Wacky Search Engine Results
Entertainingly, one of my recent referrals was from a Google search on “slashdot freelance tech support”. Google points to this post I put up about a Slashdot article on someone’s tech support experiences and advice over the past few years, during the period of the IT downturn. It’s good money for honest work, and certainly a better reaction to circumstances than simply sitting at home and watching TV while emailing out resumes.
The amusing part of all this is how my little blog was ranked by Google in terms of relevance. I actually came in as #1. The original Slashdot post came in at #2. The article we were all pointing to came in at around #9. Golly! I beat out Slashdot! In the past, I’ve come close to beating out ValueDisk’s corporate site, but Slashdot is a far bigger surprise.
As a side note, I’ve noticed that my Google PageRank has gone from zero to 3 to 4 over the past few weeks. This is perhaps the median PageRank for a vaguely useful blog — I seem to be an authoritative source on cracking Master Lock combination locks for some reason — and nothing noteworthy.
Anyway, this quirk of Google’s ranking system may not last past the next monthly reindexing. As proof (as far as proof goes for image files), I’ve done a screen capture.