Andrew Gerhart first noticed the problem on Monday.  Gerhart collected screenshots to prove his point, and as he notes, Yahoo Autos is clearly in violation of Yahoo’s own policy regarding “search content quality.”

“Normally, I could care less if someone is spamming or using shady techniques,” Gerhart writes.  “BUT, I don’t feel that this applies to the search engines.  They are the ones placing the ‘quality guidelines’, penalizing websites, banning websites, and trying to enforce the rules that they’ve made up.  And they penalize and ban websites for less than what Yahoo! is doing above.”

Gerhart continues by asking, “How is that fair?  With one hand you’re going to ban a site and in effect reduce their revenue and with your other hand you employ the same strategies (or worse)?  Come on now.”

I should pause here to say that every fault Gerhart found with Yahoo Autos is a real one – a discussion in the WebmasterWorld Forum corroborates everything, and Search Engine Roundtable adds, “Tim Mayer of Yahoo! has confirmed on [the] May 22nd edition of The Daily Search Cast that Yahoo Autos has changed the page since this has been reported.”

But there’s one other interesting angle to this story, and it relates to Gerhart’s position as Director of SEO for Primedia Automotive.  As WebProNews reported, Primedia started a “Ride of the Month” contest last week, and that contest will involve a game for Microsoft’s Xbox 360.  So it seems that someone with ties to Microsoft is pointing out problems with Yahoo.

Interesting, yes, but again, it doesn’t in any way counterbalance the fact that Yahoo Autos was cloaking.

The MotorTrend, IntelliChoice, and Import Tuner sites are all part of Primedia’s network – hence the large number of eyes the campaign will reach.  Granted, not everyone will actually enter the contest, but even people who don’t own automotive beauties can still appreciate the sight of them.

As for those advertisers, a Primedia statement declared that “Ride of the Month presents an opportunity to connect to a passionate, active and engaged user base of auto enthusiasts online.”  Note: “passionate, active, and engaged” means “fanatical, excited, and ready to spend some serious cash” in a lot of cases, especially as the terms relate to cars.

And we mustn’t forget old Microsoft – Primedia is a powerful force (“bigger than Yahoo! Autos, CarsDirect, and Autobytel,” according to the company), but it’s hard to compare to the Redmond-based giant; within Microsoft, it’s actually the influential console gaming division that has a tie to the Ride of the Month contest.

“Upcoming Forza Motorsport 2 will be promoted during the course of the contest,” writes Nicolo S. of Xbox 360 News.  The Primedia folks might add that this promotion will occur during May and June, so any Xbox addicts will want to act quickly.  As for the rest of us . . . an “end date” for the Ride of the Month contest has not been announced, so we may get to enjoy seeing “hot” cars for quite some time to come.