Quote:
Originally Posted by Bigtoe
The whole idea of using links to rate the quality of a site is flawed. It started in the SEO community where people are trading ideas/links.
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Totally untrue.
In the early days of the web, sites traded links because that was basically the only way to get traffic. There were no search engines unless you count Archie and Veronica.
Then Yahoo developed as a directory (at Stanford). Next, some early ineffective search engines like Alta Vista, Lycos, and so on began to take shape. Still, since search engines sucked unless you could pay for banner ads, the best way to get traffic was through links.
Sites that were similar to one another linked together. When a lot of sites linked to one particular site, it was seen as an authority -- an important site in that topic area.
Researchers at Stanford tested using links in search algorithms as a way to provide more relevant search results. It worked. Two search engines came out of that research. One is now called Google and one is used by Ask.com (Clever).
After the Google and Clever search engines came out,
then SEO guys began linking campaigns as a way to boost search engine results.