# Google "failure" = GWB biography?? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 14, 2005, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604 "2005-09-14T15:34:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Flipshod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f19dbf/32.png) [@Flipshod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flipshod)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/1 "2005-09-14T15:34:20Z")
On the advice of an e-mail I just googled the word “failure” and the first site listed is a biography of George W Bush. No matter what you think of him, that’s just weird. Did someone hack Google? Or did they actually go to the effort to get a site to top a google search for “failure” and then put the GWB stuff their?? It’s ODD. ---
**Author:** ![Nanoda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Nanoda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nanoda)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/2 "2005-09-14T15:44:30Z")
It’s called [Googlebombing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googlebomb). That’s actually the best known example, where the phrase “miserable failure” was linked to George Bush. If you have a few thousand websites or a few hundred people who do, you can do that yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Absolute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Absolute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absolute)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/3 "2005-09-14T15:44:49Z")
I wouldn’t call it hacking Google, but they’ve tricked it. Google’s algorithms partly use link text to determine a site’s ranking. So, if a lot of sites link to [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb) with the text “The Straight Dope”, it increases the ranking of that page in searches for that text. The degree of affect a link has on rankings is related to the popularity of the site it’s on, so a link from [CNN.com](http://CNN.com) would have a more significant effect on the linked page’s ranking than one from Joe’s Discount Floor Tile Superstore. So, what’s happened here is that a lot of jokesters with popular sites (usually blogs) decided to link to Bush’s biography on [whitehouse.gov](http://whitehouse.gov) with the text “miserable failure” (apparently this has gained enough momentum for “failure” alone to work as well). And thus… Some people call this a failure of Google, but I disagree. Their engine is accurately reflecting the content of the web. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/4 "2005-09-14T15:45:11Z")
This is known as a [Google bomb](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_bomb), where users manipulate the Google search rankings by linking to a site using certain anchor text. In W’s case, his official White House bio was linked to via the words [miserable failure](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=miserable+failure&btnG=Google+Search). ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/5 "2005-09-14T15:46:21Z")
Jeez. Spend some time to verify the links and look what happens! ---
**Author:** ![Flipshod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f19dbf/32.png) [@Flipshod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flipshod)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/6 "2005-09-14T15:54:51Z")
Thanks for link to wikipediae (sp). This stuff has been around for years. I can’t believe I’ve never heard of it. Feelin’ out of the loop. :wally ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2005, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-failure-gwb-biography/321604/7 "2005-09-14T22:08:30Z")
Since this one is answered, I’m closing it. If anyone wants to continue a discussion, perhaps MPSIMS, IMHO, GD, depending on what you’re trying to say. **samclem** GQ moderator