forums and see how they game system. I don't recomment their services but it's worth reading about the things they take into account. From keywords, density, headings all the way to domain age and server location.

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This is the "don't anthropomorphize Larry Ellison" defense [0]. Google isn't killing anything because Google is just an algorithm. Your site fares poorly not because Google wants to hurt you but because you don't want to waste your life catering to an algorithm. It's not Google's fault that that you have other priorities like actually helping your readers live a better life!

While it's strictly accurate, it's not a very useful way to look at the world. Google is killing independent sites that spend more time on the content than on SEO. It might be killing those sites in the same way that a volcanic eruption kills wildlife—as an unthinking, uncaring force of nature—but it's still killing them.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=33m1s&v=-zRN7XLCRhc&feature=...

It’s also a framing that ignores the fact that Google clearly wants to be able to filter out the garbage but can’t. It’s not bloggers’ fault for that. At some point, you can either decide to write for people or decide to write for the algorithm.

It’s not about Google owing anyone traffic, people are upset that Google can’t tell the difference between inauthentic product recommendations and authentic ones. Google clearly wishes they could as well, but it doesn’t scale so they don’t solve the problem.

> your website is less algorithm oriented

Maybe we should refuse to accept Google’s framing. It’s content creators’ job to create great content as judged by people. It’s Google’s job to discover that content and rank it above procedurally generated garbage that is devouring the internet. The fact that Google’s results are dominated by trash isn’t because there’s a lack of good content.

Not everyone has the time and resources to do SEO to beat big media companies at this game. Buying an old domain is a prime example.

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