Google Reduces PageRank of Many Sites

Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 by Andy Beal

Google Reduces PageRank of Many Sites

Both Daily Blog Tips and Andy Beard are covering a dramatic drop in PageRank for some very popular web sites. The drop happened overnight and while there’s no concrete evidence as to why, speculation includes selling links or interlinking within a network of sites.

Here are just a few sites affected:

Engadget (from 7 to 5)
AutoBlog (from 6 to 4)
Problogger (from 6 to 4)
Copyblogger (from 6 to 4)
Washington Post (from 7 to 5)
Forbes.com (from 7 to 5)
SFGate.com (from 7 to 5)

Another theory is that Google is changing the PR scale. I don’t think this is the case, as we’d see pretty much all sites drop in PR. As we avoid selling paid links, and don’t benefit from links from a network of blogs, we seem to have made it through unscathed–although, that doesn’t mean MP and other sites could be caught up in this at some point.

What I’d like to see next is a report on whether any of these sites have seen a reduction in Google traffic. After all, if it’s just a cosmetic reduction in PR, there’s no big deal.

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16 comments on “Google Reduces PageRank of Many Sites”

Brian Chappell Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 10:20 am

“What I’d like to see next is a report on whether any of these sites have seen a reduction in Google traffic. After all, if it’s just a cosmetic reduction in PR, there’s no big deal.”

Your not the only one. Bring on the FUD!
paqo Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 10:44 am

http://www.webrankinfo.com/ PR7 to 4
Brian Chappell Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 11:00 am

I found some others as well. Checking there rankings for terms, no noticeable difference what so ever.
Ciaran Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 11:06 am

The fact that New Scientist, the site that Danny ‘outed’ (a term I disagree with btw) has also dropped to 5 (I think that it was on 7 or suggests that it’s all about the links…
Fionn Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 12:02 pm

Interesting. Google has said repeatedly that they will find a way to penalize sites selling links maybe it was not the FUD everybody keeps calling it and they were actually serious. They have wall to wall PHD’s it cant be that hard to figure out.
Jaan Kanellis Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 12:21 pm

All about offering PAID links right Ciaran?
Ciaran Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 12:51 pm

@Jaan

yes – my bad; I missed out paid…
Steven Bradley Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 2:21 pm

Paid links are the obvious culprit, though it’s an interesting list of sites. Hard to imagine their PR going down other than through a Google penalty of some kind.
Brian Chappell Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 5:51 pm

I am showing all the aforementioned sites back to their original PR.
Andy Beal Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 6:08 pm

@Brian – I’m still seeing the reduced PR numbers.
Jason Bartholme Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 6:11 pm

My blog is going from a PR5 to PR3. I’ve been sick to my stomach all day.
Andy Beard Says:

October 24th, 2007 at 6:58 pm

That little green bar can have all kinds of weird knock on effects.

Whilst today I am the centre of attention (before the Facebook deal) on Techmeme, maybe their algo uses TBPR a little.

All those nice tables that send you 10 visitors per day start to add up to 50-100 visitors a day that are often potential new subscribers.

Am I enough of an authority for others to want to tempt me to link back to them on a story, or will they look elsewhere hoping for a reciprocal link?

2 weeks ago I speculated that I might not be passing pagerank, though it is hard to determine as there are other factors such as my expading tag clouds, and the pages I gain lots of links on also reciprocating with the dofollow trackbacks.
Let’s hear it for mediocre | Cosmos Says:

February 16th, 2008 at 8:43 am

[...] sure you’ve all read how many “top blogs”; ProBlogger, AdesBlog, Quickonlinetips, Uncle Tom Cobley and all [1] have been knocked off their perches with Google PR losses, typically PR 6/7 down to PR [...]
Fery Says:

February 24th, 2008 at 10:11 pm

It’s huge disaster for those sites I think. PR shows the popularity of the site, isn’t it?
Tina Says:

February 24th, 2008 at 10:12 pm

I’ve lose my blogs on blogger with unclear reason, I’ve appealed it to google, but they don’t respond me yet.
The Click2Map™ Blog » Blog Archive » SMBs’ Confusion with Online Social Promotion Tools Says:

July 5th, 2008 at 4:48 pm

[...] the whole Web 2.0 is a gray area: The line between power users and system gamers is too thin. The PageRank fiasco that hit Google a few month back reflects the same problematic. Is Robert Scoble gaming the system [...]

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