Google Bomb Remembered
Remembering the First Google Bomb
Topic: search
Googbomb Earlier today, Matt Cutts and the Google software engineering team posted an update citing the progress they’ve been making fighting Google bombs. Back in the old days, these pranks were common practice, but they’ve become less prevalent thanks to Google’s diligence.
A Google bomb (also called a link bomb) is a technique where somebody uses a specific term to link to another page, usually a personal web page. Search for that specific and often humorous term, and you’ll see the victim’s web page as the first hit in your results. This has to do with the way Google’s search algorithm weighs link anchor text, or the text that’s hyperlinked on a page.
The Wikipedia article on Google bombs names Adam Mathes as the man who pulled off the first Google bomb in April, 2001 by linking the words “talentless hack” to the personal site of his friend. Whenever anyone searched for “talentless hack” in Google, his poor, unsuspecting buddy was the first result.
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