It seems that the top-ranked site on Google if you search for “Jew” is an anti-semitic site. So this is CT doing our googlebombing best to correct this by linking to the Wikipedia entry for “Jew”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jew instead. (See “Norman Geras”:http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2004/04/joogle.html for more details).
{ 17 comments }
anthony 04.05.04 at 9:32 am
You have to link to it using the word you wish to relate the page too. In this case the word is Jew. The way you have linked means you are driving the wikipedia page up the search results for “the relevant Wikipedia entry”.
The original google bomb article is here.
Chris Bertram 04.05.04 at 9:38 am
Thanks Anthony. Fixed this now.
norm 04.05.04 at 10:32 am
Thanks, Chris.
Chris Lightfoot 04.05.04 at 11:20 am
Anthony– no. For the full details read Page and Brin’s paper on “Page rank”, but firstly “Page rank” is content-independent — it’s computed over the link graph, not the index — and secondly Google will index (a) all the text in a page; (b) all the text in inlinks to that page. So since the Wikipedia page is actually about the word “Jew”, simply linking to it will be enough to increase its “Page rank”; it already appears when you search for “Jew”.
The other sort of “Google bomb” — where you’re trying to get a site up the rankings for a term which does not appear in it, as with trying to make the White House biography of George W. Bush the top link for “miserable failure” — does rely on putting the relevant term in the link text, but that’s not relevant here.
Lis Riba 04.05.04 at 8:10 pm
On second thought, Wikis can be vandalized just as easily as googlebombing manipulates popularity-based search results. What’s to prevent someone from trashing that Wikipedia page and replacing it with neonazi crap?
Maybe a better link for Jew would be Jewfaq.org.
eszter 04.05.04 at 10:45 pm
I agree with Lis, Wikis can be edited too easily. I also prefer a more stable page for a “Jew” link.
George Williams 04.05.04 at 10:54 pm
If you use the word in question too often in one blog post (and its comments) you run the risk of the blog post becoming the number response to a google search instead of the page to which you are linking. This happened on my blog entry with the “unelectable” meme.
Abiola Lapite 04.05.04 at 11:59 pm
“What’s to prevent someone from trashing that Wikipedia page and replacing it with neonazi crap?”
The fact that all edits can be easily reverted, and that there are people who keep a loving watch on pages they’ve worked on? I know, as I do the same myself. If that isn’t assurance enough, you should also be aware that vandals can and do regularly get banned from making edits to Wikipedia.
I think you’re worrying about nothing here.
liz 04.06.04 at 12:19 am
I don’t know. Maybe a stronger case could be made for listing a number of sites. I find the CJF site quite off-putting as well.
Zibblsnrt 04.06.04 at 4:26 am
The bomb has struck, and Jewwatch is now off the #1 spot in the listings. Good job, all.
Wonder if we can bash it down another spot or forty. That’s probably pushing it. ;)
James Russell 04.06.04 at 6:06 am
What’s to prevent someone from trashing that Wikipedia page and replacing it with neonazi crap?
Nothing. The Wikipedia entry contains a list of previous edits, several of them noting “reverted to previous entry due to vandalism”. Abiola notes that vandals can and do get banned from editing Wikipedia; unfortunately this doesn’t stop new ones from coming along and doing the same thing.
Abiola Lapite 04.06.04 at 10:31 am
“unfortunately this doesn’t stop new ones from coming along and doing the same thing.”
The thing is, as I’ve noted already, that registered contributors can set up watchlists, so that they get notified as soon as vandals strike. Even if hundreds of troublemakers were to coordinate an attack from scores of IP addresses all at once, the page could simply be locked down to prevent any edits from being made.
Abiola Lapite 04.06.04 at 10:35 am
“The bomb has struck, and Jewwatch is now off the #1 spot in the listings. Good job, all.”
You’re a bit premature with the congratulations. Are you sure you don’t have SafeSearch on? Turn it off, and you’ll see that JewWatch is still number one on Google’s index.
George Williams 04.06.04 at 1:39 pm
Google has different server farms such that search results will vary slightly depending on your location.
sennoma 04.06.04 at 4:11 pm
I posted this, and a friend pointed out in comments that it would be nice to force the scumbags right off the first page of results:
jew
jew
jew
jew
jew
jew
jew
jew
jonathan briggs 04.10.04 at 7:44 pm
I am glad that your Joogle campaign is gradually proving successful.
I have recently been teaching in Kosovo and the local Albanian Kosovars have a similar story about the monopoly of search results for Serbian sites when you type Kosovo into Google.
Perhaps Google really does need to think of ways of addressing the “authority issue” in its ranking.
IXLNXS 04.12.04 at 6:58 am
Jew Watch
Fun with Google.
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