More than 50 blogs, forums, and similar sites were selected from hundreds of candidate sites for inclusion in the search engine. The only requirement for inclusion was that content must be publicly accessible without requiring a membership. Even requiring a free membership to allow people to view your content disqualifies your site from this search index.

Some sites were chosen because of their high volume of traffic and discussion. Volume does not necessarily equal quality. In fact, the more popular a forum is, the more likely that many simple, often-asked questions will be posted repeatedly.

Some blogs were chosen simply because their quality is of such high content that they could not be ignored. But for the most part the blogs were chosen because of the high number of comments the posts attract. These are "SEO community blogs" and not simply "SEO blogs".

The "Michael's Picks" reflect personal preferences. These personal preferences do not necessarily constitute and endorsement of or agreement with everything advocated by the forum and blog operators or their community members. The SEO community represents a broad diversity of opinion and experience.

SEO Discussion Search

The SEO Discussion Search tool brings together an elite selection of SEO forums and blogs (and a few static content sites) in a unique index of SEO discussion topics. If you think you have read something somewhere in an SEO discussion, chances are pretty good you will find it one of these forums and blogs. All the official search engine forums and blogs are included in the index.

The inclusion of a particular forum or blog in this index does not constitute an endorsement of the statements or opinions expressed hy the members of that community. In particular, anyone who discusses Google Toolbar PageRank as if it means something useful with respect to search engine rankings has -- in Michael's opinion -- much to learn about search engine optimization.

Did your pages "go Supplemental" after Google's 2006 Thanksgiving update? Read Why you now have Supplemental Pages on Google at the SEO Theory blog.