Search Engine Journal is reporting that Google might decide to remove their Google PageRank bar from their Google Toolbar.
These rumors are stemming from a simple
WebmasterWorld thread that states that Google’s PageRank displayed on the toolbar faces two main vital flaws:
- They are around 2-3 months out of date.
- The release of PageRank has led to people buying/selling text links based on the toolbar PageRank (a good place would be
TextLinkAds).
Even though this is a featured thread on WebmasterWorld, I personally don’t agree with Loren Baker when he said:
It seems that Google is keeping an eye on this one and taking it seriously.This is mainly because Google, as well as many other people, know that Google has definitely faced similar criticism in the past about their outdated PageRank display. However, it is a good Public Relations stunt (as stated in the main post) that has definitely grabbed the attention of many webmasters
If they are truly a search engine, they would be able to single out the websites that participate in the buying/selling of links and place a penalty on them. I highly doubt that they would remove the PageRank display from their toolbar.
