Google: In 2009 We Selected Only One Of Your Anchor Text When...

Back in 2008, Moz published a report claiming the first anchor text counts - meaning, if you have a web page that has two or more links going to the same page, but the anchor text of those links differ, Google would pick the first anchor text and ignore the ones in the past.
We covered that back in 2008 and then SEOs began debating the validity of the study. Later on Branko confirmed the claims, questioning the scientific nature of the other studies.
Now, Google's Matt Cutts comes out with a video saying in 2009, Google may (which means did, imo) have picked one of the anchor texts and not counted the other. He did not say the first, but it is likely the first. First how? First in source code or based on skipping the navigation. That is unsure, but watch the video:

Either way, SEOs like to obsess about these things - Cutts says, don't.
It changes and he clearly didn't check to see what Google does now, in 2014.
Forum discussion at Google+ and Twitter.

Matt Cutts Talks About Coming Google Algorithm Changes

Google seems to have announced some coming changes to its algorithm in the latest “Webmaster Help” video. Head of webspam Matt Cutts said the search engine is working on some changes that will help it better determine when a site is an authority on a topic. He didn’t give any specific dates or anything, but says he’s “looking forward to to those rolling out.” 

Do you think Google is good at determining which sites are authorities on certain topics right now? Do you expect these changes to lead to better results?

The topic came up when Blind Five Year Old asked Cutts, “As Google continues to add social signals to the algorithm, how do you separate simple popularity from true authority?”