Google: "Don't be evil"... unless there's money in it.

[djbaxter]

Google Blurs The Line Between Paid and Unpaid Results Again
by Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Land
Feb 15, 2010

Google has a new program that allows local businesses to get paid listings that appear within what?s known as the 7-pack of local listings. But do those listings violate the Federal Trade Commission?s guidelines about proper disclosure of paid search ads? Probably not, but they do seem confusing.

The New York Times had a good article about the program this weekend, These Battle Lines Are Drawn In Yellow. We also covered the program?s launch earlier this month in our own article, Google New Local Ad Category Invades The 7 Pack.

So what?s the problem? In The Trouble With Google?s Yellow Pages Experiment from Silicon Valley Watcher, Tom Forenski, notes:

Prior to this, the results were separated. Sponsored links were always on the right, and the main search results were ?organic,? they were listed on how relevant they were to the query ? not because of payment.​

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