Google has updated the webmaster guidelines document to add that automatically generated content is against the guidelines only when it is “intended to manipulate search rankings.” This was added to the main webmaster guidelines here the other day. However the specific document has said for the past couple of years the same language, “where it’s intended to manipulate search rankings and not help users.”

The page last week had a bullet point that read “Automatically generated content” as an item that is against the webmaster guidelines. Now it reals “Automatically generated content intended to manipulate search rankings.” The detailed page had seemed to always have that line “where it’s intended to manipulate search rankings and not help users.”

So I don’t think anything specific has changed with the guidance specifically, since it was always in the main document.

Google recently said the quality of AI content is still not good enough for search quality purposes. But Google has also said that one day it might be.

Hat tip to Kenichi Suzuki:

🤨So, automatically generated content isn’t always a violation of the guidelines. It’s fine as long as you’re not trying to manipulate search engines.https://t.co/DJu3miDya0
CC: @rustybrick pic.twitter.com/DqeEjRGqQC

— Kenichi Suzuki🇺🇦鈴木謙一 (@suzukik) April 12, 2022

Forum discussion at Twitter.