[backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/greedy-bbc-blocks-external-links/1478/ Greedy BBC Blocks External Links In an outrageous act of selfishness and greed the BBChttp://news.bbc.co.uk/ has decided to stop giving real links to the websites featured in the Related Internet Links section on the right hand side of each news story. I thought *I* went over the top with things like this. Is is any less evil than wikipedia using rel=nofollow on all its external links? -- Brian Butterworth follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/briantist web: http://www.ukfree.tv - independent digital television and switchover advice, since 2002
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
Brian, http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/greedy-bbc-blocks-external-links/1478/ Greedy BBC Blocks External Links In an outrageous act of selfishness and greed the BBChttp://news.bbc.co.uk/ has decided to stop giving real links to the websites featured in the Related Internet Links section on the right hand side of each news story. I would not categorize this as evil behavior per se... it's to protect from phishing attacks. Though I would suggest BBC not allow open redirect altogether and instead generate a hash for the url and append it to the redirect to ensure that redirects are not open to potential adversaries. Google's solution is slightly more elegant and they take the hash key approach: http://www.google.com/url?sa=tsource=webct=rescd=9url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vaio.eu%2Fei=pg8QSeKUDIqOwQHN29SuCwusg=AFQjCNGEZF4TAMzxTywhVCfBZKTJcsE8Qwsig2=z3E6_NauPvoc6RmJcuaDQA If you hack the above URL and replace vaio.eu with vaio.com you get a redirect page similar to BBC's (but no auto-redirect): http://www.google.com/url?sa=tsource=webct=rescd=9url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vaio.com%2Fei=pg8QSeKUDIqOwQHN29SuCwusg=AFQjCNGEZF4TAMzxTywhVCfBZKTJcsE8Qwsig2=z3E6_NauPvoc6RmJcuaDQA I thought *I* went over the top with things like this. Is is any less evil than wikipedia using rel=nofollow on all its external links? Why is this evil or even over the top? Any open system should have rel=nofollow to revent attacks to boost PR. If it did not, wikipedia would become an integral part of the marketing strategy right alongside DMOZ or something. -- Aleem B It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves -- Sir Edmund Hillary (1919 - 2008)
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
Brian Butterworth wrote: http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/greedy-bbc-blocks-external-links/1478/ Greedy BBC Blocks External Links In an outrageous act of selfishness and greed the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/ has decided to stop giving real links to the websites featured in the Related Internet Links section on the right hand side of each news story. I thought *I* went over the top with things like this. Is is any less evil than wikipedia using rel=nofollow on all its external links? I wouldn't call it evil, but How is Google supposed to run a link based algorithm if the most trusted sites stop linking to anybody? is fair comment. I'd be interested to hear why Javascript is not being used instead (either to track click events or to rewrite the HTML in a way that's invisible to spiders). cheers, Dan -- http://danbri.org/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
RE: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
Keep it all server-side is what I say J. Won't affect the SEO, and won't limit users without JS. However the OnClick would almost achieve the same I guess ... Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth Sent: 04 November 2008 10:32 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page ... my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? I can see a good point about using a redirector as you can use it a) test to see if the link is broken; and b) count the number of times it get used. I keep thinking of using a bit of onclick=... with an AJAX routine to do the testing and counting. It is a simple matter of returning a true value to allow the link to activate. I guess if it broken you could return false... End-user generated content is a different matter ... Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth Sent: 04 November 2008 10:12 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies
RE: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page ... my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? End-user generated content is a different matter ... Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth Sent: 04 November 2008 10:12 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl - http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Brian Butterworth follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/briantist web: http://www.ukfree.tv - independent digital television and switchover advice, since 2002 This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ , a service from Viatel http://www.viatel.com/ .
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
Gavin Pearce wrote: ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page … my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to “key” sites related to the story in hand? End-user generated content is a different matter … The only thing I could think of that made sense, was if the journalists were being somehow lobbied by googlejuice-crazed SEO's sending dozens of 'helpful' links or faked up stories in the hope some would end up in a highly ranked sidebar. But this seems implausible at best. BBC journalists should be pretty good at avoiding flimflam, whether SEO-inspired or otherwise. Poking around the SEO websites a bit, I can't find much evidence of that. A few posts like http://www.affiliates4u.com/forums/search-engine-strategies/12692-link-bbc-how-best-gain.html sure, but hardly enough to be worth worrying about. In my own experiments I've been crawling news.bbc.co.uk and trying to use the related link sidebar as implicit topic metadata. I reckon this holds some promise, but now it looks like custom code is needed to deal with the indirected URLs. Not a huge deal but makes the structure just that bit more gnarly... cheers, Dan -- http://danbri.org/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
I like the BBC Blocks.. I don't think they're greedy. Stylish and understated maybe... On Tue, Nov 4, 2008 at 10:54 AM, Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Keep it all server-side is what I say J. Won't affect the SEO, and won't limit users without JS. However the OnClick would almost achieve the same I guess … Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth Sent: 04 November 2008 10:32 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page … my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? I can see a good point about using a redirector as you can use it a) test to see if the link is broken; and b) count the number of times it get used. I keep thinking of using a bit of onclick=... with an AJAX routine to do the testing and counting. It is a simple matter of returning a true value to allow the link to activate. I guess if it broken you could return false... End-user generated content is a different matter … Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Butterworth Sent: 04 November 2008 10:12 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well -
RE: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl - http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl - http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Brian Butterworth follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/briantist web: http://www.ukfree.tv - independent digital television and switchover advice, since 2002
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page … my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? I can see a good point about using a redirector as you can use it a) test to see if the link is broken; and b) count the number of times it get used. I keep thinking of using a bit of onclick=... with an AJAX routine to do the testing and counting. It is a simple matter of returning a true value to allow the link to activate. I guess if it broken you could return false... End-user generated content is a different matter … *Gavin Pearce* |* **Web Developer* |* **TBS *The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin *http://www.tbs.uk.com* *TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459.* *From:* [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *On Behalf Of *Brian Butterworth *Sent:* 04 November 2008 10:12 *To:* backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk *Subject:* Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl - http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Brian Butterworth follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/briantist web: http://www.ukfree.tv - independent digital television and switchover advice, since 2002 This message has been scanned for viruses by *Viatel MailControlhttp://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ *, a service from *Viatel
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
[backstage] Social Innovation Camp and BBC Backstage
Hi all, One of the things we missed earlier this year was social innovation camp. It clashed with Mashed 2008 and Interesting2008. So I'm glad to say we'll be supporting some of the future social innovation camps in 2009. Tim Oreilly talked about the need to apply our technology to human issues rather that throwing sheep a little while ago at the Web 20 Expo. Well we think the same and social innovation camp fits really well with this. Till next year, here's the meet up. Ian Forrester This e-mail is: [x] private; [] ask first; [] bloggable Senior Producer, BBC Backstage Room 1044, BBC Manchester BH, Oxford Road, M60 1SJ email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] work: +44 (0)2080083965 mob: +44 (0)7711913293 Social Innovation Camp http://www.sicamp.org/ is back this December and we're looking for the best ideas for web-based tools that could change something important. Over one weekend from 5th-7th December 2008, the Social Innovation Camp is bringing together some of the best of the UK's software developers and designers with those at the sharp end of social problems. Their mission will be to accelerate six back-of-the-envelop ideas to working prototype web tools that could change the world in under 48 hours. Send us your idea http://www.sicamp.org/?page_id=6 for a web tool to create social change before 7th November and you could be joining 80 other participants to try and make your idea a reality. Don't have an idea to enter but still want to get involved? We're also looking for talented software developers and designers, as well as those with business, fundraising, legal or other expertise needed to get an idea off the ground. Sign up to come along here http://www.sicamp.org/?page_id=189 . Take a look here http://www.sicamp.org/?page_id=166 for more info on how it worked when we held our first SI Camp back in April. And for some examples of the kinds of ideas we're after, watch SI Camp's April winner talk about her idea, Enabled by Design http://www.enabledbydesign.org/ , here http://www.sicamp.org/?p=195%0A%0A and take a look here http://www.sicamp.org/?page_id=16 at the other ideas we helped along over the weekend. Anything else you'd like to know etc, get in touch. Thanks! p.s. if you can't make December, we also run monthly Meetups http://www.meetup.com/Social-Innovation-Camp/ - a little bit of what we do at our weekend events, but more often Anna Maybank Director Social Innovation Camp www.sicamp.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] Office: 020 8980 6263 Mobile: 077 9297 5765 Skype: anna.maybank
Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
I keep thinking of using a bit of onclick=... with an AJAX routine to do the testing and counting. It is a simple matter of returning a true value to allow the link to activate. I guess if it broken you could return false... FWIW, adding an onclick is not the preferred way of doing this. It's better to attach events to anchors during document.onload event. If anchors need to be filtered, dom/css classes can be used. On Tue, Nov 4, 2008 at 3:31 PM, Brian Butterworth [EMAIL PROTECTED]wrote: 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page … my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? I can see a good point about using a redirector as you can use it a) test to see if the link is broken; and b) count the number of times it get used. I keep thinking of using a bit of onclick=... with an AJAX routine to do the testing and counting. It is a simple matter of returning a true value to allow the link to activate. I guess if it broken you could return false... End-user generated content is a different matter … *Gavin Pearce* |* **Web Developer* |* **TBS *The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin *http://www.tbs.uk.com* *TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459.* *From:* [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *On Behalf Of *Brian Butterworth *Sent:* 04 November 2008 10:12 *To:* backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk *Subject:* Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links 2008/11/4 Gavin Pearce [EMAIL PROTECTED] I might be being a bit blond here, but why even the need to have rel=nofollow at all? It is supposed to be there to stop automatic and commercial links polluting search engine rankings. I can understand on user generated content, but when it's a link to a relevant and respected website on the topic in hand, than that isn't a good or valid reason to use the nofollow syntax. In fact as stated already, that's a large part in how the big search engines work. Google isn't likely to start penalising the BBC site as it's no doubt on a respected site / white list somewhere else within the Google system... But that isn't, to be fair, the issue. The issue is that even if the BBC decides to link to an external site, if it uses either the methods described, a visiting user will get there, but a search engine will dismiss it. Incoming links are useful for SEO and to have them turned off from the BBC is a big problem. Last time I had a link from a major BBC page to my site, my usual traffic (and ad revenue) tripled for three days. But the link did not boost any search engine ratings. Gavin Pearce | Web Developer | TBS The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG, United Kingdom Direct: +44 (0) 1344 403488 | Office: +44 (0) 1344 306011 | Fax: +44 (0) 1344 427138 MSN: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Yahoo: pearce.gavin http://www.tbs.uk.com TBS is a trading name of Technology Services International Limited. Registered in England, company number 2079459. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Belam Sent: 04 November 2008 09:36 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links I don't think it is evil, and as I've pointed out on their blog and on Sphinn, since Patrick at Blogstorm himself applies nofollow to all outbound links it is a little rich to be complaining that the BBC doesn't provide 'trusted' links. Interesting point about how Google can be expected to run a trusted link based algorithm in the future, but lets not forget it was the search engines that concocted nofollow themselves, and Google is these days notorious for penalising sites in the rankings that it 'believes' are displaying paid links that are not clearly marked as advertising. I've blogged a little about the Blogstorm post as well - http://www.currybet.net/cbet_blog/2008/11/bbc_news_clumsy_linking.php cheers, martin - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ This message has been scanned for viruses by Viatel MailControl - http://viatel.mailcontrol.com/ - Sent via the
RE: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links
Hi all - I have a blog post going out about this tomorrow. I pulled the short straw to respond. Essentially, the /go/ tracking system used by the BBC to track external links is the cause of the change, as this is being implemented across the Journalism sites for related links. It changes the links in order to measure usage of external links. The BBC Trust has asked us to do this. We are adapting this to use some JavaScript to rewrite links so that they look untouched, but when clicked use the /go/ system. It's not pretty but it's the standard way to do it at BBC Towers, and it's not unusual across many sites for them to use a similar method with similar issues... Martin's posts have covered off the history of this issue admirably... Cheers, ::: John O'Donovan ::: Chief Architect, BBC FMT Journalism ::: BBC Broadcast Centre ::: 201 Wood Lane, London W12 7TS ::: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ::: http://www.bbc.co.uk -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dan Brickley Sent: 04 November 2008 11:18 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: Re: [backstage] Greedy BBC Blocks External Links Gavin Pearce wrote: ** Sorry I meant within the BBC related links section specifically. My bad for not making it clear. Exactly Brian, I think we are on the same page ... my point is why does the BBC need to make use of JavaScript, or NoFollow tags for links to key sites related to the story in hand? End-user generated content is a different matter ... The only thing I could think of that made sense, was if the journalists were being somehow lobbied by googlejuice-crazed SEO's sending dozens of 'helpful' links or faked up stories in the hope some would end up in a highly ranked sidebar. But this seems implausible at best. BBC journalists should be pretty good at avoiding flimflam, whether SEO-inspired or otherwise. Poking around the SEO websites a bit, I can't find much evidence of that. A few posts like http://www.affiliates4u.com/forums/search-engine-strategies/12692-link-b bc-how-best-gain.html sure, but hardly enough to be worth worrying about. In my own experiments I've been crawling news.bbc.co.uk and trying to use the related link sidebar as implicit topic metadata. I reckon this holds some promise, but now it looks like custom code is needed to deal with the indirected URLs. Not a huge deal but makes the structure just that bit more gnarly... cheers, Dan -- http://danbri.org/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
[backstage] I've woken up to a new world
where bbc.co.uk is unavailable, and twitter.com is responding well. -- Frank Wales [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
God bless America!http://mpelembe.blogware.com/god-bless-america On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 4:30 AM, John O'Donovan [EMAIL PROTECTED]wrote: Still working from here...both home page and news front page. Obama won in case you were wondering :o) ::: John O'Donovan ::: Chief Architect, BBC FMT Journalism ::: BBC Broadcast Centre ::: 201 Wood Lane, London W12 7TS ::: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ::: http://www.bbc.co.uk -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Frank Wales Sent: 05 November 2008 04:22 To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk Subject: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world where bbc.co.uk is unavailable, and twitter.com is responding well. -- Frank Wales [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Sam Mbale Mpelembe Network http://www.mpelembe.net Follow me on http://twitter.com/mpelembe
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
Google's real time results is working well, http://election.mpelembe.net On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 4:56 AM, Alison Young [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Frank Wales wrote: where bbc.co.uk is unavailable, and twitter.com is responding well. bbc.co.uk seems fine from here. Know what you mean about the surprisingly good twitter performance, I presume other people have observations on the performance of other social networks. Have spent most of the night cheering whenever the BBC broke out the incredibly zoomy graphics. Fab. Alison -- Alison Young [EMAIL PROTECTED] 0777 32 96 156 - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Sam Mbale Mpelembe Network http://www.mpelembe.net Follow me on http://twitter.com/mpelembe
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
Frank Wales wrote: where bbc.co.uk is unavailable, and twitter.com is responding well. bbc.co.uk seems fine from here. Know what you mean about the surprisingly good twitter performance, I presume other people have observations on the performance of other social networks. Have spent most of the night cheering whenever the BBC broke out the incredibly zoomy graphics. Fab. Alison -- Alison Young [EMAIL PROTECTED] 0777 32 96 156 - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
It's a beautiful day! http://tinyurl.com/6necjp On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 4:59 AM, Sam Mbale [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Google's real time results is working well, http://election.mpelembe.net On Wed, Nov 5, 2008 at 4:56 AM, Alison Young [EMAIL PROTECTED]wrote: Frank Wales wrote: where bbc.co.uk is unavailable, and twitter.com is responding well. bbc.co.uk seems fine from here. Know what you mean about the surprisingly good twitter performance, I presume other people have observations on the performance of other social networks. Have spent most of the night cheering whenever the BBC broke out the incredibly zoomy graphics. Fab. Alison -- Alison Young [EMAIL PROTECTED] 0777 32 96 156 - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ -- Sam Mbale Mpelembe Network http://www.mpelembe.net Follow me on http://twitter.com/mpelembe -- Sam Mbale Mpelembe Network http://www.mpelembe.net Follow me on http://twitter.com/mpelembe
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
Alison Young wrote: Have spent most of the night cheering whenever the BBC broke out the incredibly zoomy graphics. Fab. Was is just a coincidence that Jeremy Vine appeared to repeatedly poke McCain in the face as he was calling up results that were in Obama's favour? -- Frank Wales [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
Re: [backstage] I've woken up to a new world
John O'Donovan wrote: Still working from here...both home page and news front page. I had a sustained period (about 45 mins) where nothing was working from bbc.co.uk, yet other sites were fine. Traceroutes were erratic, as were pings, both from here and from a couple of other systems in distant locations. Probably rats chewing on cables. Obama won in case you were wondering :o) Oh, I wasn't wondering -- BBC News on the televisual gramophone still worked, despite Gore Vidal's best efforts to stupefy everyone. I notice I sent out several more tweets than I remember too. -- Frank Wales [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
