Google sued by KinderStart for penalizing site

[JohnW]

Website owner sues Google based on 1st amendment rights, using a twist of the arguement Google successfully used to defend themselves in the SearchKing suit.
www.breitbart.com/news/2006/03/17/D8GDKG900.html

[BradBristol]

Anyone wanna bet (i am giving odds) that they are going to be no more successful than search slut was...

One of these days, there will be a main stream reporter that understands the terms used in SEO.... Being banned is now being in the sandbox, according to this ignorant reporter.

I guess some reporters just love catchy names... even if they are wrong!

[investing101]

Actually Google might find themselves in a contradictory position in this case.

When they are accused of copyright and trademark infringement they argue that they are a just a "non-biased compiler" of information and their use of copyright and trademarks is protected under "fair use" law -- they try to present themselves as if they are some sort of "library." But then if someone complains that they have been "black-listed" by Google and their site is not being displayed in the search results "properly," Google defends themselves arguing that their search represents "opinion" and is protected against any claims that it is "unfair" under First Amendment law.

I think Google is going to have to figure out exactly what position they want to take in handling information.

--Joe

[unreviewed]

I checked out the web site (the one suing Google) and it somehow got a popup past my blocker and offered to install a spy ware program. This is a site aimed at children for goodness sake ...

[gehrlekrona]

but what I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.
I thought that in this country you were innocent until proven otherwise and that you had a chance to defend yourself but when it comes to Google then they are the Almighty and can't do anything wrong, and if they do... OH well, sucks to be you, right??? We know what we are doing and you did something wrong but we won't tell you about it before we kill your site and we won't tell you afterwards either, no matter how many time you do a so called re-inclusion request.
I guess when you walk hand-in-hand with the Chinese government then you can do like the chinese does, put people in jail for years with no trial and not telling them what they did wrong, not even that they violated the Chinese Guidelines so all you have is to read the Guidelines over and over again to see what you might have done wrong and to annoy BigBrother..... :mad:

[cline]

When they are accused of copyright and trademark infringement they argue that they are a just a "non-biased compiler" of information and their use of copyright and trademarks is protected under "fair use" law -- they try to present themselves as if they are some sort of "library." But then if someone complains that they have been "black-listed" by Google and their site is not being displayed in the search results "properly," Google defends themselves arguing that their search represents "opinion" and is protected against any claims that it is "unfair" under First Amendment law.

No contradiction. Libraries have always excercised opinion in choosing what items to put in their collections.

[JohnW]

>I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.

This site is not dropped from the index.

The article reports on an interesting legal theory, however many of the facts in the article must surely have been reported incorrectly by the writer. The site is not banned.

I'm not really sure what keywords, if any, it would deserve to rank for if it were not penalized, if it is actually penalized.

[gehrlekrona]

I also checked and found their web site but I also did some cache checking on different Google data centers and most of them had an old cache from June last year. The ones that were new was about a week old.
If I were Google I would let the site show up in the index too :)

[JohnW]

Check this out:

http://www.google.com/search?hs=OBz&hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q=site%3Akinderstart.com+-site%3Awww.kinderstart.com&btnG=Search

If I had a site with problems like this I would be looking at my webmaster, not at Google. I still have not seen where Google has done anything unusual to them, what am I missing?

[BradBristol]

I don't think your missing anything John.

These guys have a sub par website that uses some 'shady' methods and they are blaming google for not listing it at the #1 spots they want.... Like I never heard that story before working as an SEO. :rolleyes:

Those kinder folks are gonna get their butts kicked in court.

But they are gonna get millions and millions in free advertising...

Maybe they will fair better in the long run than search slut did, but I doubt it.

[Old Welsh Guy]

As I have posted elsewhere, this is more about getting their name in the media than winning in court. No-one can tell you what books to stock in your FREE library. Same applies to a search engine. If they want to appear at the top, then welcome to adwords.

[inlogicalbearer]

They should clean up their comments in their directory before to do anything. A site for childs should be monitored when you got open comments in their directories !!!

I've found in less than 5 minutes; Casino links, diet pills links, drug pills link and even piercing links.
Probably the crawlers have saw thoses and put it in sandbox. Links on my blog.

[vayapues]

ugg, here we go again. I hope Google counter sues for legal expenses. Not to mention liable, defamation, etc.

As people realize how a lawsuit gets their name in the media for free, they will cause a lot of heart ache for Google, and a lot of wasted time and energy for everyone else.

Kinderstart is shameless, not to mention that their site is um, well, really bad, to say the least.

But look how many of us have visited their site just in this discussion. They are getting a lot of mileage out of it, which is exactly why Google needs to go after them. Not for revenge, but simply to stop the problem before 10,000 other site owners sue them.

[vayapues]

They should clean up their comments in their directory before to do anything. A site for child's should be monitored when you got open comments in their directories !!!

They are not a child's website. They are a scrapper wearing sheep's clothing, out to make a quick buck.

I can understand being out to make a quick buck, don't get me wrong, but at the least, have some ethics. There site is loaded with garbage that is not appropriate for children.

[ewc21]

Right, OWG.

They even put Adsense code in their site. They never paid a penny for any sales generated by organic search, and Google did not ask for any percentage of their earnings just because Google was the referer that helped people find their site.

As with my other posts elsewhere, this is more of gaining popularity by being talked about than the suit. Just imagine how much traffic Kinderstart generates from the 160 plus news links you'll find in Google News about this story.

[JohnW]

>this is more about getting their name in the media than winning in court

If that’s true, I can’t imagine that they expected the type of commentary they are getting here and elsewhere. If the national press picks up the fact the professional search engine marketing community is slamming them, this may not turn out they way they planned. Do you think they know that they did this to themselves with sloppy coding?

[Marcia]

but what I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.The logistics of that would be overwhelming. There's no reason innocent parties should be burdened because of the actions of a few - and it is just a few, compared with how many sites & pages are indexed.

I thought that in this country you were innocent until proven otherwise and that you had a chance to defend yourselfImmaterial and irrelevant to the matter at hand.

This isn't a legal or criminal issue, this is an issue of adhering to publicly published guidelines. Failing to do so is either deliberate (in which case the party already knows what they've done) or lack of knowledge - which is nobody's responsibility but the person running the site.

If the person running the site doesn't have the knowledge to know why a site is in trouble, they're free to hire an SEO consultant to examine the situation and tell them why. The lack of knowledge of a few is no reason for Google to pay employees to assume the role of SEO consultant and provide free SEO services to webmasters at their own expense. That's not their responsibility, it's the responsibility of the people running sites.

[Old Welsh Guy]

Ignorance is no defence.

But the matter here is that there is nothing to defend against. We have to be careful here and look at what is being said. If this company win this case, then ANYONE with a directory who removes a site from it is also open to being sued.

People have to get it in their heads that getting traffic (organic) from Google is a free bonus, not a right. The only rights you aquire are those when you take up a paid agreement with them via adsense/sdwords etc.

[vayapues]

The lack of knowledge of a few is no reason for Google to pay employees to assume the role of SEO consultant and provide free SEO services to webmasters at their own expense. That's not their responsibility, it's the responsibility of the people running sites.
Amen Marcia, Well Put.

If this company win this case, then ANYONE with a directory who removes a site from it is also open to being sued.

People have to get it in their heads that getting traffic (organic) from Google is a free bonus, not a right.
Also well put.

[dannysullivan]

The First Amendment provides protection against the US government from hindering free speech. It does nothing to prevent private parties from doing so. Google isn't part of the US government. It has no First Amendment obligations to fulfill, any more than a newspaper can be forced to print something it doesn't want to. I'm amazed the suit tries to argue this point. It doesn't speak well for the lawyer or lawyers behind it, much less the chances of success.

[ericgoldman]

I have posted (http://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2006/03/google_sued_ove.htm) the complaint as well as a legal critique of the lawsuit (mostly very unfavorable). Eric.

[mcanerin]

It doesn't speak well for the lawyer or lawyers behind it, much less the chances of success.

Agreed. This isn't a freedom of speech issue.

This is kind of like suing a casino because you got used to a winning streak and then finally lost.

Ian

[davecskul]

Kinderstart has overlooked one very valuable point. Natural search engine rankings are the sole responsiblitiy and property of Google because they are produced by a patented algorithm.

Also there is never any guarantee of placement based upon any criteria. Face it if the company wanted to flip the pyramid tomorrow they could without any legal ramifications. Natural search engine rankings are added value services not guaranteed placement.

The only way to guarantee search position is to pay for it; hence the AdWords program. We all play the best practices game to get listed well in the SE's, but come on.

I would compare this situation to someone walking up to you at the bus stop everyday and handing you twenty dollars no questions asked for many weeks. Then one day the guy does not show up, you throw a fit, and call the cops in order to apprehend this guy for stealing your twenty dollars.

When you get something for free you need to remember that nothing is free!

Kinderstart needs to buck up and buy some ad placement to offset their current rankings. If they had any SEM knowledge they would approach this as an opportunity. Maybe they could even leverage some of their competitor’s keywords. Gee do you think?

My question is do these guys want to talk or do they want to act. Anyone in the business long enough has probalby been de-indexed, booted, ignored, flamed, beguiled, ignored, disregarded, or plain unsuccessful upon venturing an idea in cyberspace. Get over it! No one ever said life was fair.


David C Skul
CEO Relativity, Inc.

(http://www.relativitycorp.com)

[sbuskirk]

I fully agree that Kinder has a lot to learn. I'm willing to bet that this is just some woman (women are more kid friendly) who hasn't taken the time to learn. She got caught up in good fortune from a Google update and figured she deserved to be ranking high without any decent effort. This person would be the type of person who has the movie mentality of "If you build it, they will come."

If it looks like spam, smells like spam, then guess what? It's probably spam! The site is cheap... nothing special, lacking decent content and most of it is duplicate content at that.

I saw the fall of great sites and the rise of crap sites during the updates from Google, Yahoo, AND MSN. Big Daddy is almost completely done. Apperantly only one or two more DC's to go according to Matt Cutts (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog).

I support the efforts of Google. I for one am tired of looking up information and finding sites that in the first 20 positions that are porn, gambling, or some other spam junk site. I was REAL relevant content when I look for it. Google doesn't promise high rankings. They assist you with ideas to help achieve them but they don't say, "Do this and this and this and we'll make you NUMBER ONE!" It's pure chance and a lot of hard work!!!

Grow up Kinder and come down to reality. You aren't special and your site is ****. It deserves to be dropped. If it were my site, I would accept that fate and be glad for the time I did get. The mighty dollar does make people to crazy things though.

[Marcia]

She got caught up in good fortune from a Google update and figured she deserved to be ranking high without any decent effort.More than likely she got up there from all the sites running her cute little graphic on their homepage that they're "kid friendly" in return for a listing, which probably went the way of the "awards" gimmick that worked for a while until the engines caught on a couple years ago.

BTW, the link given is NOT a link, but opens in a frame on her site. That will skew the authority/hub score, and in this case it looks absolutely, blatantly deliberate. Ignorant or not, it's manipulating for rankings - aka spamming the engines.

There are a ton of pages from that site in the index, most of them Supplemental - about as thin as auto-generated garbage pages. Not banned, but the trick they were depending on just stopped working.

[PerformanceSEO]

Even though Kinderstart may not be a prime candidate for the ideally compliant website, I am happy to see someone taking a stand to Google.

I'm a strong opponent of putting all your eggs in one "Organic" basket, but for people who don't know any better, losing your largest traffic source overnight can ruin peoples' lives.

I think the best thing that can come out of this is for Google to send warning to these sites before dropping them. They don't owe it to anyone to explain why, but they should give these people time to prepare another strategy...like ADWORDS for example. Hmmmm...win/win Google.

[mcanerin]

The problem is, that "not knowing any better" is probably one of the most common reasons peoples lives are ruined, and not just in search.

The issue really is, is it reasonable to expect people to research their business? Is it reasonable to expect them to know that they should not put all their proverbial eggs in a basket?

If it is not reasonable or obvious, then perhaps the search engines owe them a warning.

But if it is reasonable to expect, then really - it's their own fault. What's next, requiring Google to come over to your house and optimize your site for you if they notice your page isn't set up well?

Let's also remember that Google has no way of even knowing if a site cares about it's Google traffic. WMW is an example, there are many others.

And why only Google? What about Yahoo, MSN, Baidu, Ask and all the others? What do they owe? Some sites get almost all of their traffic from MSN - does Google owe them a warning if their rankings are going down? How would Google know?

At the end of the day, as long as someone is trying to make money off of someone else's technology (for free, I might add), they are not a charity, and do not deserve to be treated like one, IMO.

It's not a game, and it's not some sort of a welfare system. It's business.

People "who don't know any better" really don't belong in business - at least not to the level where their lives would get ruined over it. By the time you are totally dependent on a business, you should know better. You really should - after all, it's your job - literally!

My opinion,

Ian

[sbuskirk]

Once again, well said mcanerin.

If you are going to be in business today then you need to have spent time figuring out what could bring your business down. The internet isn't stable by any means and trying to base your pay check on one website or one product or even one service solely isn't the way to go. If that's all you got then you should at least know what will bring you down. Don't depend on Johnny Noname to give you business... depend on yourself and learn.

Would you pass yourself off as a roofer without knowing the inches between each lair of shingle or what ridge is or that you need starter shingles? NO! That's bad business and you can end up in a bind when your "found out".

I say again, if you are going to be in business then you should know the business and what to expect from every possible avenue to protect your assets.

[Papadoc]

Aw gwarsh... another company that thinks they are going to make a million by suing a deep pockets company. I have to give them credit for creative thinking, but that's about it. However, I do believe these people probably grew up never learning why you don’t pee into the wind or spit into the fan.

I would personally like to see Google file a counter suit for a frivolous claim and ask for legal expenses and punitive damages, and ask the judge to order the company to post a bond equal to the value of their demand in order to continue the lawsuit. I suspect that the attorney filing the suit has also thrown in stuff like the first amendment charge, just to see what sticks to the wall and most of it would be withdrawn before the case would be heard, IF it gets past a motion to dismiss. However, I've always been a fan of judges who force plaintiffs to continue their suit without withdrawing part of the complaint. It often shows the plaintiff's for who they are.

The only thing I can see good about this particular company going forward is that judging by their currently filed case, what they are claiming, and the spammy nature of their site, Google can probably walk away with a very nice precedent to thwart future lawsuits by more noble companies that just didn’t like what the new algo did to their search position or wants Google to PROVE why they shouldn’t be in first place. Not that those claim should have any weight either, but in a Cali courtroom with a judge that wants headlines, anything but this is possible.

I personally think it rather magnanimous of Google to keep them in the index at all and to not boot them from AdSense. Google owes them nothing except for a quick lesson in NOT kicking the 800# gorilla, just because he stopped feeding you his bananas.

[PerformanceSEO]

If you are going to be in business today then you need to have spent time figuring out what could bring your business down. The internet isn't stable by any means and trying to base your pay check on one website or one product or even one service solely isn't the way to go. If that's all you got then you should at least know what will bring you down. Don't depend on Johnny Noname to give you business... depend on yourself and learn.


There is no argument to that. However, you have to realize that sites that have been enjoying top rankings on Google for years have no reason to believe they are going to get booted. Especially sites that aren't doing anything SEO-related. One day they come to work and their phone isn't ringing anymore. You have to have sympathy for that.

[Marcia]

for people who don't know any betterI don't know about that, that that "didn't know any better." They sure knew enough to have all their links opening up in a frame on their site to avoid "leaking PageRank." I seriously doubt that anyone with a website for any length of time hasn't heard something about that at one time or another. Some don't - and some do, just like they did.

Maybe they just did know what they were doing, but just happened to miss where a Google rep SPECIFICALLY posted, very publicly, to watch out about doing that very thing they were doing.

GoogleGuy's advice, a couple of years ago:
(Regarding Javascript links instead of classical links.)
Of course, folks never know when we're going to adjust our scoring. It's pretty easy to spot domains that are hoarding PageRank; that can be just another factor in scoring. If you work really hard to boost your authority-like score while trying to minimize your hub-like score, that sets your site apart from most domains. Just something to bear in mind.. That's msg #19, and again in msg #20:

Let me clarify that last post a smidge. You can try all sorts of stuff to "conserve PageRank," but that's no guarantee that something will work, or that it will work in the future. I think Giacomo's advice was the best of all: "Stop watching that green line on the toolbar, and try to focus on your site's content." If you spend your time making a great site that attracts and keeps users, the rankings in Google will follow. Time spent improving and adding content to your site is maybe the best payoff. http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum10003/3219-2-15.htm

Whether or not these people ever read that, or thought that for some reason it didn't apply to them, that is exactly what they were deliberately doing, by not linking out to all those people linking to them. Else, why are all those links like that - that isn't the "normal" way of linking.

They were hoarding PR and manipulating rankings. They knew enough to do that, didn't they?

[sbuskirk]

There is no argument to that. However, you have to realize that sites that have been enjoying top rankings on Google for years have no reason to believe they are going to get booted. Especially sites that aren't doing anything SEO-related. One day they come to work and their phone isn't ringing anymore. You have to have sympathy for that.

Sympathy? No! In business, you NEVER trust that each day will be the same. You can hope it will be but you need to prepare for all situations. Their preperation would have been to not keep a spammy site. I'm sorry but, "I just didn't know any better" isn't going to work. I come to work every single day and lets say I screw up really bad. Do you think my bosses will keep me on with a defense like that? If the world worked like that then there would be a lot less stress in trying to do ones job RIGHT.

Trust nobody in business. Trust nothing in business. It's a dog eat dog world and if you want to stay on top you need to know what you can do to make sure certain things don't happen. Even that isn't fool proof though but knowing is half the battle.

I look at each and every possible avenue for failure and take precautions to get a jump start at making sure the "what ifs" are answered back with a "lets do this is counter that possibility".

Relying on another company, especially a search engine, alone is not a great way to stay in business. If you are going to do that then you need to be in the know and make sure you do what you can to counter any possible problems that can and will occur. This is good business practice.

From a legal sense these guys hold no weight and I will definitely not have sympathy for those individuals or companies who don't take the time to look at every possible avenue of defeat and put in place a plan or a goal of countering that failure.

I don't love Google but I appreciate what they are trying to do.

[Papadoc]

There is no argument to that. However, you have to realize that sites that have been enjoying top rankings on Google for years have no reason to believe they are going to get booted. Especially sites that aren't doing anything SEO-related. One day they come to work and their phone isn't ringing anymore. You have to have sympathy for that.
Been there, done that. Old pages that I'd forgot about that incorporated legit SEO years ago on one site suddenly hit new filters that called them spammy and the site was dropped like a rock. It took me a week to figure out what and why and another week to update them to good current standards. Then I spent my down time tweaking the rest of the site and adding new content. The result - four weeks after being dropped the site came back with 50% more traffic and 60% better income. And now I have a process in place that allows me to periodically review old stuff for current compliance. Google didn't know it (and still doesn't) and they most certainly don't care, but they did me a favor.

But I didn't SUE! My site, my responsibility. I can choose to live by their rules or not... my choice, and the same holds true for them. And one of those rules is that the rules can and do change.

Sorry, but I will have to reserve my sympathies for the guy that gets booted because he allowed himself to get swindled by an incompetant or blackhat SEO and doesn't have a clue what went wrong, how to fix it, and doesn't have the money to have it fixed. I have no sympathy for companies like this that have purposely employed some of these tactics and whose only response is to attack those that dare stop giving them free business.

[mcanerin]

Sorry, but I will have to reserve my sympathies for the guy that gets booted because he allowed himself to get swindled by an incompetent or blackhat SEO and doesn't have a clue what went wrong, how to fix it, and doesn't have the money to have it fixed. I have no sympathy for companies like this that have purposely employed some of these tactics and whose only response is to attack those that dare stop giving them free business.

Hear, Hear!

I do have sympathy for victims of companies like TP and their ilk, (unless the fact that they were a bad company is so well known that any amount of due diligence at all would have shown it). In this case, they are admitting they are not experts and are hiring experts as a result. Fair enough, and pretty smart, actually.

If the firm they hired happens to be a bad one, but there was no practical way for them to know that at the time, then yes, I certainly have sympathy. As a matter of fact, I'll do what I can to help them out.

But frankly, if you know enough to spam, then ipso facto you know the risks of doing so. Being purposefully blind or hopelessly optimistic is not the same as not knowing. The test in law is "known or ought to have known".

Knowing enough to manipulate your link love pretty much demands that you would have come across the probable result of doing so. You either knew and chose not to listen, or you should have known.

I remember a case where there was a drug dealer who was arrested for dealing drugs. Not unusual, right? Well, it turns out that this was no ordinary drug dealer. He was actually a talented chemist and specialized in making custom drugs that were not yet banned. Every few months or so, the government would publish a list of illegal drug combinations, and he would stop selling those and create another version that was just different enough that it avoided the exact ones that were banned. Technically, he only sold legal drugs.

One day, he missed a memo, and was caught selling a drug that had been recently banned. He pleaded ignorance. Now everyone knows that "ignorance of the law is no excuse" but that's not really true. There are times when it can be, especially in areas of very fast paced changes. (No, it doesn't work with the usual things like murder, etc).

In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that although the normal person might get off the first time with a warning under these circumstances, he made a living doing this, and therefore the claim of ignorance was not available to him. If it's your livelihood, then you are expected to know the rules related to it. He did full time.

I realize that there is no direct comparison between a drug dealer and a spammer, but the logic, I believe, is valid.

Although the average person may not be expected to know what a search engine considers spam or not, people who do SEO (either part-time on their own site or full time as professionals) are responsible for knowing the rules that relate to what they are doing, just like drivers are expected to know the rules of the road.

Ian