Last month was a pretty busy month with Google announcing the launch of BERT, one of the most significant updates the company made to search ever – the company said. We have a lot on BERT below, including the possibility that the New York Times was hurt by it.

Google released the speed report for Search Console and integrated Site Kit into WordPress. Google launched in search those new snippet controls, so feel free to use them. Google said it will stop indexing Flash this year.

Google does not have an EAT score and no, there is no BERT score either. Good luck renting out experts to improve your E-A-T said Google. Oh, and content accuracy may be a ranking factor again.

Google had another short term indexing bug this month and is investigating broken search operators and a possible issue with recipe rich results.

It was a busy month, kind of like last month and the ongoing WebmasterWorld thread is still buzzing on BERT.

Here is a summary of the more important Google Webmaster related topics I wrote this month:

Google Algorithms & BERT:
Google BERT Update Impacts 10% Queries & Has Been Rolling Out All Week
Google: There Is Nothing To Optimize For With BERT
The Google BERT Update Felt Small But Was Big
New York Times Search Ranking Drop After Google BERT Update
Google: There Are No BERT Values Or Scores
Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update Signals On Wednesday
A Google Search Algorithm Update Rolling Out?

Google Search Console:
New Google Search Console Speed Reports Rolling Out
Google: Site Kit Now Available To All WordPress Sites
Google Sends “Fix Videos Markup For” Search Console Messages

Google SEO:
Google’s New Snippet Controls Rolling Out In A Few Days With Changes To Google France
Google To Stop Indexing Content Within Flash This Year
Google: We Do Not Have An EAT Score
Google: Renting Specialist Or Expert Names Does Not Help With EAT
Google: Content Accuracy Is A Ranking Factor
Google: We Are Not Working On Content Submission & Crawling Removal
Evergreen GoogleBot Now On Chrome 78
Google Said It Is Reviewing Recipe Rich Results Bug Reports
Google Recipe Rich Results Image Disappearing For Some?
Google Adding City Names To Some Snippet Titles
Google Video Structured Data: Use interactionStatistic Instead Of interactionCount
Google: Auto-Translating Content Won’t Lead To Google Manual Action But…
Someday Machine Written Content Will Be Okay With Google Webmaster Guidelines
Google Site Speed Video Starring John Mueller & Martin Splitt
Google: Don’t Crawl Your Site To Build A Sitemap File
Google Corporate Contact Markup For Knowledge Panels Deprecated
Google: Structured Data Can Help Generate Actions For Google Assistant
Google Search Doesn’t Recognize Authors But Rather Entities
Google: Some But Not All Algorithms May Trigger Spikes In Crawl Rates
New Term: Google Baby Algorithms

Google & Links:
Google: Core Updates Are Not About Bad Links
Google: Links With Diminishing Traffic Are Not Any Less Valuable
SEOs Have Doubt With Google’s Disavow Link Tool
Google: When Disavowing A Link, All Associations Are Removed
Google: Disavow Tool Hurts Too Many Sites
Google: Changing The Destination URL Of A Link Changes Relevance & Value Of That Link
Google Changed Nofollow Link Rule To Better Understand The Web
Google: The New Link Attributes Are Designed To Help Us Understand Better
Google: All You Need Is Google’s Link Tool, Not Third-Party Tools
Google’s Danny Sullivan: Journalists Should Link To Sources

Google Search:
Google Fixed Another Indexing Issue With Fresh Content
Google Is Investigating Broken Search Operators
Google Changes Expandable Featured Snippet Look

Google Local:
Google Tests Image Carousel In Local Pack
Google Search Photos Of Places Nearby
Google My Business Messaging Adds Photos
Google My Business Tests Auto Replies For Reviews

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.