Pirate sites react to Google decision to dock search rankings

File sharing websites, Isohunt and The Pirate Bay, have suggested that Google's decision to dock the rankings of sites linking to or providing copyright infringed material will not affect them.

Google made its plans clear in an announcement made last week. However, Isohunt and The Pirate Bay have instead argued that users will instead resort to using the search functions on their own sites to find pirated material as an alternative to Google. The sites also claimed that Google wasn't their main traffic source,with Isohunt owner Gary Fung stating that just 21 per cent of the site's traffic came from Google.

The Pirate Bay stated, in a post published on the service's blog: "That Google is putting our links lower is in a way a good thing for us. We'll get more direct traffic when people don't get the expected search result when using Google.

"The thing we don't like them with this is... they're dictating terms," the post added.

Meanwhile Mr Fung questioned how valid the copyright removal notices would prove to be, arguing that they could be spammed.

Isohunt's owner also claimed that Google could give its own video service, YouTube, special treatment because of its lack of appearance on the site's Transparency Report list of sites - a list which highlights websites that have been served a copyright removal request.

However, in an attempt to quell such speculation, a spokesperson for Google has since told the BBC: "This update applies to all websites including our own - YouTube, Blogger etc."

The decision to dock the rankings of sites served with a copyright removal notice was made by the search engine giant in light of complaints from the film industry. Those within the industry argued that pirates have made it considerably harder for them to market a product - be it by using traditional marketing forms or via Internet marketing - to consumers who know they could watch or download it for free.

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