How much trouble can I get into?

Well I guess we are going to find out. Now mind you, I never really want to get into trouble, it's always a hassle. But when I do something, like I am about to do now, it always comes back to bite me in the proverbial butt. But hey, you gotta stand up for what you believe in and Freedom of Speech is a beautiful thing. So here goes.

You may or may not know that just a few days ago I blogged about being annoyed because my blog had been marked as a spam blog. I was irritated beyond belief and was wondering why this was going on. I got some bologney about bots being sent out that tagged me. Yeah to that I say "BULL" I came across this nice little newsletter that I get and lo and behold here is the real reason why I got marked. I really had no clue that this was going on. Before you read the article let me just say this: (To the person who reported my blog) Thank you - you moron who apparently has nothing better to do with your time than to try and report other people for trying to make money. I appreciate your determination in trying to make others as pitiful and socially lacking as yourself.

By the way - this article is from April 17th and can be found at WebProNews.

Written by Rich Ord - CEO iEntry Inc

Matt Cutts blogged that Google would like you, the average search engine user, to report on sites you feel are displaying links for cash. This created a firestorm of negative responses from the SEO, webmaster, and free speech crowd. Below, I put together what I feel are the top 7 reasons Google's paid link snitch plan sucks. I linked to my inspirations (No payment requested!).

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Editor's Note: Google's Matt Cutts had a busier weekend than he'd planned after setting this fire. The paid links report debate raged on for 250 comments on his blog, placing him in front of his home computer monitor until late Sunday night answering questions and concerns. General consensus: Nobody likes this idea. What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
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1. Links are valuable because of the Page Rank display in the Google Toolbar. Matt, if Google doesn't like the way paid links influence search results, then eliminate the scoreboard. It's hard to take your call-to-action seriously when you have the power to grind serious link buying to a halt all by yourself.

If people had to guess a page rank, most of their motivation for buying links would go away. Of course, Google won't eliminate the green bar because that is the number one reason the Google search engine is at the top of most web browsers.

2. Most people that post on Digg, or add articles to Wikipedia, or work as editors at DMOZ also send paid link reports to Google to benefit themselves in some way. My point: Anyone taking the time to send complaints to Google about a paid link that hurts no one and may even be relevant, probably has unseen motivations.

One of the problems is that there is no other motivation I can see to report a paid link than to help Google out. It's not like paid links irritate the end user like poor search results do. Therefore, the detection these reports offer will be of no value to Google.

3. It's impossible to define a paid link exactly. Paying cash is obviously what you meant, but is that any different than a link to a client or to a buddy who helped you submit your site to 1,000 free web directories?

If I'm right with that assumption, then it's really about determining motivation. Humans cannot determine motivations any better than the Google algorithm. It's a virtual coin toss!

4. Payment can be proven only by following the money trail. Otherwise, it is simply a case of 'he said, she said.' This creates a heavy burden on Google to be correct in their assumptions.

5. Marketing Pilgrim's Andy Beal asks: "What business does Google have in dictating the disclosure of any business relationships on others?"

Google, you are just a search engine. You should be reacting to the internet world, not trying to recreate it in your own image. Links are not evil and payment for links is not evil. The Web is based on links, link-trading and advertising, which of course is payment for links.

6. The hypocrisy of being in the business of selling links and then asking others not to sell them is a bit much for many webmasters.

7. Is this just a way to cre ate more spending for Google AdWords? Stopping the selling of links will make AdWords one of the last ways to generate traffic from Google. If the link police can slow this to a crawl, then what will businesses do?

So, what do you think about all of this?