[rickdeveloper]

I think a lot of this is due to Google both owning search and the ads on the websites (AdSense). There’s an incentive for them to prioritize click farms (and other sites filled with their ads). I think in general there may be a correlation between the number of ads on a site and its usefulness to me, which is inverse to its usefulness to google.

I’m curious what would happen if those products were split up into 2 separate companies.

[thomasmarcelis]

I also can't help but wonder this. I'm certain people at google search want to provide the best quality search results and do this with integrity. But at some point in the business hierarchy you are at a level where people set objectives for both these departments ( search & ads ) and are trying to optimise for things like total revenue/profit.

[tonyedgecombe]

Yes. In fact if you wanted to cut out the SEO spam then delisting anything with Adsense would probably be a good start for a competitor.