We Are All Rankers Now: Or Why the Internet Has Turned to Shit

I almost posted a comment on a Medium article this morning. The comment was: "This kind of advice is why the internet has turned to shit." I didn't post it. Not because it was wrong, but because the article didn't deserve it. It was excellent. Genuinely useful. The kind of piece that makes you think rather than just nod. Read the SERP before you write. Understand intent. Find the thinking gap. Look for what the top results quietly stepped around and write that instead. Good advice. Practically sound. The author clearly knows what they're doing. But I couldn't shake the feeling that something had gone wrong somewhere upstream. The PremiseThe article was about keywords. Specifically, about finding "exploitable" ones. About understanding "conversion paths" and "audience assets" and the difference between a keyword difficulty of 19 and one of 41 and why the numbers don't tell the whole story. All true. All useful. And all completely beside the point of why anyone ever started writing…