Comments on: Nofollow and the Spam War Arms Race http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/ Technology, home automation, usability, and whatever else amuses me. Thu, 09 Feb 2012 04:52:59 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Web Hosting Blog http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1591 Web Hosting Blog Sat, 14 Jun 2008 20:11:14 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1591 I run a web hosting blog and I was faced with the same problem once I enabled do-follow. Let the flood gates open! Basically what I do is manually read each comment and make sure its legit before I pass it onto my blog. I was hoping it would inspire more peeps to comment on my blog but really it just inspired more spam bots to lol I run a web hosting blog and I was faced with the same problem once I enabled do-follow. Let the flood gates open! Basically what I do is manually read each comment and make sure its legit before I pass it onto my blog. I was hoping it would inspire more peeps to comment on my blog but really it just inspired more spam bots to lol

]]> By: Miraj Patel http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1572 Miraj Patel Wed, 04 Jun 2008 18:02:16 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1572 @Annie Maloney I don't really see a need to have a keyword field because if people really wanted to they could just leave the keyword(s) in the name field. As a blog owner I actually prefer them not using keywords because in my opinion it looks spammy to use keywords in the name (even if it says John from whatever), and it just makes it blatant that they are commenting only to get links. Just my 2 cents... @Annie Maloney I don’t really see a need to have a keyword field because if people really wanted to they could just leave the keyword(s) in the name field. As a blog owner I actually prefer them not using keywords because in my opinion it looks spammy to use keywords in the name (even if it says John from whatever), and it just makes it blatant that they are commenting only to get links. Just my 2 cents…

]]> By: Annie Maloney http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1540 Annie Maloney Fri, 23 May 2008 14:29:56 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1540 @ Doug - CommentLuv is pretty cool. BUT, the newest plugin out that is awesome is keywordLuv. Basically it allows the user to use their keywords as their name. Finished result look like so "Annie from Sevierville Real Estate says...... So it still uses the users name but uses the keywords as the anchor. Using this in conjunction with the commentluv really sparks up the comments. Check it out.. Annie @ Doug – CommentLuv is pretty cool. BUT, the newest plugin out that is awesome is keywordLuv. Basically it allows the user to use their keywords as their name. Finished result look like so “Annie from Sevierville Real Estate says…… So it still uses the users name but uses the keywords as the anchor. Using this in conjunction with the commentluv really sparks up the comments. Check it out..

Annie

]]> By: Christo http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1500 Christo Tue, 20 May 2008 20:43:50 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1500 I agree completely. My person blog had DoFollow/CommentLuv installed, but it attracked spammers like hell. :/ I agree completely. My person blog had DoFollow/CommentLuv installed, but it attracked spammers like hell. :/

]]> By: Chris http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1467 Chris Tue, 06 May 2008 19:53:52 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1467 I agree with you enable Dofollow is a spam magnet. But you will also get many visitors too. So my experience to fight spam is: - Use Akismet(i think are you using this plugin too) and proactively flag spam so the url once flag will more likely block by Akismet. - Another thing is always moderate comments. - Let visitors know you are will flag their url as spam if they do spam use. ( they may scare their domain being black list then it will harder for them to spam later) Hopefully they will move on. Thanks Chris. I agree with you enable Dofollow is a spam magnet. But you will also get many visitors too.

So my experience to fight spam is:
- Use Akismet(i think are you using this plugin too) and proactively flag spam so the url once flag will more likely block by Akismet.
- Another thing is always moderate comments.
- Let visitors know you are will flag their url as spam if they do spam use. ( they may scare their domain being black list then it will harder for them to spam later) Hopefully they will move on.

Thanks
Chris.

]]> By: Annie Maloney http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1455 Annie Maloney Thu, 01 May 2008 15:46:19 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1455 Great article! This is a tricky topic. Bloggers are faced with a decision as to what they should allow, dofollow or nofollow. The reasons behind both are obvious and we all know them. In a perfect world you could moderate every comment and apply the dofollow as you see fit. Unfortunately most of us have full time jobs and can't sit in front of the computer waiting for blog comments. As far as the custom searches go, there are an endless amount of sites and people who have created these tools for anyone to use. Now, these tools do eliminate much of the work for spammers but they also allow people who are white-hat to quickly find blogs that are related to their niche' that are dofollow so that they can post coherent comments that actually provide some additional insight to the conversation (unlike the spam programs). All I can say is good luck with what ever path you decide to travel, your blog is good enough to attract readers and entice comments on its own.... Great article! This is a tricky topic. Bloggers are faced with a decision as to what they should allow, dofollow or nofollow. The reasons behind both are obvious and we all know them. In a perfect world you could moderate every comment and apply the dofollow as you see fit. Unfortunately most of us have full time jobs and can’t sit in front of the computer waiting for blog comments. As far as the custom searches go, there are an endless amount of sites and people who have created these tools for anyone to use. Now, these tools do eliminate much of the work for spammers but they also allow people who are white-hat to quickly find blogs that are related to their niche’ that are dofollow so that they can post coherent comments that actually provide some additional insight to the conversation (unlike the spam programs). All I can say is good luck with what ever path you decide to travel, your blog is good enough to attract readers and entice comments on its own….

]]> By: Doug Smith http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1255 Doug Smith Thu, 28 Feb 2008 15:09:58 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1255 @Stewart, That is the dilemma in all of this. Sometimes it's really hard to tell and I agonize over those. But there are other times when it's obvious by the writing or the URL. For example, linking to a get rich on the Internet site is a big red flag. :-) @Stewart, That is the dilemma in all of this. Sometimes it’s really hard to tell and I agonize over those. But there are other times when it’s obvious by the writing or the URL. For example, linking to a get rich on the Internet site is a big red flag. :-)

]]> By: Stewart http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1247 Stewart Thu, 28 Feb 2008 00:30:05 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1247 Guys, How can you tell a genuine comment from someone who has gone to the trouble of finding your blog via let's say a Google search, and someone who simply used one of those software's to find your blog and make a post of equal quality? Taking the problem of blog spam into all consideration, it seems that you could be punishing real bloggers too. Would love to hear your comments on that. Thanks Guys,

How can you tell a genuine comment from someone who has gone to the trouble of finding your blog via let’s say a Google search, and someone who simply used one of those software’s to find your blog and make a post of equal quality?

Taking the problem of blog spam into all consideration, it seems that you could be punishing real bloggers too.

Would love to hear your comments on that.

Thanks

]]> By: Doug Smith http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1242 Doug Smith Wed, 27 Feb 2008 14:51:26 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1242 @Jeffro2pt0, That's an excellent suggestion. Most of the comment spam I see does seem to be on older posts. I believe that is an intentional attempt to slip comments in without being noticed. Unfortunately, some of the comments in this last flood of spam have been written well enough to slip past Akismet altogether. But Akismet is learning and improving. @Jeffro2pt0, That’s an excellent suggestion. Most of the comment spam I see does seem to be on older posts. I believe that is an intentional attempt to slip comments in without being noticed.

Unfortunately, some of the comments in this last flood of spam have been written well enough to slip past Akismet altogether. But Akismet is learning and improving.

]]> By: Jeffro2pt0 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/comment-page-1/#comment-1236 Jeffro2pt0 Tue, 26 Feb 2008 22:44:51 +0000 http://smithsrus.com/nofollow-and-the-spam-war-arms-race/#comment-1236 If you notice that many of your posts that are older than one month are attracting spam bots, login to your admin panel and browse to the plugins tab, then click on Akismet configuration. Check mark the box that describes the option to automatically discard spam comments on entries more than a month old and click the save button. This has really cleaned up my Akismet spam filter. This is the tip I gave on WordPress Weekly Episode 6 http://www.jeffro2pt0.com/wordpress-weekly-episode-6 If you notice that many of your posts that are older than one month are attracting spam bots, login to your admin panel and browse to the plugins tab, then click on Akismet configuration. Check mark the box that describes the option to automatically discard spam comments on entries more than a month old and click the save button. This has really cleaned up my Akismet spam filter.

This is the tip I gave on WordPress Weekly Episode 6 http://www.jeffro2pt0.com/wordpress-weekly-episode-6

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