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- Sphinn It!
Went Hot: April 23, 2008 - 11:53 am
Posted By: SlightlyShadySEO 24 days ago
Topic Type: News Story (Jump to http://www.slightlyshadyseo.com)
Category: Other Online Marketing
Say it with me folks.
"I will not buy a conference pass that will ‘allow’ me to see Jason speak. It’s not just that I won’t attend him speaking. I will not actually purchase a ticket that would even make it possible."
39 Comments
Comments
sphunn because calacanis is a douche and mahalo is worthless
damn straight... I'm not going to any more conferences where this guy or Kris Jones from pepperjam have keynotes.
I like it how Calacanis always talks about providing his users with value, yet every conference he speaks at he provides zero value and just pumps up his own products.
It's kinda like I am watching a gunthy runker commercial when I see him talk.
I'll join that pledge, I won't buy a ticket to another Calaconference either.
I'm planting a wooden sign in this thread: Don't Feed the Trolls!
Not feeding them DarkMatter. If enough people say they will not attend conferences where he is speaking, maybe people will take some notice. It's not sitting there quietly, but it's not just feeding. It's trying to DO something.
SPUN!
All you are doing here is feeding the ego. Stop please.
hey atleast he can Sphinn his own shit
@jason: The constructiveness of that reply truly boggles the mind.
i don't think so. It's good to have a variety of opinions represented. Besides, this is a social media conference and he was being transparent with his views/opinions of SEO. SEO was discussed too much at this conference anyway. My two cents.
I actually think it's good to throw a douchebag into the mix, every now and then. It sparks some interesting conversation and fuels fresh thoughts...
sure but not at EVERY conference
@Britopian: I'm not arguing that multiple views shouldn't be represented. But he's not even in the profession he's speaking about! Doug Heil would be a plenty "different" view from most. VERY similar to Jason. Just not whoring out his product.
I agree that we should keep a good mix of people in the panel. Just for the sake of understanding who is on what side.
I'm all for the good mix. Shameless self-promo will always be prevalent, can't help that. One-sided conferences are worse than some people feeling slighted in my opinion. Be better than that and read the blog post that's titled Conference Douche Bags (forgot where I saw it).
@ajax: But that's the thing. We CAN prevent that. At least prevent 20+ minute tangents about it. Mention it in passing? Aight. But not this bullcrap.
Having a site with a strategy around search, should Jason be throwing stones at black hats? But don't forget, he helped PayPerPost get banned by Google just by calling them out, no SEO tricks. Social media strategy/white hat/creating real value for people is less of an arms race then back hat SEO. Mahalo is just a good way to demonstrate successful non-black hat SEO strategy, along with using social media, trust, etc. While black hats are always trying to subvert the system, people like Jason are forward thinkers for stakeholders for Google, Yahoo, etc who need to fight spam. Jason is the ultimate white hat.
@nsputnik: can you explain then, why mahalo is more spammy than google, yahoo, and msn combined? can you explain why is "search engine" pages are indexed in other search engines? can you explain why nonexistant pages on maholo give no content but serve adsense arbitrage pages instead? Many pages with no unique content and no value to any user with the goal of generating more traffic and revenue?
Ultimate whitehat...puhhhleeeaseeeee.
nsputnik: the ultimate whitehat... i like that! :-)
Huh? Whats all the yelling about?
You pulled me from my slumber for this?
solution - don't ban Jason from conferences, instead just stop using and promoting his projects if you feel that strongly. duh...
Like him, hate him, who cares? I don't recall anyone asking. If you rally the troops to cut off his free speech, or carry on the personal attacks, you're going to open a whole new can of worms anyway. I hate worms.
I need more ZZZ's now - shhhhh
"he provides zero value and just pumps up his own products."
The ultimate irony is to read that on a site that caters to spammers.
@screwTheMan: How does what I myself do even touch on the points there? That was written from a general perspective. Not blackhat at all.
What Jason does or doesn't do with Mahalo will really hardly effect any business I'm in. I have very little direct interest, other than the fact I think there are more qualified, better speakers who are goign to concentrate on at least a little more than self promotion.
This all is very ridiculous to me. I'm sorry, but who cares what Calacanis says about SEO. Sure, it might not be a good idea to invite him to SMX if the audience dislikes his speaking - that's just common sense for those who run the show. But why everyone is up in arms over his comments I just don't know. In my opinion, this guy couldn't matter less to me and my daily life. Sure, I know who he is, I know what he's done. He's not exactly the least successful guy I can think of. So he's got some volatile things to say about SEO. I have worked at a few agencies, and honestly all I've seen is the worst in people selling SEO services. So he's not way off base in bad-mouthing SEOs. There are a lot of dishonest people selling it out there. That's why I appreciate those of us who do honest work for our clients and strive to get them results. Those of us who make money performing SEO on our own properties - well, your income should tell you just how full of crap this guy is, and his opnion shouldn't matter.
Jason's recommendation to focus on creating valuable content is right on the money. But is SEO just "spinning your wheels?" Absolutely not. I've seen technicial revisions at a site for SEO purposes increase organic traffic by 75% virtually overnight with not a single change to content. We all know SEO is valuable, crucial even, so why get angry because someone says otherwise? Seems to me we all should stop worrying about this and get back to work finding ways to create real value for our clients - and prove it to them. Or get back to building up our own properties and growing our income.
@nickycakes
Show me a nonexistent page that ranks high in search, or even shows up in natural search. I would not call Mahalo a search engine.
If Google decides through its algorithm that a Mahalo page deserves to rank high on a search result page, he must be doing something right.
I think what you are defining as value is just an opinion. Again, the search engines decide value.
Black/gray hat SEO is like a sport. It deliver value to their clients despite the ability to create the greatest value for possible search users. White hat and social media strategy deliver value to their clients, the client's potential customers (can happen completely outside of search), and search users.
Besides, don't you think it is important to know what your "enemy" is thinking? You need to know what you are up against, and listing to Jason is the best way.
I'll cross post:
http://sphinn.com/story/42262
http://sphinn.com/story/42285
People tend to think that Jason speaks at all the same conferences on all the same things -- and they fixate on his anti-SEO comments the most. I'll recap the shows I've had him speak at and why.
SES Chicago 2006: When I booked Jason, he was heading Netscape, which had grabbed some attention as a Digg rival. Plus, he's been an interesting character with a long history on the web overall. I think this was the first SEO show he did on his own (I think he was on an AdSense panel at a previous SES, along with others -- and since he ran a major site earning off of AdSense, good sense -- no pun -- for him to be there). At SES Chicago, we did get into his SEO attitude which was a hot button and remains, in my view, a product of his misconception (either intentional or accidental) that SEO = gaming.
SMX Social Media 2008: Jason heads Mahalo, a major human-powered search engine doing interesting things. There's a social aspect to it, and for search marketers wnating to understand how social and search might intersect, he's a front line guy with important things to say and learn from. As was the same for Jimmy Wales on that panel, as too for Steven Marder from Eurekster. The bulk of that panel was about social and search, not "oh, SEOs suck."
Those are shows I'm responsible for, and I totally feel Jason being involved added value. Jason also spoke at SES Local 2008 and SES NY 2008. I'm not up on what he covered in those sessions and how they differed from the roles he was doing as part of the shows I was responsible for. I was no longer programming SES at those times.
As for yesterday, when Jason talked again about SEO and issues with it, I then countered to him saying that SEO does not equal gaming -- that SEO equals understanding how search engines gather information and taking steps to make your content visible with it. And for Mahalo, that means engaging in a dialog with the editors, suggesting links and so on. And Jason agreed that SEO as defined like that is totally accceptable and should be encouraged. As did Jimmy Wales.
Sadly, Lisa Barone who was live blogging all this got very ill and missed this important discussion. And Rand, who defends the right for others to hear what Jason says would have heard it too if he hadn't walked out in apparent disgust. By walking out, he also missed hearing other things about how social might change search.
You don't have to like people or agree with them. Matt Cutts is fairly well loved but not all SEOs like him or agree with his views on SEO or how say, links should be policed. So do you ban Matt from speaking? Do you plug your ears and refuse to hear what he says? Either of those lead to less knowledge, not more.
Matt Cutts loves Jason, and this is why what he says is important to SEOs. If you don't like what Jason says, it is only a matter of time before Matt Cutts comes for you and your page rank! ;)
@nsputnik"I would not call Mahalo a search engine."
you might not, but calacanis would - "Human powered search" in fact, which tends to mean the site is full of "search results." Wouldn't blocking the whole site via robots.txt be the responsible thing to do? ;)
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/search-results-in-search-results/
@nsputnik: That's the weakest argument I've ever heard. Matt Cutts also loves his wife and I'm sure a whole bunch of other people too, including some web devs/designers/"SEO"s who don't get search. Actually, I remember Matt loving his cat(s) too... That doesn't make any of them important.
And coming for someone's PageRank ... wow. I dunno if I voted that down because it was so silly or pointless or what . Nothing personal, but I thought that was a really value-removed comment.
@ Danny - good defence of your programming. That all being said, you might want to consider Shady, Diorex and some others (Seth Godin? Clayton Makepeace?) for keynotes...
My last comment was supposed to be tongue-and-cheek, hence the ;) My point is that Matt would support all of Jason's arguments (maybe not the tone), that it is about adding relevance and value to search users over and above site owners. Yes, Matt coming after your page rank is silly, but there is some truth. Google changes their algorithm occasionally to deal with new exploits they don't like, right?
Every bus needs a clown, but please don't let the clown drive the bus.
It wasn't the "SEO'ing is spinning your wheels" or the "This entire room is going to have to find a new job soon" that got me. It was the naivity of this guy to come say that google results are all completely garbage and his are 100% spam-free and will always be that way. Mahalo may be a great system, but if there's money to be made in gaming it, spammers will find a way. I don't think we'll ever see a 100% spam-free search engine. But I guess it's OK to dream.
OH er, I feel like a dumbass for missing that. My bad, nsputnik (being serious here, though I know it's hard to tell tone in text).
Sadly, we've done nothing in these threads but prove that we can be gamed by this guy. 2 front page stories each with tons of sphinns and comments....
the fiddle....doesn't seem like an instrument that is too hard to learn to play?
Greetings gronk.
Once again, I'm not just bitching about Jason in this article. If I was the "fiddle" shoemoney so eloquently said was being played would actually apply.
This is instead trying to reach out to the people organizing the conferences, explaining WHY Jason should not be hired, and how they can get the same buzz, without him.
@ Danny Sullivan: "SEO does not equal gaming... SEO equals understanding how search engines gather information and taking steps to make your content visible with it."
After the first time you told him and he still didn't get it, didn't you kinda wonder what's wrong with the man?
@Shady, the way to get the same buzz is to announce a day-long panel discussion on "Why Calacanis Sucks." Not quite as dignified as actually talking to someone who has some interesting perspectives (Jason), not quite as useful, but I'm sure it would pull an audience.
@DanTheis
lol, I'd sit in on that one over a boxed lunch!
I'd rather see a debate between Calacanis and an SEO than a keynote by him at conferences. That would be more interesting anyway. It could be a Lincoln-Douglas style debate with no moderator. After the debate is over, there could be the usual Q and A and people could go online and vote for who the winner is. There's more of a realistic chance of this happening than people boycotting the conferences because he's there.
The entertainment element of this would be even more heightened than his usual speeches. What do you think of this idea, Danny?