Comments
This all sounds like a baby-with-the-bathwater approach. Kill Blogspot blogs because there are a lot of fake blogs being set up through Blogger.com? A few years ago - before spam-blockers became standard-issue with most email services - I noticed that the bulk of the spam I was getting was coming from yahoo.com addresses. Should we have simply called for the eradication of Yahoo?
It also smacks of blog-snobbery. One of Blogger's attractions is the ease with which any damned fool can set up a blog in five minutes or less. (I did.) It's free, it's simple, and it doesn't require an advanced knowledge of html or specialized code to create and maintain a blog. Should everybody using this be forced to dump their existing blogs and maybe go out and pay for a domain name and learn Moveable Type or some other blogging software? Mr. Pirillo doesn't seem to have a problem with that. I do.
A few months ago I did a random walk with the "Next Blog" button and found that 4 out of 5 blogs were "fake" blogs. A few weeks ago I did it again and found that 4 out of 5 were "real" blogs. Maybe Mr. Pirillo is exaggerating a bit when he suggests that 99% of blogspot blogs are not , as he puts it, "legitimate".
I'm not even sure what "subscribed search spam for designated keywords" is. I tried to go to the screenshot to get a better understanding, but the image (or whatever, it apparently involved sound) took forever to load, and I didn't feel like crashing my computer as one of the commentors on his site had happen to them. But it sounds like this is a problem that can be addressed with less draconian measures than simply eradicating all Blogspot blogs.
(A side note: Is there any way of getting "carriage returns" to appear in the comments? My carefully paragraphed comments are all running together in a single block, like a schizophrenic's handwritten treatise on life, the universe, and everything.)
Posted by Harold | Wednesday 19 October 2005 10:20PM
Splogspot in the Splogosphere (Chris Pirillo)
"I don't want babies to get thrown out with the bathwater, or I wouldn't have offered a possible solution in my original entry."
In regards to "subscribed search spam for designated keywords"...
I'll explain it as I understand it...
Comment & trackback spam is specifically engineered to manipulate Google's search engine.
Google Ranking depends upon popularity. The more sites link to a URL, the higher that URL is in the index. The more sites link to a URL using certain keywords, the higher that URL turns up in searches for that keyword.
And the subscribed thing is, I believe a reference to some kind of subscription (by e-mail?) for entries matching specific search terms. (I don't use it myself.) Some people track certain key words for various reasons, and spammers are using Blogspot to manipulate this too - to get their advertisements to these people.
But that's not the only crapola Blogspot spam blogs ("splogs") cause. It causes trouble for bloggers
And as for baby/bathwater... I think the point this guy was trying to make was that Google refuses to take the trouble to implement any measures at all, to get the spam blog problem in check!
This has been going on awhile now, since after being acquired by Google. That seems odd, since you'd think a wealthy company would be able to take care of it better than the private citizens who started it with their own time & resources. Since they were the ones who wanted Blogger so badly they paid for it... and it was supposed to be such a great thing - you'd think they'd take the trouble to care for it! Just as Yahoo has taken the trouble to get a handle on spam through their service, or they would be on all the major e-mail spam blacklists, and then they would be out of the e-mail business.
This post that I link to was meant as a call for them to wake up and do something about it already!
As a Blogspot user yourself, you should be just as anxious to see them stand up and take responsibility, Harold!
You, and a few other people I know still using blogspot are the only reason I didn't ban blogspot URLs months ago on my blacklist, and before I upgraded to the new MT, I spent about 15 minutes a day dealing with spam comments, many of which were blogspot, and would get blogspot on my blacklist by accident regularly. That was time I could've spent doing other things. So then I bought to the new version of MT, which involved paying money for it. I could've easily continued on with 2.6 if it weren't for Blogspot spam blogs. The spamming of those blogs was impossible to filter out without banning you and others from posting comments here w/ your URLs.
As for the "ease of use" thing... This is my hobby, and I care about it enough to take the time & money to personalize it and make it mine.
I guess many are of the mind that if it's as important to you, you'd do the same. That a free service is good for "trying it out"... to see if you really want to blog as a hobby... and then you get your own site if you decide you're into it.
If not, that's your choice, of course.
But you can't expect everyone to take you quite as seriously if you're not as willing to put as much into it as others are putting into it.
Besides, it's not as if this hobby is anywhere near as expensive as a lot of other ones. Especially if you web space with your ISP service, and there are free blogging tools you can install for free. And it's not like it takes a semester at the community college to learn some simple HTML & how to install your own blogging tool.
(Speaking of which, yes, you can get carriage returns here in comments by using the simplest of HTML. ;) You can also make italics & links!
And just so I don't get accused of snobbery towards those poverty stricken people with something important to say, who blog from the public libraries... Of course I think it's good that people who cannot afford even a few dollars a month to blog, or can't afford a computer & internet in their home, can still have a blog. I wouldn't say they don't have something worthwhile to publish on the internet.
However, I believe if Google is going to exploit... er, I mean - offer the service to them in exchange for free advertising (at least of their Blogger) on their content... then that's all the more argument that they should take the trouble to keep the service clean, and stop inconveniencing, and wasting the time of, everyone else, who has to deal with their refuse.
Don't defend the people in power, with the power to stop it, who allow this blog community atrocity to continue!
;)
Posted by Chloe | Thursday 20 October 2005 2:42AM
It has come to my attention that I have been the target of name-calling and character assassination supposedly because I'm 'credited' with stating things I never spoke or wrote. So just to make it all the more clear, for those having a hard time figuring out what I said, here it is again:
1) I never said Blogspot users should be drummed off the internet, or that I had anything against Blogspot users.
I said that I was disgusted with Google's lack of policing their service, and think that if they don't care to keep their service free of abuse, they should get out of the blogging business.
And even if Google did disband Blogger, there are other free blogging services where people can set up shop again. And indeed, it might be better because those other free blogging services are not infested with spam blogs.
Furthermore, if a Blogspot blogger with a blog I liked asked me to host them on my own web site for free, I would even consider that. And my monthly cost for this WatermelonPunch.com web site is about $13.00. And the time I spend on general maintenance, (above & beyond posting & commenting, etc.), is about 4-8 hours a month.
Before upgrading to the new MT, because of the loads of Blogspot spam, for a couple of months I was spending double that time on just dealing with spam comments. Which should clearly demonstrate why I'm disgusted with Google's having allowed the Blogspot spam blog problem to continue.
2) I've never deliberately banned Blogspot URLs in my comments.
Indeed, I've jumped through hoops, spending a lot of time I'll never get back, and then money, to keep my spam filters from banning Blogspot URLs as a result of the Blogspot spam blogs. And I don't see any Blogspot users nor Google, eager to recompense me for that time or money, that's for sure. Nor have I seen anyone patting me on the back for bending over backwards to allow Blogspot bloggers to comment on my site.
3) My blog is my blog, and I can ban any comments, from anyone, for any reason I choose. I have no obligation to host anyone else's text on my web site. It's my prerogative what I decide is unwanted on my own web site. And it's nobody else's business, not other bloggers nor spammers, to dictate to me how I go about filtering, deleting, or blocking those unwanted comments, because it's not their time & money I'm spending.
4) I never said I frowned upon, or looked down upon, Blogspot users. I do think there are undesirable qualities about many of the free blogging services like Blogspot and Livejournal, and some of the people who are making sites on them, but I do read some blogs on those servers, and link to them, so obviously I'm not exclusively snubbing anyone. I simply pointed out that many bloggers are not impresed with Blogspot bloggers in general - this is a fact.
Demonstrated by this URL topped Daypop yesterday:
Weblog Usability: The Top Ten Design Mistakes
But it's by no means "rules" handed out from anyone in any kind of authority, obviously... It's advice based on real facts about what people are attracted to in blogs. If you want your site to be popular among the masses, and people in general to be impressed by your blog, it's good advice.
I've never been one for popularity contests, so I would hardly try to bully anyone into following that advice. I don't give a flying mouse's doopah what blogging tool or hosting service anyone else uses. Nor will I be bullied into denying reality. Nobody's going to tell me whose blogs I should be looking at or not looking at, I'll make those choices for myself, and I think other people should make that choice for themselves as well. And I think we all do. If someone's not happy with that, they're free to try and swim against the current, that's their own business.
And nobody is obligated to read my site, that's for sure. It's your business whether you're here reading this or not. I don't have a gun to anybody's head.
Once more, this time with feeling:
Don't throw pearls to swine
Posted by Chloe | Saturday 22 October 2005 4:43PM
Chloe, I hope you don't mean me. I never stated or implied that I believed your views were the same as Chris Pirillo's. I've added a disclaimer to my entry on the "Kill Blogspot Already!" issue to that effect, just to be clear.
Posted by Harold | Monday 24 October 2005 7:39PM
Well, but my views ARE the same as Chris Pirillo's. He pretty much said the same thing I did in my last comment.
Posted by Chloe | Monday 24 October 2005 11:03PM
Add a Comment
|
|
