Would you snitch on your competition?

I was always taught that running a business professionally means focusing on yourself and your results. Grow your company by improving your products and practices, not by trying to destroy others.

It has worked for me so far. I’ve done okay in life.

What about you? Would you try to hurt your competitors if you could? Well, here’s a chance.

▶️ Now you can report spam pages to Google

Google will now allow people to report spammy websites, links, and pages. You can also report phishing and malware (should be reported!).

So you can go to a page (search “report spammy link to Google”) and you will be able to fill out a small form and tell Google about a page that you believe is spam.

Hmm… Makes me wonder. Is that AI engine not working so well?

And brings me to another question. Who will actually make the effort of reporting a page?

Most users just click out of a web result they didn’t like in less than 1/10th of a second. They don’t bother to assess and report. They just move on.

▶️ But will real users bother?

The only people who can be bothered to report a page as spam to Google would be people with a real interest in changing the results. That means, you or your competition.

So would you do it?

I know I tend to dislike most of the stuff my competition produces. I notice all the flaws and the problems and it just seems low-quality. 🙂

That’s a human being.

The second question is, who is assessing that data? Is it the same stupid AI algo that bans accounts on Facebook and Twitter just because they are mass reported? Well, then you can raise a ban-army and throw your competitors out of Google.

▶️ This could be a danger to you too

Google has plenty of signals about the readability or value of some content. How many people clicked on it? How long did people stay on it? Did they search for the same thing or something else next? Isn’t that enough information to make a great decision about spam?

I am not so worried about you doing this to your competition. I am worried about your competition doing this to you.

Are you worried too? What do you think of this move? Let me know.