Buying blog program pioneer Blogger in 2003 was one thing, but Google probably didn't figure it meant a porn outfit using cross-linked Blogger-powered blogs – several of which have titles that feature popular search terms like Jenna Jameson, Cameron Diaz, and Janet Jackson – to inflate the rank of three of the outfit's porn sites.
Wired reported Aug. 3 that CyberQuest set up the cross-linked blogs and that a number of experienced bloggers think the cross-links were done specifically to inflate the rankings. "It's the latest sleazy porn marketing scheme," said Fleshbot editor John d'Addario to Wired. "It's clever. You have to give them that. And it's another example of porn folk being sort of ahead of the curve when it comes to technology and marketing."
The cross-link technique, Wired said, "is particularly effective because of Google's algorithms, which reward sites with many cross-links with high rankings in search results for a particular term. Thus each of CyberQuest's Blogspot blogs includes the same set of related links to blogs such as Free Full Hilton Paris Video or pamelaandersonboob."
Blogdex creator Cameron Marlow, whose service offers real time rankings of the more popular blogs, told the magazine the name of the game is subtle manipulation of page rank. "I think that what they try and do is create artificial pockets of page rank so that they can push that page rank arbitrarily wherever they want," Marlow said.
Marlow also said that using Blogger's Blogspot was a clever way to beat filtering or parental control software, since those kinds of programs depend less on the actual content than on the top-level domain name of the site – meaning CyberQuest porn blogs probably got past those programs at times.
Apparently, Blogger itself has wised up to CyberQuest's technique. An attempt to view Free Full Hilton Paris Video and pamelaandersonboob by AVNOnline.com turned up "Not Found: The requested URL was not found on this server." The same result happened when attempting to bring up CyberQuest-linked Blogger-based blogs on Jameson, Diaz, and Jackson.
"What's clear about the CyberQuest blog strategy is that it's not built around activity that anyone would recognize as actual blogging at all," Wired said. "Instead, each of the outfit's blogs follows a general pattern of including several hardcore photos from one of the company's three porn sites, as well as direct links to those sites and a series of sexually oriented stories lifted verbatim from a wide range of erotica sites."
But d'Addario admitted one thing to the magazine. "Just because it's porn," he said of the cross-linking technique, "doesn't mean it's sneaky or underhanded." But he also said that the boost in business enjoyed by those bloggers who use it may prove short-enough lived as more people give it a try, just as happened in the metatagging era.
