The floor was open for audience questions as representatives from Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask.com addressed issues on the importance and value of inbound links.
One question seemed to resonate throughout the entire session. How can a search engine identify whether a link is paid or organic in nature? Shashi Thakur of Google replied that through both manual and algorithmic methods, the search engine is able to determine the nature of a link.
But why are paid links so bad? Thakur suggests that generally, purchased links are intended only to deceive search engines while adding little to no value to the user.
However, Peter Linsley of Ask.com and Sean Suchter of Yahoo agree that purchased links are not necessarily evil so long as they provide some sort of value and relevance to the user.