How I am testing backlinks 

Alot is being talked about when it comes to backlinks in SEO circles. Basically, they are the holy grail of the Internet. It's not the amount of them nor is it the link architecture methodology. It comes down to the quality of your link. Is it an ad? or is it information? Search engines like information as ads are usually looked at as spam and they want to provide their users with the best quality sites according to the user's search criteria.

What also matters is where the link is either coming from or going to. If  you link to a Page Rank 6 or 7 page, it actually improves your ranking as well. If a Page Rank 6 or 7 links to you, then  your page gets a higher value Page Rank.

What's an SEO?

Why does SEs hate SEO companies?

SEO is an abbreviation for "search engine optimizer" or "seach enging optimization." Many SEOs, agencies and consultants provide valuable services for websites and their owners, from writing copy, giving advice on site architecture to helping find relevant directories in which their site should be submitted. On the other hand, there are also unethical SEOs which have given the industry a bad name through overly aggressive marketing efforts and utilzing techniques which attempt to unfairly manipulate search engine results in their favor.

The definition of Cloaking

according to Wikipedia found here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloaking

"Cloaking is a black hat search engine optimization (SEO) technique in which the content presented to the search engine spider is different from that presented to the users' browser. This is done by delivering content based on the IP addresses or the User-Agent HTTP header of the user requesting the page. When a user is identified as a search engine spider, a server-side script delivers a different version of the web page, one that contains content not present on the visible page. The purpose of cloaking is to deceive search engines so they display the page when it would not otherwise be displayed."

250 Back link Directory list via seocompany.ca

List of over 250 Places to add your URL for backlinks.

The name PageRank is a trademark of Google and is assigned to Stanford University.

Google's description of PageRank:

Having back links means you are getting votes for your web pages. Other web pages are saying that your web page is a good place to find "WhateverYourPageIsAbout". Back links also provide access for search engines to find your content and index it.