Google begins penalizing search 'over-optimization'

Google is making a change to its search algorithm to penalize what the company's head of Web spam called "over-optimization" and instead favor websites with high-quality content and less refined search-engine optimization. 

Google announced Tuesday that a change in its search algorithm will punish sites that violate the company's "existing quality guidelines" and is intended to reward those "making great sites for users, not just algorithms." The change will go live over the next few days, the company said.

Specifically, the changes aim to reduce the amount of content that surfaces high in a user's search results on Google but that is not particularly useful or valuable; this is also known as Web spam. Matt Cutts, the company's Web spam chief, first mentioned the plan at the SXSW Interactive conference in March.