Bleeecchhh! I've gone from a PR of 4/10 to a PR of 2/10 (insert expletive here) - boy, all from having a wee few paid links on my site?  A gal just can't get ahead, LOL.  While I'm not alone - the news about Google's Halloween page rank update is all over the web - it's a shame that my small site is lumped in with some of the bigger sites that sell text link ads such as The Washington Post , Forbes , Engadget , Search Engine Journal , etc.  Technorati Profile

Most search engine experts will tell you that worrying about PR is a waste of energy and that Page Rank doesn't truly mean anything.  Since my actual Google rankings are higher now than they ever were previously, I'm not that concerned.  It just feels a wee bit like going out and forgetting to wear your lipstick and feeling a bit "off."  <grin>

Some websites will actually see a Page Rank jump - but again, it may not really mean much.  If the Google algorythm is shifting and devaluing many websites - you may see some changes simply because the sites that link to you aren't as powerful now.  Also, it seems the experts agree that the type of links coming in to your site have relevance as well - if you get links in too fast, or they're more 'temporary' such as a trackback on a blog post rather than a permanent resource link from another site, it may have less relevance.

Ugh - all it means is what I've been saying for ages - you can't "buy" your seo nor can you game the search engines.  You literally have to constantly build up great content and find normal ways to get noticed.  If you spend as little as an hour or two per week adding content and visit industry forums and make occasional posts (with a link to your website in your signature) - you'll get good rankings.  

If you'd like to check your current page rank across all Google servers - visit this link .  

There is a lot of buzz about this around the blogosphere. Here are some of the blog posts:

• Google Page Rank Crash Affects Dozens of Websites, www.labnol.org
• Google Slapping Entire Internet Marketing Industry, courtneytuttle.com
• 2nd Google PageRank in October 2007, Search Engine Roundtable
• PR Update Today - Many Sink, The SEO Scoop
• Digg Favorites Slapped By Google, andybeard.eu
• ProBlogger - PageRank 4, ProBlogger
• Thanks Google!, Copyblogger
• Google Changing the PageRank Algorithm?, www.dailyblogtips.com
• Google PageRank As Good As Dead, Everybody Go To
• Google PR October 2007, danielctw.com
• Google attacks its competitors with PR meltdown, Syntagma Media
• If the SEOs Go, Does Google Go Too?, CenterNetworks
• Google Drops PageRank For Many Sites: Paid Links or New Algorithm?, Search Engine Journal
• The Great Google Bitch Slap, www.twentysteps.com
• PageRank Drops for Many Sites, Google Blogoscoped
• Google Pagerank Penalties A TextLinkAds Killer?, Jim Kukral
• Google uses the PageRank hammer, mathewingram.com
• Google Declares Jihad On Blog Link Farms, TechCrunch
• Google PageRank Penalties For Network Blogs, technosailor.com
• Google hammers web sites, perhaps for paid links -- who knows?, The Guardian
• The Ongoing PageRank Massacre Hits Big Players, Fantomaster
• Three Clicks to Spam: Google's Hypocritical Link Selling Policy, mashable.com
• Time to pay the Page Rank Piper, TechWag
• Google PageRank Update and It's All Down, John Chow dot Com
• Search: Is Google punishing dirty linkwhores?, Valleywag
• Is Google's PageRank algorithm changing?, News.com
• The Randomness of Google PageRank, Dan Blank
• Google: Journalistopia as important as Washington Post, LA Times, Journalistopia
• At Last, Google Declares War on Parasitic Link Farms and Feed Scraping Blogs, B.L. Ochman's weblog
• Taken Down a Peg (or 2) as Google Page Rank Drops for Many, the Constant Observer
• Google Changing the PageRank Algorithm?, Crenk
• How's Your PageRank? Mine's Still an 8, Ryan Stewart
• Anyone Have Some Boots I Could Borrow?, Search Engine Guide
• Google's PageRank Shuffle: Big Sites Say Bye-bye, Traffic, Silicon Alley Insider
• Is Google's PageRank algorithm changing?, Webware