Hidden gay slur, search terms, get campaign site blacklisted

[ccharles000]

Add a new item to the long list of political shenanigans that backfire once discovered. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) has decided to run for Texas governor against incumbent Rick Perry, and her new campaign website contained hidden text that read "rick perry gay." The resulting flap led to the firing of the Web development firm involved, drew heated responses from Perry's office, and (perhaps worst of all) saw Hutchison's campaign website yanked from Google's search index.

Texas newspapers uncovered the hidden text last week. The "rick perry gay" reference was one of only thousands of phrases tucked into the source code for Hutchison's site, apparently to help draw search engine traffic.

Hutchison's campaign initially told the Austin American-Statesman that "a vendor sold them on a tool that generates the phrases hourly or less in an attempt to divine the most frequent Web searches made by individuals who search online using one or all of the terms 'Rick Perry,' 'Kay Bailey Hutchison' and 'Texas'"—and plenty of people search for "rick perry gay."

The tool was allegedly used to help make banner ad buying decision, said the campaign, a claim that makes little sense on its face. Why would such a list be inserted in the website's source code unless the goal was to draw search traffic to the site?

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/08/hidden-gay-slur-search-terms-get-campaign-site-blacklisted.ars

[TheWraith]

1. This race promises much popcorn. nt

[Hepburn]

2. Baily Hutchison = sick POS.

:puke:

And I am sure she will say she had NO clue on this, right??? :eyes:

[olkaz]

3. Look up SEO Optimization sometime

If "rick perry gay" literally was only found in the source code, then the story seems plausible.

There are tons of companies that do this to increase web visibility.