Splogs, Spam, Spings, Scraper Sites and Sanity

Splogs  and scraper sites are places that I have too often found my articles and posts  with intrusive links and ads. Today I found out what they were and what can be done about them. So below are several definitions  of splogs, spam, scaper sites and some posts from bloggers that may help you keep your sanity.

From Wikipedia:

Spam in blogs (also called simply blog spam or comment spam) is a form of spamdexing. It is done by automatically posting random comments or promoting commercial services to blogs, wikis, guestbooks, or other publicly accessible online discussion boards. Any web application that accepts and displays hyperlinks submitted by visitors may be a target.

Adding links that point to the spammer’s web site artificially increases the site’s search engine ranking. An increased ranking often results in the spammer’s commercial site being listed ahead of other sites for certain searches, increasing the number of potential visitors and paying customers
Splogs are blogs where the articles are fake, and are only created for search engine spamming. To spam in blogs, conversely, is to include random comments on the blogs of innocent bystanders, in which spammers take advantage of a site’s ability to allow visitors to post comments that may include links.
Sping is short for “spam ping”, and is related to fraudulent pings from blogs using trackbacks, called trackback spam. Pings are messages sent from blog and publishing tools to a centralized network service (a ping server) providing notification of newly published posts or content. Spings, or ping spam, are pings that are sent from spam blogs, or are sometimes multiple pings in a short interval from a legitimate source, often tens or hundreds per minute, due to misconfigured software, or a wish to make the content coming from the source appear fresh.

A scraper site is a website that copies all of its content from other websites using web scraping.[1] No part of a scraper site is original. A search engine is not a scraper site: sites such as Yahoo and Google gather content from other websites and index it so that the index can be searched with keywords. Search engines then display snippets of the original site content in response to a user’s search.

In the last few years, and due to the advent of the Google Adsense web advertising program, scraper sites have proliferated at an amazing rate for spamming search engines.[1] Open content sites such as Wikipedia are a common source of material for scraper sites.

 

Here is a great definition and article from Techtarget

Now you know when you are bothered by keying in those funny looking words when you go on some sites? Especially if you go to the RSS via Feedburner? Well, I finally appreciate it. It is called CAPTCHA It is one of the good guys because it attempts to catch those nasty splogs.

IPA: /?kæpt??/) is a type of challenge-response test used in computing to ensure that the response is not generated by a computer. The process usually involves one computer (a server) asking a user to complete a simple test which the computer is able to generate and grade. Because other computers are unable to solve the CAPTCHA, any user entering a correct solution is presumed to be human. (Wikipedia)

Some suggest that Google may benefit from sploggers….

A recent blog posted about the possibility of some political blogs that were splogs.

Finally, my sanity solution is to know that splogs can be reported. You know clicking on that flag in blogger or reporting to google. Perhaps more but something can  be done. I did not know when I first started blogging and became upset when I saw  it from a google alert on my articles but now I do.  Read this post from lorelle.wordpress on helping to clean up splogs.

Can anyone suggests plug-ins that can help protect our blogs?

Oops, almost neglected to put a category on this post, when you see posts without categories they can smell like a splog.

Layoffs for Baby Boomers-Can They Be a Good Thing?-Guest Blogger Jim Armstrong

Layoffs and Baby Boomers is the focus of a post by guest author-James Armstrong. Read this cutting edge article below. After you read it think about how if you or anyone you know is laid off how they can use blogging in their transition phase.

Rosie 

Turning a Layoff into Success by James O. Armstrong

Baby boomers are probably disadvantaged by being older. While our society, in both the U.S. and Canada, is largely beyond the point of discrimination by race, gender, nationality or religious preference, for example, I do believe there is an age-based discrimination that has continued among some companies. I deplore this situation and consider it to be something that we will get beyond principally based on supply and demand factors in the future.

Typically, companies tend to focus on older employees from the standpoint of downsizing or rightsizing formulas. Oftentimes, the formula focuses on your age and years of service, which in effect is a double weighting on age. So, someone who is 52, 55 or 61 years old winds up being out of a job.

Professional HR departments in companies cannot admit publicly that by lowering their average age, they lower both their overall payroll and fringe benefit costs. In the United States, this factor especially relates to the total healthcare costs because as we get older, we tend to use doctors, hospitals, medical tests, prescriptions and dentists more frequently.

Begin to make plans today

If you anticipate that there will be a reorganization in your company, you should begin to make plans today. Of course, one of those strategies for moving forward might involve going back to school to get more education or more training so that you can become more employable in the future.

If you are downsized, never give up

The first objective is this: “Don’t give up!” You must stay in the game. So, interact with friends, neighbors, colleagues plus men and women at your church or civic organization, such as your local chamber of commerce. Don’t be afraid to ask for some help in this process.

The Bible puts it like this: “You have not because you ask not.” So we do want to let people know. And as a professional sales and marketing executive most of my life, it has been stressed over and over again in seminars, where I have received training in my craft: “Ask for the business.”

Fear can immobilize us. But the opposite of fear is taking action that’s appropriate to the circumstance, which might include going back and getting more education or training. On the other hand, it certainly does involve networking with your friends, relatives, neighbors and people in your company or industry.

You must begin to go forward — by developing your resume, making appropriate phone calls, networking, meeting with individuals in person, and simply asking men and women if they have jobs for someone with your unique background and skills.

You must hang in there and not give up. The highlight of former Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s most famous speech goes like this: “Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never — in nothing, great or small, large or petty — never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense.” (Source: October 29, 1941 address at Harrow School, located in Harrow on the Hill, England.)

Finally, please remember that for every $10,000 of income that you expect or anticipate in your next job, you should expect to invest one week to six weeks of effort. In other words, the higher your income has been in the past, the more time you can expect to put into this effort on a full-time basis in order to achieve your desired outcome, as you go forward.

James O. Armstrong, who is President of NowWhatJobs.net, Inc., http://www.nowwhatjobs.net, also serves as the Editor of NowWhatJobs.net. In addition, he is the author of “Now What: Discovering Your New Life And Career After 50” and the President of James Armstrong & Associates, Inc., which is a media representation firm based in Suburban Chicago.
Article Source: Articles for Boomers

Domain Name Ideas Can Be Stolen

Ray and I had just returned from our morning walk. We had a great product idea and wanted to search to see if the domain name we discussed was available for purchase. The blood was circulating to our brains from our robust walk and we were excited about the catchy domain name. We went to our office downstairs and promptly keyed in the domain name idea into our Internet browser.

The search showed that no domain name existed. So we went to a registrar to lock in the name. We were ready with credit card in hand.

We could not believe that the domain name was available as a .com. WOW!

But then we had second thoughts. “Why not wait until we had breakfast and discuss it further.

It didn’t take long to eat our oatmeal. As we further discussed the product idea we started mapping out an operational plan. Ah, yes, one of the tasks was to get the domain name that would brand the product.

We ran back downstairs, careful not to fall, as we hustled to our computer. We decided to register the name. We were stunned and stared at the computer screen at the message glaring in front of our eyes. “UNAVAILABLE” The domain name was purchased soon after we searched for it in our browser address line.

Was it magic? We looked around the office to see if there were hidden listening devices. How did they know? What was happening.

THE DOMAIN NAME WAS NO LONGER AVAILABLE. But how could that be we wondered. Later we found out that searching for a domain name in the Internet browser is a NO NO!

So tonight we wanted to share this tid bit with you. Search for the availability of a domain name in a well known registrar like
www.godaddy.com
and places like domaintools Stay away from searches in your Internet browser or search engine search boxes.

Has this ever happened to you?

Ray and Rosie

Social Bookmarking vs Social Networking

Social bookmarking is different from social networking. I got a really clear explanation of this recently. Yet, I have subscribed to many sites that belong in both categories and did not have a full grasp of the difference between the two of them.

Ok, this is my explanation:

Both are part of Web 2.0. However, social bookmarking is like choosing things to go into your favorites to go to later. Except there is a wide internet world that can see the sites you have chosen.

Whereas, social networking is like visiting sites you want to hang out in and play, visit, learn and share information with others in the world wide web who have silmilar interests.

An example of a social networking site is Twitter An example of a social bookmarking site is Delicious.

Also, see and enjoy an earlier post on Twitter. 

Here is a great, easy to understand video from Common Craft on Social Bookmarking.

Blog Comments Can Curve Your Common Errors

Blog comments can really help you grow in your blogging experience. Good comments can not only encourage you but cut down your blogging errors. Ok, what am I talking about. Well, if you look at the comment on the last post you will notice that the blogger was kind enough to let me know I made a mistake in the link for his site.

Now of course this is helpful for him to get the link right but it is also helpful for me. The great thing about blogging is I was able to correct it simply by going to the manage section of my blog and clicking on the edit button.

Note also that if I had not decided to visit my blog and post today I would not have seen the comment. So, the morale of this tale is to post often, learn from your mistakes, quickly correct them and keep encouraging comments, good or bad, from your readers.

Rosie

PS ALWAYS CHECK YOUR LINKS BEFORE YOU GO TO BED!