In 2008, Eric Schmidt called the Internet a cesspool and said that brands were the way to sort it out. Popular blogger Michael Gray aka Graywolf says that big brand media sites are "the real cesspool of the Internet."
I initially intended to piece together a retrospective article about the happenings in the search industry and SEO from throughout the year, based on our coverage of it., much like what I did with online video and online music. I quickly realized this would be a monumental task given that something like 90% of what we cover is search or SEO related.
Matt Cutts posted a note about Google being in position to handle paid link report submissions from the Internet community; Michael Gray complained about the fairness of the request.
A public service or draconian narc network? You be the judge. It didn't take long for a few things to happen with Twitter: for so-called spammers to seek out a "marketing" advantage; for Twitterers to fight back against said spammers; and for a moral authority to form.
Michael Gray doesn’t know who I am, I don’t expect him to. We sat next to each other one day at lunch during Pubcon, he is a polite, engaging guy, with obviously tons of knowledge in SEO/SEM field.
It maybe that Jason Calacanis just likes stirring up the SEO crowd, or it could be that he really feels a certain way about them. Either way, the hostility that met him at the beginning of the week meets him again at its close.
People want better search results, but the personalization technology that can enable it may be a little scary to the privacy-conscious.