Google's alogirthm has become a little better than what you describe above. The last I played with it, your subject matter had to match what you optimized for. Example, if you were optimizing for fluffy pink elephants, your article better be about fluffy pink elephants. Now that may not be interesting to you and me, but it will rank well most likely for fluffy pink elephants and people looking for information about fluffy pink elephants. My understanding is that Google has gotten a lot better at filtering out fluff pieces just meant to bait people and are pushing toward good content now. BUt I haven't messed with it in sometime, so maybe its not so anymore.

Yeah, I may not be around that much as I have other things going on these days and Hive just isn't on my list of priorities. I will stick my head in occasionally and say hey to you and others though.