Payperpost Gets Pissed at Google

Payperpost has been on the attack the last few days, and their target has been Google and Google's "Page Rank" system.

Payperpost has said that Google has started targeting some of the blogs that use their system, reducing their Page Rank all the way down to zero.

Basically, PPP allows advertisers to buy "sponsored posts" on blogs, where the blog owner will do a write-up on the company or web site that purchases the post.

Google took dead aim at web sites that sell text link ads a few weeks ago, and it seems as though they have started to focus on sites that sell "sponsored blog" posts as well.

Once it appeared that publishers in their network were having their Page Rank taken away from them, Payperpost went on the offensive, posting a series of entries on their blog that chastised Google and questioned the way that they do business.

In a post entitled "Google Goes after the Everyday Blogger", Ted Murphy lashes out at Google, saying that they have a "monopolistic stranglehold on search and online advertising" and that "Payperpost offers a very attractive alternative to Adsense", as if to say that Google is purposely punishing sites in the Payperpost network in order to win back some of their Adsense business that they may have lost to Payperpost.

There are so many things wrong with the linked blog posting that I don't even know where to start. Let me try..

1. The entire theme of the article seems to be that Google doesn't care about the little guy, and takes a very "us versus them" stance throughout the article. As I said, Google has tried to give people a heads-up over purchasing paid links and paid posts. I've known about it for ages, so I can't be alone. We used to sell Text Link Ads and stopped because of this very reason. In my opinion, if Google were truly evil, they wouldn't have given people any kind of a warning.

2. What people don't seem to understand is that Google doesn't like people flaunting their Page Rank in order to make money. They give you a Page Rank of six and then you go ahead and sell Text Link Ads that have nothing to do with your site or sell a Sponsored Post that has absolutely nothing to do with the theme of your site? John Chow is the perfect example of this. He has completely gone over the top monetizing his blog, taking full advantage of the strong Page Rank that Google gave him, and now he complains because Google punished him by dropping his Page Rank and penalizing him in the search engine results? Give me a break.

3. Last time I checked, Google didn't have any unfair advantage over their competition. Their market share is growing by the month because their competitors products, for the most part, are terrible. This is Google's problem how?

4. Payperpost also takes aim at sites like Techcrunch in the article, questioning how Techcrunch can get away with having posts where they give thanks to their sponsors. This led to a response from Techcrunch, in which they just savaged PPP. Techcrunch doesn't make money selling their high Page Rank; they make money by selling their high traffic. There is a difference.

5. Ted Murphy ends his rant by saying that you should write to Google and your congressmen. LOL.

We've been dealing with Google for many years now. They have always been fair and reasonable with us. At the same time, we would never rely on them for Page Rank or for free traffic or whatever. The sooner that people realize that Google doesn't owe anyone anything, the better.

Filed under: Internet Companies