So, how did you fare in the most recent update?
This site (TWF) dropped from 6 back to 5 - possibly because of all our recent updates, hopefully not because they think we're selling links.
A Padded Cell and my site are both up one to 5 though! At least I think they were both at 4 before, I don't remember. So that's good news 
I think we see a lot of benefit in having these three sites really closely tied together. They link back and forth often, so it's much more than a link exchange.
(taking PR with a grain of salt as always...)
Megan
My web design blog
demonhale posted this at 18:49—14th January 2008.
He has: 3,195 posts
Joined: May 2005
What I noticed recently is varying degree of PR(Google) drops on some sites and increase on some. Plenty of sites also get sandboxed, and if you didn't know yet, Google has also dropped their Adsense Referral program which has caused a lot of affiliates to change strategies on their Adsense program. The only regions/country that have been spared by Google AdSense are North America, Latin America and Japan.
http://adsense.blogspot.com/2008/01/upcoming-referrals-changes.html
I just hope the new algorithm settles down and we can work back a new SEO strategy.
*sidenote
because of the recent changes in ranking metrics etc. some sites that offer seo services suffered a lot as some of their client pages are either sandboxed by google or completely banned. I found a link somewhere, I just forgot that google provided to these clients who suffered the ban. I even read on Matt Cutts Blog that an SEO service provider has been jailed.
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/traffic-power-ceo-in-jail/
Megan posted this at 19:31—14th January 2008.
She has: 10,057 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
Interesting - I thought the sandbox effect had been discontinued as of 2006 (??). They have gotten rid of the whole supplmental effect as well. Will have to research that when I get a chance.
A lot of sites had adjustments for buying/selling links - that was big in the October update.
Megan
My web design blog
demonhale posted this at 19:41—14th January 2008.
He has: 3,195 posts
Joined: May 2005
I'm not sure if I'm using the right terminology, either they are sandboxed or I think they are completely banned from the results. I think the most appropriate word would be "blacklisted" because sometime ago in google developers blog, they provided a link for sites that shouldn't be blacklisted...
Megan posted this at 14:58—15th January 2008.
She has: 10,057 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
A lot of sites had various penalities last fall, mostly for buying and selling links. This had been going on for a lot longer but toolbar PR didn't reflect any adjustments until October (google only changed that after people complained a lot that toolbar PR wasn't reflecting the penalties).
The whole story can be found in this post:
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/12/information-about-buy...
Megan
My web design blog
nairbuoyevoli posted this at 00:41—19th January 2008.
They have: 11 posts
Joined: Jan 2008
so the last update performed some mistake? and the reason that now they get to cleared it..
Real Estate Properties
Luxury Homes
Web Conferencing
demonhale posted this at 18:02—20th January 2008.
He has: 3,195 posts
Joined: May 2005
Google restores the Adsense referral system due to some pressures from the Adsense publishers...