[nirvana]

It strikes me that this is exactly the position every web developer has with google.

Google can arbitrarily and capriciously exclude them from their index. When google excludes you from the index, there is no appeal, there is no explanation, and, unlike Apple, google will not publish a set of (reliable) rules. (It gives a lot of advice but is inconsistent.)

Also, like Apple, if you are not able to get in the big leagues for distribution, you can distribute your product thru other, less popular channels that are more of a hassle.

Unlike Apple, however, which give you explicit feedback on the feature that was the problem (with screenshots if needed) and always cites chapter and verse from the handbook for the exclusion, google will not tell you why, or give you any way to resolve it.

With Apple, you can resolve the issue and resubmit it. Your app will be on the store in about 7 days. With google, even if you figure out what the problem is, and you resolve it, you have no way of knowing if you'll ever be let back into the index.

[blauwbilgorgel]

>> Google can arbitrarily and capriciously exclude them from their index.

As a web developer on SEO forums, I hear of these cases all the time, but when you analyze these sites, usually 1 of 3 things is happening:

- Web developer(s) made a mistake, causing a (search engine) accessibility problem.

- The site is in violation of the Google webmaster guidelines.

- The site lacks (unique) content, or otherwise doesn't contribute at all to a healthy search engine index.

I never read of a case of Google arbitrarily or capriciously excluding sites from their index, offering them no way to appeal. In general, I also think the advice Google gives is far from inconsistent.

This could be a popular position for a web developer who got a site de-indexed, but maybe apply Occam's razor first. A mistake? A trend? An algo change? Worthless content? Blackhat SEO? Bad architecture? Got hacked?

Or do you want to jump immediately to Google arbitrarily removing well-intentioned sites from their index? I guess then you can blame bad luck of the draw.

[bostonvaulter2]

While Google may not currently arbitrarily remove a site/app from its index, it is obvious that they could do that at any time.

[slowpoke]

Just look at the removable of co.cc a while ago. While they had some reason (malicious subdomains etc), it was still highly arbitrary and kicked out a lot of legit sites too.

[BoppreH]

Aren't those index exclusions done by algorithms? If that's the case, just telling you why they removed you from their index would be a huge disclosure on Google's technologies.

Example: "Your website has been removed from our indexes because it displays too many X's.", when no other search engine has thought of filtering websites based on X.

And because the decision is probably based on many, many parameters and weighted, it would have to tell you the values (and descriptions!) of each one of them, making the message even more sensitive.

[mekoka]

You don't need to pay google to be able to access websites that you created yourself, whether for personal, community or commercial use. You don't need to jailbreak your Internet to do it either.

When was the last time you hacked something together for yourself on an iOS device?

[lacker]

You don't need Google indexing you to be successful on the web. Just look at Facebook.

[thristian]

Wasn't there an incident a few months back where the top Google result for "facebook login" temporarily pointed to a non-Facebook site, and suddenly thousands of people were complaining that they couldn't get to Facebook?

[DCoder]

You're probably referring to http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/open_thread_the_interne... .

[mcantelon]

>Also, like Apple, if you are not able to get in the big leagues for distribution, you can distribute your product thru other, less popular channels that are more of a hassle.

Are there any alternative channels that don't require jailbreaking?

[lukifer]

There is openappmkt.com, but there are certain hardware features which are inaccessible to web apps, so it's a subpar solution.

[0x12]

Conclusion: don't be dependent on google for your traffic (search) or your income (adsense).

[adabsurdo]

no, not all. the web is fully open. google is not the exclusive gateway to the internet. if google were to become wildly inaccurate,, or start to willingly leave out relevant results, other search engines (hello bing!) would take over pretty fast. remember, the cost of switching search engines is approximately zero. this is precisely why the market leader in search does not behave this way.

and obviously, there are other, extremely simple and effective ways to reach a website: typing in the address bar, links by email, facebook, twitter, etc., etc.

the app store is the one and only gateway to the iOS platform.