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Google slapping PageRank Penalties

As in it’s all over the blogosphere now. A lot of popular sites have been slapped with PageRank penalties, some scrambling for their lives. And some though it was just this blog.


Here’s a long list of very popular and trusted sites been drastically affected by the recent PageRank update.

http://www.downloadsquad.com PR5 -> PR4
http://www.autoblog.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.engadget.com PR7 -> PR5
http://www.problogger.net PR6 -> PR4
http://www.copyblogger.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.joystiq.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.tuaw.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.searchengineguide.com PR7 -> PR4
http://www.searchenginejournal.com PR7 -> PR4
http://www.johnchow.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.quickonlinetips.com PR6 -> PR3
http://weblogtoolscollection.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.seroundtable.com PR7 -> PR4
http://www.blogherald.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.washingtonpost.com PR7 -> PR5
http://www.washingtontimes.com PR6 -> PR4
http://www.forbes.com PR7 -> PR5
http://www.sfgate.com PR7 -> PR5
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com PR6 -> PR4

This is what Google has been announced recently — sites selling raw link for PR juice will be penalized.

So, did the recent update affected your blogs/websites?

It is also possible that this recent update is screwed in some way. If you remember some 6 months ago when that PR update was so screwed some sites easily get PR6 and even on blog I owned for 6 months got a PR8 page. Maybe this time, it’s the other way around.

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Avatar for Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

43 Responses

  1. Avatar for Megha Singh Megha Singh says:

    google stop page rank algorithm

  2. Avatar for How To Make A How To Make A says:

    Greetings from Los angeles! I’m bored at work so I decided to check out your site on my iphone during lunch break. I enjoy the information you provide here and can’t wait
    to take a look when I get home. I’m surprised at how fast your blog loaded on my cell phone .. I’m
    not even using WIFI, just 3G .. Anyways, amazing site!

  3. Avatar for How To Make A How To Make A says:

    I love your blog.. very nice colors & theme.
    Did you design this website yourself or did you hire
    someone to do it for you? Plz answer back as I’m looking to design my own blog and would like to know where u got this from. thanks a lot

  4. Avatar for creating a blog creating a blog says:

    Hello! Do you use Twitter? I’d like to follow you if that would be okay. I’m undoubtedly enjoying your blog and look forward to new
    posts.

  5. Avatar for skysenshi skysenshi says:

    I was actually shocked when I saw one of the newer blogs, who have higher following than my decrepit old blog, go down from 3 to 0. I got retained at 3. I hope it doesn’t get any lower than that because I update regularly now.

  6. Avatar for SEO birmingham SEO birmingham says:

    Thanks for sharing Google pr update every 3 months

  7. Avatar for Jamesh Jamesh says:

    This will really help lots of business minded people to be able to be featured online.

  8. Avatar for cj cj says:

    too bad, I used to have PR3, then a few weeks later it went down to 2. and i was glad to note that some of my other pages got PR 1 because of some sites that linked to these pages. but today when i checked my PR, all of my pages including the main page now got a 0 PR!!!

  9. Avatar for meapemisy meapemisy says:

    Hi all. I would like to recommend a SEO tool to exchange links – ForOzik.com. I started to use it and the results are very well.

  10. Avatar for Neetu Sharma Neetu Sharma says:

    Hey,

    Now after 3 months from 31st Dec 08, Google finally update my site’s PR as on 2nd April 09.
    @@

    http://www.seowonders.com

  11. Avatar for Latest Google Page Rank Update Latest Google Page Rank Update says:

    Google updated the toolbar page rank again on 2 April 2009.This time they filtered more back links. Previously i have around 70 now i have just 10 back links left for my site http://www.cybex.in. But site rank well on all top keywords. It seems google backlinks scheme updated too. It still loves article links as i did for my site.

  12. Avatar for dendi dendi says:

    Saat ini PR saya Slam Dunk jadi 0 (nol), saya dah berusaha dengan saya dah coba posting rutin, submit ke directory dan juga blobwalking, tetapi PR-nya tetep slam dunk jadi 0 I(nol), gimana ya ? seberapa google menghukum PR suatu web/blog?

  13. Avatar for Benjamin Benjamin says:

    Wow, no fun. I wonder what they did to get this penalty. Duplicate content perhaps? I guess we’ll never know…

  14. Avatar for Maruel Maruel says:

    Just got a “Google Slap” last sunday. My PR dropped from 2 to 0. 2 na nga lang PR ko eh kinuha pa nila, hindi na sila naawa, huhuhu… :(

  15. Avatar for Tom Tom says:

    My PR flopped from 3 to zero last Sunday. The blogflux said that my PR is still 3.

  16. Avatar for Grace Grace says:

    Before I got PR3 then it becomes PR2 and now, it’s PR0 :( how sad…..

  17. Avatar for Grace Grace says:

    Hello po! Pwede po bang malaman san makikita ang google announcements?

  18. Avatar for James | PinoyMoneyTalk.com James | PinoyMoneyTalk.com says:

    Just an update, Google has updated PR again this week. A lot of Pinoy sites have again been affected.

    Check out the list of sites with reduced PR:

    More Pinoy sites lose PageRank as Google updates… again

  19. Avatar for Sonnie Sonnie says:

    Mine got an upgrade to PR 5

  20. Avatar for KK KK says:

    What is the difference of advertising and selling links? Yung advertising is also paying someone to blog about a certain company then link them up. It’s all very confusing. But I think the whole world just felt the grip of Google. I think the Internet community should come up with a non-baised system for ranking because alot of the advertising online is so dependent on the Google value. The monopoly game has been won.

  21. Avatar for jomar jomar says:

    hmm, mine went up, i now have several pr4 and even more pr3 blogs . :)

    nice.

    of course i didn’t sell links or purchased them.

    jomar

  22. Avatar for autocad autocad says:

    Warning about engaging in paid links by Google was announced a long time ago. That’s why as much as possible I wanted to avoid, it but sometimes I’m tempted to do it because it appears that it’s only a threat. But now it happens.

    Anyway I think PR might not affect much the ranking and traffic, because I see many sites with high PR but low traffic and low PR with high traffic.

    And regarding the effect of the update on my sites, yes I was surprise because the sites I didn’t expect to have a PR did increase. One have PR0 -> PR3( http://www.filipinofriendsterworld.com ).
    But sub domains have decreased PR.

  23. Avatar for Rachel Rachel says:

    My blog PR demoted to PR2 from PR4 :(

  24. Avatar for Jon Jon says:

    Personally, I believe more on Google’s internal PR than the toolbar PR. You can still rank well with low PR.

  25. Avatar for Eugene Eugene says:

    Weird. All of my websites have the same PRs as before. PR0, PR3, PR4…

  26. Avatar for make money online make money online says:

    i forgot, i have TLA links in my blog but I took it just today.. could those links contributed to the sudden drop?

  27. Avatar for make money online make money online says:

    PR ng blog ko ng drop din. From PR-4 to 2 and to PR-1 (without www)..is the update for good or we will expect another PR change in a matter of days? Last hour my website with a “www” had a PR-3 then now its down to 2. Very unpredictable..

  28. Avatar for DesignPinas DesignPinas says:

    There was a PR update?

  29. Avatar for Jaypee Jaypee says:

    In Copyblogger’s case, he said that he never sold any links on his blog. There are other theories why these big time blogs got penalized.

    http://jaypeeonline.net/internet/google-pagerank-update-results/

  30. Avatar for Aja Lapus Aja Lapus says:

    Is Google trying to imply that TLA should be avoided? It is more profitable for me than Adsense. Please don’t take away my PR!

  31. Avatar for Lonely Pinoy Lonely Pinoy says:

    too bad :(

  32. Avatar for Bryanboy Bryanboy says:

    mine is PR5.

    yeehaw!

    but then again, i’m not into the whole pagerank thing so it’s the least of my priorities, really.

    :)

  33. Avatar for leo leo says:

    Is PR thing really that valuable? As long as my earnings doesn’t change, it doesn’t seems to bother me at all. Oh, I don’t sell links anyway.

  34. Avatar for Rico Rico says:

    I understand getting scared, since the almighty PR is literally an indicator of income. But what I don’t understand is how some people feel entitled to their previously high PR.

    In any case, as the rules of the game change, we’ll see who adapts and who doesn’t.

  35. Avatar for Mikko Mikko says:

    I’ve read several posts on Google penalizing sites selling links lately.

    I’m at 0, buti nalang walang negative.

  36. Avatar for James | PinoyMoneyTalk.com James | PinoyMoneyTalk.com says:

    Mine got hit with a -2 penalty as well. I also saw that although the Inquirer, Manila Times, and Phil. Star’s sites still show PR 6 on the toolbar, a LivePR check shows that those media giants also lost PR.

    http://www.pinoymoneytalk.com/2007/10/25/popular-sites-lose-pagerank/

  37. Avatar for Dennison Uy - Graphic Designer Dennison Uy - Graphic Designer says:

    Kaya pala biglang nawala sa first page yung site ko. I even have screenshots that were taken just 6 hours ago. Ang bilis nawala parang bula :(

  38. Avatar for Alwell Alwell says:

    Before I read your post I already noticed some decrease in PR of some of my favorite websites. So far my sites were not affective maybe because I only have two PR4 which is not that high.

  39. Avatar for jhay jhay says:

    This is scary, I hope Google doesn’t reduce my PR 5 rating. It’s time to review those link ads once more.

  40. Avatar for jozzua jozzua says:

    Yeah saw it coming yesterday as the datacenters were updating. 2 Points down on my own blog as well.

  41. Avatar for noemi noemi says:

    Some are saying it is a penalty? out of my three (3) PR 6 sites, two of them are now mostly PR 4 in the google datacenters. Incidentally, the my lone PR 6 site is my old webhosting site which has no paid text links ads at all. lauren’s blog retains a PR 5 even if she has text link ads . Mine is now PR 3.

  42. Avatar for markku markku says:

    Really bad news! Are you on PR3 now Abe?

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