Evil Google? Come on!Tadeusz Szewczyk, a/k/a Tad Chef, has offered up an eyebrow-raising post over on Collective Thoughts. His “Top 12 Reasons To Distrust Google” post Saturday accuses the search giant of, among other things:

  1. Supporting and implementing censorship measures in nondemocratic countries like China.
  2. Recording and collecting all your personal and private data.
  3. Arbitrarily “kicking out” spammy websites, even if they’re not spam sites.
  4. Being “literally a black box company and accountable to nobody.”
  5. Practicing conflict of interest by owning one of the biggest U.S. SEO companies.
  6. Disclosing your private data to identify you for authorities investigating crimes, particularly in non-democratic countries where free speech is sometimes against the law.
  7. Being a multinational corporation.
  8. Laying off employees.
  9. Being like the Bush administration in claiming they aren’t evil.

Wouldn’t everyone, technically, claim they aren’t evil? I’m just asking.

I’ve long had a distaste for certain types of search marketers. While I’m not yet lumping Tad Chef into this group, his SEO-friendly listing of why we should hate Google is the exact kind of conspiracy theory propaganda one would expect from a black hat marketer trying to drive traffic to his own website. (Tad’s post ends with the non-poetic, “I am Tad Chef and I will enable you to venture beyond Google on my SEO 2.0 blog.”)

Interesting then that his latest post, as of Saturday morning, was a tip article on how to rank high in Google searches.

I’m not about to defend each point Tad makes. Google is a large corporation (I don’t see this as bad) and the bigger you are, the more room there is for imperfection. It is interesting to note, however, that he offers no links or third-party research to back up his claims. And couldn’t possibly confirm any intent behind them if they were true. I’d call and research and all that, but frankly, have better things to do than to try and defray wild accusations against someone I don’t work for.

He doesn’t go so far as to accuse Google of doing anything with your personal and private data, but I thought Google became smarter as a search engine by recording the searches and behavior of its users. Am I confused on this or is Tad just paranoid?

There is one point he makes that I just feel is out of bounds and inappropriate. To quote:

“Google does not communicate its most controversial policy officially but via the private blog of a cat lover.”

That last part links to Matt Cutt’s blog.

I’m sorry, Tad. Calling Google black hat and taking a pot-shot at Matt Cutts for liking cats doesn’t exactly bolster your credibility. I wouldn’t trust you with my searches or, frankly, my SEO advice. No offense.

And to offer disclosure, I competed against Matt Cutts in high school speech tournaments, but don’t know him.

To make matters worse, Tad brags in a recent post that he outranked Matt for the search term “SEO” in seven easy steps. In that tome, he says:

Do you know Matt Cutts? This famous cat blogger with the ugly WordPress theme? Yes, I know he is only famous because he works at Google and he can shatter lives of people who depend on online revenue with one click. While most SEO 1.0 aficionados dread this guy and pray each day not to get penalized (why does this word sound so similar to “penis”? Is it because people do not want to get f****d by Google?) I do not read his blog for at least 10 reasons.”

The list of 10 reasons is another insult spew. In which Tad asserts, “I’m special.” No argument here, pal.

Now, conspiracy theorists and nut-jobs exist no matter where you are or what niche topic you’re discussing. Again, I don’t know Tad at all, so I don’t want to label him unfairly. But this is the type of vitriol and venom that normally results in people being banned from forums, if not wholly deteriorating their credibility.

And unfortunately, as one of the banner carriers for Collective Thoughts, Tad may strip away some of the credibility of others there. Having respect for several of them, a few I’ve even had the pleasure of meeting, that’s a shame.

[tags]conspiracy theory, Google conspiracy, Matt Cutts, Google, credibility, search marketers, search marketing[/tags]

SME Paid Under

By Jason Falls

Jason Falls is the founder of Social Media Explorer and one of the most notable and outspoken voices in the social media marketing industry. He is a noted marketing keynote speaker, author of two books and unapologetic bourbon aficionado. He can also be found at JasonFalls.com.

Comments are closed.