Do you smell that?

There’s nothing like the sweet smell of speculation and controversy throughout the blogosphere.

I so love it!

Monday, ShoeMoney posted that he received information from a reliable source that Google may start offering sponsored posts. This would place Google in direct competition with PayPerPost, SponsoredReviews, ReviewMe, and many more companies.

No doubt my feed reader has been busting at the seams with many posts playing off of ShoeMoney and the information he received. And as I read through everyone’s posts it seems that the general feeling of the idea is this:

Stupid. Plain and simple.

How on Earth could Google not look like the biggest hypocrites after knocking PageRank of blogs that had sponsored posts? And then to top it all of, have Google’s golden boy, Matt Cutts make an announcement as to why sponsored posts are bad for Google (and search engines in general).

Here’s what is really fascinating to me.

I am, by no means, in support of Google playing God to the Internet. And just like when people threw their tantrums over Microsoft playing monopoly, it’s now happening with Google.

There are people that love Google and love to hate Google. Personally, I have no stake either way to the love/hate relationship.

Actually, I understand why Google knocked PageRank. Again, I don’t agree with it but I understand it. You’re not going to find me making statements as to “who do they think they are?”

What I don’t understand is why people are making those statements. Who do you think you are to be angry at Google for taking away your PageRank? Then put into the same sentence that you, the blogger for hire, never agreed to follow their terms of service?

Bloggers and companies alike agreed to follow the terms of service Google has when they relied on Google for their PageRank to earn an income. It was your bad for not making sure you understood the terms Google has before you started earning that income.

And now, hundreds of bloggers are yelling at companies, like Izea to do something.

What are they supposed to do? They knew Google’s terms and used their system too. And, even though Izea (the only company so far) has responded to the smack down by Google, the use of PageRank is still in play with PayPerPost.

Honestly, do I think that Google will step into the boxing ring with sponsored review companies? Probably not. Unless however, they manage to launch a system that utilizes the no follow tag long before Izea launches SocialSpark which encourages (not requires) the no follow tag for their posts.

In general, this could all be a lot of fluff and yet another why to hype up the controversy surrounding Google. The truth is that Matt Cutts responded on ShoeMoney’s post already and make a comment.

You know what they say, any publicity is good publicity and Google is winning in that ring right now, hands down (or dukes up). Don’t you think so?

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