When it comes to blogging for SEO, questions arise over the risk of content being seen as spam by search engines. This is a legitimate concern, but a lot of the claims and assertions in this area tend to be based on anecdotal evidence or empircal studies of questionable fundamentals. Advice should always be approached with a skeptical eye and a readiness to ask for justification.
If there is one person you should pay attention to in this area, it is definitely Google's Matt Cutts. He spends a lot of time mulling over what makes a page spammy and making sure that Google doesn't give those pages undue placement.
Yesterday, Cutts gave a talk at the Web 2.0 Summit on what he calls "virtual blight"... the techniques that spammers use to hijack websites to boost their own search engine profile. The talk wraps up with some recommendations for site owners who might be targets of such activity.
The trade publication eWeek has posted a slide show of the talk materials. If your line of work involves managing this kind of risk, the talk materials are worth a read.
