Talk:Google bombing

This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Google Mid‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Google, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Google and related topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GoogleWikipedia:WikiProject GoogleTemplate:WikiProject GoogleGoogle articles

Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Google To-do:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : Articles for most of the other products listed here and here.
Assess : All articles in the Category:Unknown-importance Google articles and Category:Unassessed Google articles using the project's assessment scale
Expand : Google Mapathon, Google Talkback
Maintain : This WikiProject
Merge : Google mobile services into List of Google products
Stubs : Category:Stub-Class Google articles and Category:Google stubs
Update : List of features in Android and Gmail interface#Product integration. Update logos of Google Marketing Platform products
Other :
- Add more stuff to this to do list if you like! (click here...)
- create:
- Help the Google article for a good article status
- Improve the Outline of Google
- Get more members using :
{{subst:Wikipedia:WikiProject Google/Invite Members}}
- Infobox Images with transparent areas needing a different background color

Internet Low‑importance

	Internet portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Internet on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.InternetWikipedia:WikiProject InternetTemplate:WikiProject InternetInternet articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Internet culture Mid‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet culture, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of internet culture on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Internet cultureWikipedia:WikiProject Internet cultureTemplate:WikiProject Internet cultureInternet culture articles

Mid

This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Internet culture To-do:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : View all requested internet culture articles
Expand : Pick an article from here or here
Photo : Category:Internet culture articles needing images
Stubs : All stubs are located here
Other : Category:Internet self-classification codes (!?); Try to get YouTube to FA; Tag all articles you find with {{WikiProject Internet culture}}
- See also Category:Internet culture articles needing attention

Marketing & Advertising Mid‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Marketing & Advertising, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Marketing on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Marketing & AdvertisingWikipedia:WikiProject Marketing & AdvertisingTemplate:WikiProject Marketing & AdvertisingMarketing & Advertising articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale.

Politics Low‑importance

	Politics portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Websites: Computing Mid‑importance

	This article is part of WikiProject Websites, an attempt to create and link together articles about the major websites on the web. To participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page.WebsitesWikipedia:WikiProject WebsitesTemplate:WikiProject WebsitesWebsites articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale.
	This article is supported by WikiProject Computing.

This article has been mentioned by multiple media organizations:

"Companies subvert search results to squelch criticism". Online Journalism Review. June 1, 2005.
"Google bombing ~ it's cool but". The Statesman. June 8, 2004.
"Web watch". The Guardian. April 15, 2004.

Google search "talentless hack" rating

The page claims that it itself is currently the number three return on Google for the words "talentless hack" - this is untrue. The page is, as of right now, the number TWO return. The irony does not cease to amuse me.--64.24.25.45 05:51, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On 13-Nov-2008, "talentless hack" matched Wikipedia "Google bomb" as first, then Urban Dictionary. Those are not Google bomb examples, just that Google favors those websites for valid search results. -Wikid77 (talk) 03:43, 14 Nov 2008

French military victories (practical joke)

The article French military victories (practical joke) now redirects to Google bomb. Please merge any material if deemed relevant. —Quarl ^(talk) 2006-12-26 14:41Z

Moved to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/French military victories (practical joke) (2nd nomination)

Removed content

I've removed material similar to this a couple of times now. While it's probably verifiable that Google's algorithm has changed, and that they may claim this will slow or stop Google bombing, any speculation as to its effects (or "I saw it myself" anecdotal stories) are original research. Let's wait until reliable sources report on the actual effect rather than speculating on it. Seraphimblade 19:44, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

How about the Search Engine Land article? Good enough? -- Seth Finkelstein 05:43, 27 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There's tons out about it now, thanks for pointing it out. Looks like we're in need of a different update here, too: [1]. I'll get their take on that put in as well. Seraphimblade 07:40, 27 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

time for an update

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/01/quick-word-about-googlebombs.html http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070126-8714.html —71.103.88.223 (talk) 19:56, 26 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Already been done! See [2] Seraphimblade 20:15, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2007/01/earlier_today_m.html —24.22.22.101 (talk) 18:35, 27 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

History

Maybe the expression "dumb motherf***er" in the History section of the article should be censored?... ;) -- JBatista 12:36, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

(moved to bottom) Actually, Wikipedia is not censored. You can read more about this at Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not.++aviper2k7++ 23:55, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

text content

Surely one critical aspect is missing from the main article. The term Google Bomb is used when the search term used does not appear in the page that ranks as number one. For example, with the "miserable failure" example linking to the whitehouse site, I'm fairly sure the phrase "miserable failure" doesn't appear in the content of the whitehouse page that (used to be) returned as the #1 Google result. In other words, it's only if the high-ranking site is unexpected in some way that you consider this a Google Bomb.

If the text DOES occur in the page, then the result isn't surprising, and you don't call it a google bomb.

For example, searching for "Google" will, (surprise surprise), return various Google sites as the top results. Since the text "Google" occurs on these pages, making the result unsurprising, then surely this doesn't count as a Google Bomb?

In which case, the important distinction needs to be made in the article that "Google Bomb" only applies to results where the page itself has no significant mention of the text used. -- Howard Wright

Not really. I mean, this is sometimes the case, but, e.g. "French military victories" does appear in the text of [3] - the point is more in the methodology (distributed effort to link to the target page with the search term in the link text) and the _disproportionate_ rank, than simply binary presence/absence of the search terms. --Random832(t c) 15:45, 6 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think we're actually in fairly close agreement here - I think "significant mention of the text" and "disproprortionate" are the key ideas. I agree that a simple check to see if the text appears at all on the page is not quite discerning enough (should have worded my first para more carefully). But, the point is the article currently says "A Google bomb is created if a large number of sites link to the page in this manner" (in this manner = using consistent anchor text). By this definition, search results for "Google", "Microsoft", "BBC", "The Whitehouse" etc etc would all be classed as Google Bombs! Appropriate wording needs to be added to make the point that ONLY when the anchor text used in the many links is deliberately chosen to be an unfair/imbalanced summary of the page contents is the effect deemed to be a link bomb or Google bomb. No? -- Howard Wright

Another example

Crazy cult. Guess who? --Jnelson09 23:39, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

i dont know where to include this on the page, if at all, but the search 'officially' returns a top page on 'what tolken officially said about elf sex'. is there a list of googlebombs on a different page? if not does someone want to make one?

There has to be a news articel on that "bomb" before it could be added anywhere. 68.39.174.238 07:36, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yet Another Googlebomb

News reference:

http://wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/Wiadomosci/1,80269,4477719.html —71.145.136.90 (talk) 02:31, 13 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Example of accidental Google Bomb?

Performing a search for the term 'Fail' will give a link to the Irish political party Fianna Fáil, who are currently in government. It is likely this 'bomb' is a result of their name.

[4] —193.120.137.237 (talk) 10:07, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Search Find Chuck Norris

Search "Search Find Chuck Norris" but hit "I'm Feeling Lucky" (takes you to first result) I think this is a Google Bomb. —Xor24 (talk • contribs) 16:40, 12 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

lol. it could just be something funny that Google put in. 75.105.128.57 (talk) 18:11, 27 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

it's fake. it's just an imitation of google. --24.103.212.138 (talk) 16:18, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Updated lede for 2-year defused bombs

14-Nov-2008: I have updated the top section to reflect changes from 2 years ago (+source footnotes): that "Before 2007" Google bombs worked on repeated anchor text, and "Google changed the ranking by January 2007 to list pages instead about the repeated linking of that text". Of course, to lower the rank of anchor-text repetitions, Google also ranked pages higher for other properties, but I won't mention the details of Google's later SEO algorithms, which are proprietary secrets intended to thwart linkspam when searching for real matches. Note that Google highly favors Wikipedia articles as search results in many cases, so wiki-pages could be pushed out of view if new secrets were revealed for moving ad-pages to the top of Google searches. In the past, over 300 similar linkspam pages have pushed real-content pages below the 31st page of Google results, so that's why I stated "pushed out of view" as a danger. -Wikid77 (talk) 03:22, 14 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Listed talk-page subpages here

14-Nov-2008: I have listed the known subpages (the archive files) in a wikitable (see Help:Table) beside the Table of Contents. I also shortened several auto-signature comments. -Wikid77 (talk) 03:43, 14 Nov 2008

Removal of the curses

I have removed the bad word from it's position by replacing it with stars.

Take a sneaky peak:

In September 2000 the first Google bomb with a verifiable creator was created by Hugedisk Men's Magazine, a now-defunct online humor magazine, when it linked the text "dumb motherf***er" to a site selling George W. Bush-related merchandise.

-Yahya Al-Shiddazi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.26.12.34 (talk) 05:49, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please see WP:NOTCENSORED Copysan (talk) 23:30, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Mr. Copysan Hohnsan! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.138.113.11 (talk) 07:31, 4 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How does Google Bombing work?

This article explains everything from the history of Google bombing to competitors. However it doesn't provide the simple explanation and the most basic question of the lay person: How does Google bombing work? What is the process involved in making a Google bomb?--Josh Is Dead (talk) 12:39, 15 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Try Anthony Cox's War on the web article and see if that explains it better for you. Pawyilee (talk) 17:06, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody needs to mention xkcd for their ability to consistently googlebomb. I remember the good old days when they were #3 for "hardcore pornography" and #1 for "Roomba dueling harness"

Scientology Googlebomb

Is there a reason why the Scientology Googlebomb isn't up here? It's a good example of Googlebombing to communicate a political message by a group. Searching "Dangerous Cult" on Google had the Scientology main page as it's first result for quite a while. DarthHamsy (talk) 23:41, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Miserable Failure

I searched miserable failure on Ask.com, and the Bush page comes up first! 71.7.85.97 (talk) 01:05, 6 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Updating

Hi, the article seems strong, but can we get any more up to date info onto it. The last story seems to be from 2007. Best, Darigan 86.152.160.255 (talk) 21:50, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think it is a reasonably strong article, but the changes at Google largely make the practice moot. That is, SEO still matters, but the explicit practice (and the term) seem to have been limited to a particular time. - Halavais (talk) 22:16, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Scientology vs. Reddit

A few days ago, a redditor noticed that the search "is it possible to be happy" (the top search at the time) yielded a page from Scientology as its top result. Disgruntled, the redditor created a thread requesting links from others, and another redditor created an alternative site, which soon reached #2 on the results page. As I write this, this is still the case. I was involved in the bomb. Is this notable? -- Luser at 99.69.244.33 (talk) 02:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Vienna elections, october 2010

http://www.google.com/search?q=vollkoffer&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:de:official&client=firefox-a A search for the Austrian expression "Vollkoffer" (dumbass, idiot) links directly to the homepage of the head of the right wing extremist Freedom Party, HC Strache —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.22.166.240 (talk) 23:24, 6 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment

I removed "It's very funny, as it is actually true. The french have never won a battle". This is not true. The French have a in reality won battles in the past. Reference any Napoleonic history.

This is no longer a working google bomb —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.91.177.9 (talk) 21:13, 29 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Possible Google Bomb

When you Google, "StalkerNet" the first hit is the MTU Online Directory. The two have no correlation, and Michigan Tech does not refer to the directory as StalkerNet.

Cookie Defender (talk) 23:01, 18 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As an MTU alumni from back in the day, I can say that the directory has a long history of being referred to by that name extending into the pre-google era. No, I can't back it up :D, but it is what everyone on campus refers to the directory as even now... dunno. 141.114.213.9 (talk) 20:18, 22 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Article needs credible references

I have checked the sources cited and many do not meet the standards of credible references for Wikipedia. They're personal blogs, personal opinions on Google answer, contents published on questionable pages such as commercial sites that aren't notable. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 08:01, 1 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

SEO contests are not google bombs

The page mentions two SEO contests as examples of google bombs, but although those contests may have used link-text techniques, they were not specifically attempts at google bombing. -- ~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.85.78.174 (talk) 13:38, 9 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Google bomb about defining an english person

Apparrently googling "Define an english person defines the wikipedia page for Cunt according to this article. http://www.zdnet.com/blog/london/google-8216glitch-returns-swearing-if-you-8216define-an-english-person/1631 124.170.55.254 (talk) 04:55, 18 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's not been identified as a Googlebomb yet, also please remember to post new messages at the bottom :) --andy4789 ★ · (talk? contribs?) ^Merry_Xmas! 01:00, 22 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"What defines an English person"

As of yet, this has not been identified as a googlebomb - so please do not add this case to the list. Thanks. --andy4789 ★ · (talk? contribs?) ^Merry_Xmas! 00:59, 22 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

google bombs

the google bombs listed don't work since they are on this page Scientific Alan (talk) 02:04, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Googlebombing as harassment

Another use, which might be argued as political but really is much more directed and personal than that, is to use the process as a way to harass people, notably bloggers but not needfully limited to that.

Here is a specific case detailed out, but which actually involves multiple targets of a convicted domestic terrorist by the name of Brett Kimberlin:
Convicted Bomber Brett Kimberlin, Neal Rauhauser, Ron Brynaert, and Their Campaign of Political Terrorism
http://patterico.com/2012/05/25/convicted-bomber-brett-kimberlin-neal-rauhauser-ron-brynaert-and-their-campaign-of-political-terrorism/
The googlebombing is only a specific sub-part of the story, which is a pretty obnoxious tale in itself.

Wikipedia links appearing first in search because of references on bottom of pages

I think the person who wrote this thought that a page with many links on it gets higher in search results, but that's actually a page with many links to it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AleksanderVatov (talk • contribs) 21:55, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Mitt Romney "Completely Wrong" bomb

[5]

Someone should write something about this. Seems important enough to warrant a mention here. --Mr. Mario (talk) 04:59, 11 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 2 external links on Google bomb. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 12:54, 24 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

New Example: Clinton image for Pathological Lying - Add?

See here: https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/5a9l2o/holy_shit_google_pathological_lying_right_now/ | MK17b | (talk) 03:25, 31 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 4 external links on Google bomb. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0%2C1282%2C41401%2C00.html
Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.collegenews.com/index.php?%2Farticle%2Fcorey_feldman_is_hurting_or_is_it_a_google_bomb_29603752352%2F
Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130116120608/http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/050601glaser/ to http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/050601glaser/
Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110122225401/http://www.collegenews.com/index.php?%2Farticle%2Fcorey_feldman_is_hurting_or_is_it_a_google_bomb_29603752352%2F to http://www.collegenews.com/index.php?%2Farticle%2Fcorey_feldman_is_hurting_or_is_it_a_google_bomb_29603752352%2F

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 04:46, 23 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 5 external links on Google bomb. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 05:35, 21 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Google bomb. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20051229221256/http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_189602.html to http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/search/s_189602.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 12:40, 9 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

What to call this?

When I googled "rhett and link webby awards 2015", a photoshopped picture of them kissing came up. It links to an "article" that makes an erroneous and brazen claim that they are engaged... I think this happened because of the heavy use of keywords on the page. Either way, it's pretty strange and unusual that it's so high in the results. I know it's not a googlebomb but what is it classified as? I have not found a term describing this. Thanks. Dorianha Bogelund (talk) 11:39, 11 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Probably an SEO strategy around keyword stuffing. Dietsociety (talk) 15:53, 16 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

New (geeky) googlebomb

According to google, git is terrible, but wget can do no wrong. Search "wget is terrible" 72.74.131.76 (talk) 14:36, 20 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

4th wall break?

"Since no later than 21 June 2015, the first result in a Google search for "miserable failure" is this article."

Are we allowed to say that kind of thing? Wikipedia usually refers to itself in 3rd person, even in its own article Polishedrelish (talk) 04:19, 28 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Amber Heard Google Bomb?

Can someone consider the merit of an Amber Heard Google Bomb?

After the Depp Vs. Heard trial, if someone was to search the word "perjury", the first several images that appeared were of Amber Heard, this happened for several months after the trial results. MrScottBull (talk) 16:12, 26 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

N vintners j

idly hmm 2409:408C:AD0C:73BE:518:6A0F:ACB1:5945 (talk) 05:48, 31 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]