Monstre du Loch Internet

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Depuis la naissance du web il réapparait régulièrement, chaque fois qu’un créateur de nouveau site souhaite faire quelque chose de magique dans l'espoir que Google indique son adresse aux Internautes de France et de Navarre. Ce monstre des profondeurs s’appelle SEO : Search Engine Optimization. Le principe : Pour une somme d’argent modique, des spécialistes peuvent « optimizer » votre beau site pour que n’importe quel visiteur potentiel le découvre automatiquement grâce à Google. C’est une belle idée. Le seul problème, c’est que ça ne peut pas marcher. L’idée qu’un bonhomme puisse insérer des termes magiques dans votre site web pour le rendre attirant est aussi stupide que de donner de l’argent à un charlatan pour qu’il vous transforme en quelqu’un de beau et intelligent.

Curieusement, c’est Google lui-même qui fait sortir ce mythe. Voici une démo magique. Je vais taper les termes “daily exami”. Admirez ce que Google me donne :

Cliquez pour agrandir

Après 0,36 secondes, Google a trouvé environ 434.000 résultats qui correspondent à “daily exami”. Magiquement, il a affiché enfin le nom du journal Grafton Daily Examiner, qui n’est autre que la canard de ma ville natale en Australie ! Je n’ai pas besoin de vous dire que, sur votre ordinateur personnel, vous n’allez certainement pas obtenir le même résultat, car vous n’êtes pas un lecteur régulier de ce journal australien. Autrement dit, il n’y a pas de magie. Google emmagasine tout bêtement les opérations que vous avez l’habitude d’effectuer sur votre ordinateur. Compris ? Ou préfériez-vous imaginer naïvement que vous seriez aussi connu que le monstre du Loch Ness ?

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