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One is a documented algorithm, the other is an industry approximation of it, and conflating them causes confusion. PageRank and link equity relate as theory to working shorthand: the 1998 model calculated a page’s importance from the quantity and importance of pages linking to it, distributing value across outbound links with a damping factor applied. Google retired the public toolbar score in 2016 but has confirmed the underlying signal remains in use, heavily modified and no longer visible to anyone outside the company.