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Should We Retaliate and No-Follow Wikipedia?
Went Hot: November 22, 2007 - 5:29 am
Posted By: HamletBatista 291 days ago
Topic Type: Discussion
Category: Google SEO
There are SEOs on both sides of the fence. and there is a Wordpress plugin to do what Rand suggests. See http://whatjapanthinks.com/wikipedia-nofollow/
What do you think?
20 Comments
Comments
Wikipedia uses nofollow because there are so many people trying to game the system for their own benefit. Does that mean we should take revenge?
Wikipedia is a great resource that offers some of the best content on the web for a whole sleuth of topics. Sure, I'm annoyed that Google ranks Wikipedia for almost anything and everything, but that doesn't mean they don't deserve the position.
Put yourself in a user's shoes - someone who knows nothing about SEO or search marketing. I would actually find a lot of the Wikipedia entries relevant and useful.
I nofollow links to sites that don't need any more link juice. Wikipedia is one of those sites. I like Wikipedia, but it doesn't need my help ranking any higher.
gyutate - I am inclined to think the same way. I have to believe there are many entries where manipulation doesn't take place. Maybe it is only a very small portion that gets affected.
Wikipedia doesn't contain any original research. I credit them in the same way they credit their sources. If I didn't use nofollow, the original sources would have even less chance of becoming visible in the SERPs.
That's good and I'm surprised it hasn't come up before. How long would it take to make a difference though?
"Wikipedia doesn't contain any original research."
You raise a good point Andy, but neither does Sphinn. Yet some bloggers are now linking to Sphinn instead of original blog posts. I'm not just talking about cases where someone links to a comment. So blog authors get second-hand juice from a link on a /story/ page instead of getting direct citations. Should we then start nofollowing links to Sphinn story pages and demand people comment on a blog post instead of commenting on a story page?
"Yet some bloggers are now linking to Sphinn instead of original blog posts."
This is a very interesting discussion.
I think the same can be said of some A-list bloggers that prefer to link to their friends when they are simply citing a story by a lesser known blogger, instead of linking directly to the source. ;-)
It's a simple equation, really, isn't it? If people don't credit you with being "trusted" by nofollowing their links, why shouldn't you return the favor?
And while I personally find Wikipedia mildly useful (though certainly no more than that) for some quick and dirty trivial lookups, if all they're capable of doing by way of spam prevention is using this silly nofollow tag, so be it, no linklove from my blogs. Not that they need any more of that in the first place, seeing how Google's opted for the cheapest way out by pushing them above the fold left, right and center.
And considering Rand's recent post on their "dark side", who knows: you might actually catch yourself a "bad neighborhood" penalty if you don't use a link condom when pointing to them LOL.
I always struggle with this, because I feel like linking back to Wikipedia just solidify their grip on Google. But in the end, I figure if they had good content, they deserve the link. I have to confess, though, I sometimes don't give them anchor text love with the link, figuring they've got enough already.
It depends why you are linking to them, is it laziness because you can't take the time to find a good resource or just because they are geniunely the best page?
I think Mike Grehan article Filthy Linking Rich applies here. They keep getting so many links because they show up first for most research searches. A small portion of us no-folowing them will not make a difference.
@HalfDeck
You have a good point, except for one thing. We gain a lot more from sphinn. It allows us to gather TARGETTED readers, many of who will refer to us in their own posts, giving us link juice that way. Wikipedia only does so in the form of the low-PRm low-traffic clones that exist everywhere, and (gasp) rank lower than wikipedia anyways, making the information redundant.
We should all be ready to link to Wikia's new search engine. Make it popular enough that it cuts in to just a fraction of searches at Google and Google may dial down the trust on the Wikipedia site. Is that a little too conspiratorial for Thanksgiving? :-)
The thing is, if you're linking to Wikipedia as a resource, then surely they deserve the link love due to both quality and relevance? Otherwise, you'd be looking elsewhere and giving the link love to somone else.
With Sphinn there is also a very important difference... currently Sphinn gives juice back.
When I link to a story on Sphinn, it is generally because there is specific discussion but most of the time Sphinn itself is a very useful way to grab a few relevant stories to a quick post and it doesn't take any longer to be able to link directly.
If you don't link directly, no one will notice your link, and even a link to a root domain is very easily missed.
Even terms I rank for which don't bring any real traffic such as niche marketing, Wikipedia's stub for niche market is in the top spot. It doesn't contain a lot of content, but at the end of the day it does give people more clue than if I had the top spot for my home page as it is currently presented.
Could I knock them off top spot? Yes, especially as I know a lot of people who have linked to that definition and I could easily create a well optimized landing page.
That being said, I don't think that Wikipedia is good enough to be "locked into" that top position, and if someone comes up with a much better alternative, they deserve a chance of beating Wikipedia for the SERP.
I don't mind Wikipedia ranking for stuff if there really isn't anything better online available.
One of these days someone will create a stub for Make Money Onine to really annoy lots of bloggers ;)
Say somebody put a link to my site in wikipedia. They did so deliberately, yet wiki still says that's untrusted and nofollows even though the link was put there by a human (which in Google's twisted suggested use of nofollow should make the link OK).
All they're doing is consolidating their position at the expense of the site's they're leeching from for their content. I find that distasteful enough that I removed any links from my site as well as any contributions I'd made. And yes, I actually have sites that contain unique historical source content that they can't get anywhere else. Nothing for me, nothing for you.
Find some way to derail the web spammers without penalizing everyone. (that's in addition to all the other problems they have like the ongoing spats about what 'notable' means.)
Say somebody put a link to my site in wikipedia. They did so deliberately, yet wiki still says that's untrusted and nofollows even though the link was put there by a human (which in Google's twisted suggested use of nofollow should make the link OK).
I'm afraid it's a case of the minority spoiling it for the majority. It's definitely not as simple as saying "someone put it there, so they must have had good intentions".
I was happy to nofollow all wiipedia links.
http://whatjapanthinks.com/wikipedia-nofollow/
Oh how we all attack google in some posts then play the game of no-follow in others in the hopes of somehow hurting others who also play the game. Then there are those of you who love to point out to google who is violating their rules in the hopes of not getting another pr hit yourselves.
Does anyone here ever look at history. For some of you maybe you can see through all of the bullcrap. Maybe the Matrix analogy is better. How many here would report NEO to get more financial gain, knowing that the matrix exists.
In the same token why is everyone playing the game to begin with?
What I meant by history in this discussion is Google can indeed drop your site at will. By feeding whatever Dpartment at Google more targets in the reports to google or articles saying what about this site or that, it reminds me of a quote I posted on Andy Beard's site.
Winston Churchill said
"An appeaser is one who feeds the crocodile hoping it will eat him last."
Let's see, what site can I no follow now, or perhaps report to google. I think staying in the google matrix and throwing no-follow's all over the place only enhances Google's pagerank system that I see most people here on Sphinn rail against.
Fight the power, as they used to say. Tune out of the whole debate until something better arrives, which in internet time will arrive sometime next year most likely. (Yes I have a crystal ball). Will those of you know the alternative to pagerank when you see it?
Agree with HamletBatista that this is an interesting discussion.
But for a different reason.
The real problem isn't even being discussed. It's how to squash those who game the system. Everything else that's come up is only made more visible by all the reactions. Personally, I don't think they should be squashed because their activities have created an industry that has put food on more tables than just their own.
Just like the prison industry and policemen need criminals and anti-virus needs virii.
Everything being discussed here, while interesting, is merely a cul-de-sac of fallout from the original sin.
See: Wikipedia: Google's Anna Nicole Smith