Why PageRank May Not Matter

Everyone seems to get so obsessed and crazy about Pagerank.  What is Pagerank exactly?  Ok. I do know a little bit about Seo. 

Pagerank is just the factor or rank that Google gives to a page to determine its quality based on the number of backlinks to that site (you can even check their site if you don't believe me, this is what they have said!).  Ok, so now that we sort of know what Pagerank is, how does that matter to us and is it very useful?

If you are around Seo circles long enough, you will always hear people, especially the younger ones screaming Pagerank! or 'How can I increase my Pagerank?'  You also hear a lot of companies claiming to raise your Pagerank for you.  So does having a higher Pagerank really matter?  So finally here are my thoughts.

Does Pagerank really matter?  Yes and no.  Yes and no!  'What do you mean?'  Well allow me to explain something.  Pagerank is just a ranking for the amount and "authority" or "power" of all backlinks to a particular page, but that doesn't guarantee that it will rank well for a particular term.  What matters is the pages that are linking to that page and the information in that link.  From my understanding Pagerank can't tell you this!  Only the search engines and their rankings can, that's why you can see a site or page with Pagerank zero or one beating out a site with Pagerank three, because it is not a magic formula.