The search community has been buzzing for the last 24 hours since James Breckenridge reported that anyone could submit a URL removal request for any site, regardless of whether they have access to the Google Webmaster Tools (GWT) account for that domain or not.
I don’t need to go over this in too many details as you can read about it on Dave Naylor’s Blog, where he performed a number of tests. The tests though, seem flawed. Dave managed to submit the removal request for BingoPlayUk.com, a site he does not have access to under GWT, but to date, it still hasn’t been removed:
Nor do I think it will be removed. The issue is, unless you have blocked access to the URL or site via robots.txt or a robots meta tag, or have removed the site or page thus serving a 404, Google won’t actually remove the URL. As Dave notes in his post, it warns you of this when you submit the removal request:
I’ll keep an eye on the SERP for BingoPlayUK, but doubt it is going to change without a physical change to the site.
As for James and his results… linkbait-a-licious given his site is brand new? I’m not one to judge but until someone else can verify his results, I’m on the fence.