This is a Leak

This post is what could be called a strategic leak. If this was the real story, truth be told, you’d have known it. Leaks need to happen from time to time and this being a Friday afternoon most American businesses forgot; this is the perfect time for a leak.

I am working on what I and other search journalists and webmasters working with me consider an extremely big story. I have been developing it for over a month now and am almost ready to go public with it. It has nothing to do with this blog other than this post appearing here.

I have been publicly hinting, asking questions, pushing sources and recording voices about this story for the past three weeks and have thus placed myself on the radar screens of some interesting people. In many ways the story is hardly a secret anymore.

Today, it is time to gently release a bit of pressure that has been building up over the past thirty-some odd days. This post is a bit of house cleaning before the mainstream media and industry giants get their hands on the story.

As of last Wednesday, the final pieces started falling into place. Sources contacted weeks earlier confirmed their details and willingness to speak publicly. Essential files had been compiled and distributed for independent verification and analysis. A collective “whew” was expressed on several instant messages, and an interesting long weekend is being had by all involved parties.

Over the weekend, three major analytics firms are independently parsing blocks of log data and will be sharing their findings with me early in the week. By the middle of next week, I expect to have a range of numbers telling what we expect will be similar views of the same story.

The crux of that story stems from the two class action lawsuits Google settled earlier this year but, as with any good story, the side trails have led into some enormous canyons we never expected to venture into.

Here’s how it stands. The majority of the story might be about click fraud or it might be about a massive misunderstanding. If it’s the former, Google has some explaining to do. If it’s the latter, the story will serve to bring clarity to what appears to be a murky situation to some of Google’s past and present advertisers. If we can explore and map the side-trail canyons we found, we will be doing Google and the public a service. All that remains to be seen.

Along the way, WebmasterRadio and I have made several promises of fair play. We have promised Google 48-hours with the log-file data before running the story publicly. We have also promised Google right of comment as part of the story. We will be seeking comment from other engines named in the piece as well. We will honour those commitments.

Google’s internal analysis and public comments will certainly play a role in how the story is understood and explained. There are obviously disagreements between Google and several of its past and present advertisers some of which seem to come down to communication issues. Advertisers don’t know exactly what they are being charged for and some have serious questions about who some questionable clicks are and where they came from. Getting Google’s viewpoint is essential to getting the story right.

Now this is where things sort of go sideways with this story. There are so many channels from which recorded clicks might hit landing pages each becomes a font of questions requiring unique answers. As I understand it, Google has not provided our sources with answers to their questions, even after settling the class action lawsuits that stemmed in part from those very questions. In the absence of answers there are accusations and some of our sources show their frustration when describing their experiences. It’s shaping up to be a pretty explosive piece of radio.

The story raises a number of issues that will require long-term monitoring on many levels, especially that of the search marketing / webmaster media. Everyone who has touched it agrees it has the potential to rock the industry. Regardless of how the story appears after development is done, holes exposed and explored in our investigations will not go away. It might take extraordinary action on the part of the entire industry to produce positive outcomes. One extreme fear expressed says the story could push Congress into calling for greater regulation of the Internet. We have, along the way, learned of closed Congressional hearings on the state of Internet advertising.

Up to this point, the circle of knowledge has been by necessity kept as small as possible but it has grown and at this point, I believe Google pretty much knows most of it, including details of some of those murky canyons.

In using this space to play the politics of a major story, I would like to assure readers that Metamend has absolutely nothing to do with what I am writing about, aside from affording me this space to write in three times a week. This post is likely going to be a surprise for them but this is the best, most neutral place to have put it.

In short, Metamend has nothing to do with this and I am using this space in this way on my own volition. That fact might be an important one in the coming weeks and I wanted it clearly made and date stamped.

On that note, Metamend’s genius child, Enquisite is being used to check data logs but the technicians doing the analysis don’t know exactly why they are doing it. I expect they will see the pieces of the puzzle when they are done.

There’s not much more I can or should say at this point. I wanted to use this post to update those close to the story about its progress and give a better understanding of what we are looking at. That too was one of the promises made. Listen to WebmasterRadio.fm for more information in the coming two weeks.

As soon as this is over, I can write the anatomy of the story, how it came together and the absurd, movie-like drama of its development. From deli-parties in Manhattan to midnight high-tower conferences to clandestine conference calls and the several civic styles of pizza that accompanied the action, the story of the story is a tale as interesting as the truth itself.

Anyway, that was a leak. If this had been a real story, well, truth be told you’d have known it.