The past two days have been trying. The next few are likely to be trying as well. Trying, as in the spammers are trying to get some backlink juice by deluging Simple Justice with comments, and trying, as in I’m trying to stop them.
Despite my belief that I’ve come to have a relatively firm grasp on how this blogging stuff works, I continue to learn. Note to new bloggers: There’s more to it than the marketers tell you. Over the past two days, I’ve learned how those who have come to the internet solely for their personal financial gain couldn’t care less about the damage they cause, like locusts on a corn field, and believe that they are entitled to take whatever they can get if it inures to their benefit.
The rationale is stunning, both in its simplicity and its arrogance. The source of my education, Angela, stopped by to argue her point :
It’s a variation on a theme, just like the blawg scrapers and the legal marketers. How is it wrong? Because it’s a lie, a fraud, a deception, an abuse of trust. If there is anything I stand for, it’s integrity. This isn’t the most popular notion these days, both in general and on the internet in particular. Everybody’s trying to find a way to game the system, justifying it as a way of making a buck as if financial gain trumps integrity. “But it’s good for me,” seems enough of an explanation to justify anything.
I apologize to the subscribers of Simple Justice comments who have been forced to endure this deluge of crap. Many have emailed me to urge me to use “no follow” in my comment links, and thus eliminate the purpose of our newfound friends. Unfortunately, my blogging program is so archaic that it won’t allow that option. I’ve asked GoDaddy to add it, and maybe they will. Some day.
But frankly, I’m not inclined to deny those who come here to legitimately comment from having a little link love. Helping real commenters to gain some recognition is fine by me, and to let these self-serving fools ruin it for everyone is a little like letting the terrorists win. Why should real readers and commenters suffer because of these scum?
In the meantime, I’m left to delete the hundreds and hundreds of comments left by Angela’s customers, some of whom have fought hard to pretend they weren’t backlinkers, going to great lengths to try to perpetrate their fraud. Don’t fall for it. The nature of liars is that they lie. But this takes a great deal of time, and eats up the time I would otherwise spend writing posts.
Hopefully, the scum will go away soon, once they realize that the scam won’t work here. Until then, I beg your indulgence and will keep my finger on the delete button.
Despite my belief that I’ve come to have a relatively firm grasp on how this blogging stuff works, I continue to learn. Note to new bloggers: There’s more to it than the marketers tell you. Over the past two days, I’ve learned how those who have come to the internet solely for their personal financial gain couldn’t care less about the damage they cause, like locusts on a corn field, and believe that they are entitled to take whatever they can get if it inures to their benefit.
The rationale is stunning, both in its simplicity and its arrogance. The source of my education, Angela, stopped by to argue her point :
Yeah, I think putting lists of links to sales sites in the middle of conversations is spammy, but I don’t see how using the blog’s “link set up” exactly the way it’s supposed to be used is “spam”. Is it “spam” SIMPLY because it benefits the commenter’s website? Who makes up the “spam rules” and decides what is and isn’t spam? What about a comment that benefits the website that the comment is on? Is that “spam” if the commenter used the URL set up that the blog allows? If the blog doesn’t want people linking to their sites, it’s easy to remove the URL feature.So you see, she’s doing me a favor. No, I didn’t ask her to do me a favor, but she’s such a great gal that she’s doing it for me anyway. “How is that wrong?”
I’ve had folks who are in my program find sites like this one that they LOVE and that they continue to participate on; I have brought traffic to many sites. How is that wrong? I LOVE sites about legal stuff, myself, so this blog truly interests me. I know I am not alone.
It’s a variation on a theme, just like the blawg scrapers and the legal marketers. How is it wrong? Because it’s a lie, a fraud, a deception, an abuse of trust. If there is anything I stand for, it’s integrity. This isn’t the most popular notion these days, both in general and on the internet in particular. Everybody’s trying to find a way to game the system, justifying it as a way of making a buck as if financial gain trumps integrity. “But it’s good for me,” seems enough of an explanation to justify anything.
I apologize to the subscribers of Simple Justice comments who have been forced to endure this deluge of crap. Many have emailed me to urge me to use “no follow” in my comment links, and thus eliminate the purpose of our newfound friends. Unfortunately, my blogging program is so archaic that it won’t allow that option. I’ve asked GoDaddy to add it, and maybe they will. Some day.
But frankly, I’m not inclined to deny those who come here to legitimately comment from having a little link love. Helping real commenters to gain some recognition is fine by me, and to let these self-serving fools ruin it for everyone is a little like letting the terrorists win. Why should real readers and commenters suffer because of these scum?
In the meantime, I’m left to delete the hundreds and hundreds of comments left by Angela’s customers, some of whom have fought hard to pretend they weren’t backlinkers, going to great lengths to try to perpetrate their fraud. Don’t fall for it. The nature of liars is that they lie. But this takes a great deal of time, and eats up the time I would otherwise spend writing posts.
Hopefully, the scum will go away soon, once they realize that the scam won’t work here. Until then, I beg your indulgence and will keep my finger on the delete button.
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Good for you Scott, don’t let the scammy buggers get you down.
I’ve got the same problem; it really is an unethical, lying bunch who can’t even tell when they’re lying. (Hint: it’s when their fingers are typing.) It is very much about trust.
My solution is the same as yours; dance quickly to stay ahead of them. Sometimes it’s depressing, but I appreciate your continued effort to put it out there for all.
Thanks Chuck. Staying one-delete-button-push ahead of them is a lot of work.
As Charlie said don’t let them get you down. It’s just one more way that marketers try to ineffectively squeeze in their message.
Among the pile of mail the post-gal drops off, there is a bill or interesting letter. The majority is just silly catalogs, credit card offers and other useless detrius. The phone rings with telemarketers and political campaigns. The television is full of ads for Cialis.
And the blog comments fill up with links for useless drugs, instant wealth ans SEOs.
Some days I get lucky and get some off-the-wall blog spam that amuses me. Today it was a few hundred question marks with embedded links. They spent way more time shoveling in that crap than it takes for me to delete.
Although I would still like to have that time back.
You want time back? Try waking up to a few hundred comments and having to figure out which are real and which are spam. If they were the typical spam, it’s easy, but this high quality spam is far harder to figure out. Angela’s spam is good, sucking all the more time out of my day to make it go away.
Here’s a choice quote from a blog post entitled “In Defense of the First Amendment (and reluctantly, Spam”:
“Bottom line: we in Public Relations have a duty to our clients and to ourselves to fight to maintain a broad interpretation of that First Amendment freedom to speak (via emails, faxes, Bizwire, phone calls, mass mailings, etc.) – without that, we’re out of business.”
Feel free to forward your spam comments to .
Inasmuch as you’re one hockey puck short of American, I’ll forgive your reliance on the First Amendmet (of which I am a great supporter) to note that there’s no such right involved here. Freedom of speech protects against limitation by the government. I am many things, but government I am not.
I do, on the other hand, appreciate your suggestion that all spam be forwarded to Barnett on PR. An excellent idea.
I think you’re experiencing cognitive dissonance when it comes to the First Amendment. As I told you before, I was referring to spam as commercial free speech: see and ACLU, Anti-Spam Laws, and the First Amendment: (via )
BTW, the anti-Canadian epithets are quite amusing, but if you took the time to find out more, I’m Croatian-Canadian and have dual citizenship. The Croatian half could care less, and the Canadian half forgives you.
I experience cognitive dissonance a lot. I’m considering a 12 step program, but I keep walking in circles.
I got the message, but I’m trying to distinguish between laws against spam (which I am largely against) and spam itself (which I am entirely against). As for your thin Canadian skin, it’s like New York and New Jersey, all in good fun. On the other hand, now that I know you’re half Croatian, I fear you and will never mention your love of curling again.
It’s all in good fun. My epidermal layer is well-calloused and my ego remains epic in scale. BTW, Canada’s anti-spam effort, the Electronic Commerce Protection Act (aka Anti-Spam Bill) is back on the legislative agenda, following the Harper government’s 2 month vacation, er, I mean prorogation of Parliament.
P.S. I only love basketball, but I tolerate curling, insofar as my Canadian citizenship would otherwise be revoked.
Cheers,
AIP
Whew. That’s better. So you probably won’t mind this video.
Good Blog with good articles.
Wait! So the First Amendment gives me the right to post whatever I want on blogs, and gives bloggers the obligation to leave it up?
Awesome! I’m going to go prepare my 142-post series on how spectacular I am, and start posting it here. SHG, don’t you dare delete even one! I’ll sue you! I KNOW MARC RANDAZZA!!!!
Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Now that you left that comment, I’m dying to buy a dashboard from you. Got one for a ’64 Healey?
Would you like to take my house and car too? Hey, did I mention I have a daughter?
Weird Al is a musical genius. It must be his Yugoslav-American heritage (although I thought he described himself as “Serbian-American”).
“Spamalot.” I just got it. I’m so slow.
I am sorry about your trouble. Geez. You know how people are about money and that’s all this is about. Wherever it is. Geez.
“How is it wrong? Because it’s a lie, a fraud, a deception, an abuse of trust. If there is anything I stand for, it’s integrity. This isn’t the most popular notion these days, both in general and on the internet in particular. Everybody’s trying to find a way to game the system, justifying it as a way of making a buck as if financial gain trumps integrity. “But it’s good for me,” seems enough of an explanation to justify anything.”
Your blog allows a spot for people’s websites. It does NOT ask folks to defend WHY they are putting their website into the allowed spot. There are many reasons people do this; backlinks has been one of those reasons for many years. If you don’t clarify that people can ONLY put their website into the slot if it does NOT benefit them in any way to do it, then how can you call it “fraud”? You don’t ask motivation, nor do you have any TOS that explains what the motivation can and can’t be, so how can wanting a backlink be a “deception”? Who are we “deceiving”?
Back when I was a teen, I remember reading the Dear Abby column (the “blog” of the day; I’m old, lol). Folks would often ask her about meeting people of the opposite gender for a committed relationship. She would advise them to start going to church. So, the motivation for beginning to go to church is meeting someone who could be a “significant other” and not “worshiping God”. Does that make it deceptive? What if the person adds something to the church and gets something out of the actual services? Are they a “fraud” and a “deceiver” because they started going there to find a mate?
I haven’t been to a church yet that has a questionnaire asking WHY you are coming to that church. ;-D
You keep calling it “high quality spam” meaning that folks really ARE leaving good comments and the ONLY thing you don’t like about it is that the URLs lead to pages that folks want a backlink to. So back to my original argument: If you don’t clarify what the motivation MUST BE for people to leave put their website into the “website box” that your blog allows, how can you get so defensive about it?
You truly don’t get the concept of honesty, do you? That there’s a box to input a URL is no more an invitation for abuse than that there’s a front door is an invitation to enter and steal. You are a scary sick woman.
Fascinating story. And yet, your point remains as wrong and idiotic as before. The absence of a big red sign saying don’t do something is neither an invitation to do it nor an indication that anything goes. Normal people would assume appropriate conduct. Mercenary scum take advantage of it. Give it up and go already.
Hey, hey Scott!
Your last name is not Brown.
Poor girl.
Ya I agree it is a fascinating story. I hope that i can read more stories like that
Scott, I just find it hilarious that the previous comment by “Janelee” is for “her” website: howtogetyourexloveback.com
Priceless.
I was about to delete her post, but then I left it (sans link) because of yours. Priceless.
If someone reads a post and leaves a comment that adds to the conversation, how have they hurt you? Have they stolen anything from you? Does it really matter if it is the only time they ever visit your blog? Or do only regular visitors deserve the link? Is it abuse to add to the conversation (& get a link for your time?)
I agree that comments like “Nice post. I like it.” that add nothing to the conversation should be deleted with extreme prejudice. The people that leave crap comments without even reading the article are the ones who waste (steal) your time. (Aside: My favorite spam comment that I have received on my blog said, “I have downloaded and seen your attachment……” I’m not sure what that’s supposed to mean.)
This is something I struggled with when I decided to remove the “NoFollow” tags from the comments on my blog. I want visitors and comments (relevant ones) on my blog. Even if that’s the only reason they went to my blog in the first place. Hopefully after reading a post or two they’ll want to come back. People that find my blog via a list of “DoFollow” blogs or are customers of people like Angela may never have found my blog otherwise. Some of them do stick around. I feel like win by getting the traffic.
Granted, you probably have different goals for this blog than I do for mine, and so it’s understandable if you don’t want any drive by commenters.
Does it really matter? Absolutely. This is a law blog, with many regular readers and commenters. They are due better than “high quality spam.” Most are lawyers and law students, and the contributions of fishmongers may be of a higher caliber than the typical Bangalore trash, but is beneath the caliber of discussion normally had here. Even more important, they deserve to know that they are having a conversation with someone in earnest, not someone who leaves a comment for the backlink.
But the really short answer is that I don’t want it and won’t allow it. This isn’t a subject of debate, and every comment I deem spam will be deleted. Neither Angela nor her minions need agree. As I said, this isn’t a democracy and the only vote that counts is mine.
I’ve done really well with akismet.com spam software. I believe it’s free. Time-saving, life-changing experience, getting this software.
Thanks, Amy, but I fear that this isn’t the sort of spam that a program can make go away. This will take good, old fashioned deleting.
I think what’s striking, and a word I haven’t seen thrown around here yet, about this is the sense of entitlement people have.
Maybe because I’m old enough (barely) to remember “No Shirt, No Service”, I respect the proprietor’s right to thrown someone on their ass (and out the door) for whatever reason suits them. Maybe it’s bad for business, maybe the old guy doesn’t like hippies – but it’s his store…
It’s as though people are arguing that they should be allowed to come into your Dunkin Donuts franchise and pass out Starbucks coupons just because you’re open for business and the door is unlocked.
Worse, it’s like they’re coming into your house (since this is not a “firm” blog set up in the hopes of commerce) and demanding that they be allowed to sell your guests life insurance. It’s cheesy, it’s amateur-hour and you have the absolute right to deny them entry (or thrown them on their ass if they get past the front door). I can’t fathom how they think otherwise – and maybe I shouldn’t try.
That said, I put my website up with my name because I want readers of this site, who think I might be interesting to know more about, to know that I’m an estate planner with a practice. I mean to say, I look at the box as the public face I want to put on this comment. (It might be different for another comment on another blog.) If you, or any other blog site owner, thinks I’m promoting something they don’t like – delete it. I would never think I have the absolute right to have that link up just because I, arguably, put a comment of value on this site. When did everything become a quid pro f**king pro? And when did the person giving you something (arguably) get to set what the heck it was worth (the link)?
I can’t believe I just wasted 10 minutes on this comment. Idiots can never be reasoned with.
Victor
Damn, I was so angry, I screwed up the only latin in my post. What kind of lawyer am I?
*hangs head in shame*
I appreciate the effort. And left your backlinks in there. At least you’re a lawyer. Maybe after this nonsense is over, you might find it worth your time to hang around and read some stuff. Maybe you may even comment because you actually want to. You are welcome by anytime.
The real question for me is pretty basic. Does the person leaving their link behind also leave value. If not, then Yep! It’s spam!
If you click my name above, you will see that my particular site is a WordPress blog (you need to be using WP btw) on the subject of getting backlinks.
I’ve followed Angela’s service for some time now, and am aware that there are a ton of her customers that blatantly spam the sites in her packets. I tend to cherry pick which of the sites I use, and usually don’t do it the way that Angela instructs. Her sites are not even the main way that I go after backlinks. I get her packet every month partially to stay current with what is going on in the backlinking world. Frankly, Angela’s method just takes too long.
There will be bad apples in every barrel. I have no doubt that a LOT of Angela’s customers have made your life pretty miserable dealing with this. I own quite a few blogs and would be spending a ton of time deleting spam comments on porn and Cialis if it were not for WordPress and the Akismet plugin. I’d advise you to migrate your blog off of GoDaddy. I buy domains from them, but the rest of their products are so far behind the times it ain’t even funny.
Good luck. Will be subscribing to this post to see what else happens. Lol
I was initially going to delete this post, but I’ve decided to leave it for use tomorrow. It’s been quite an experience living the intersection of Angela’s internet, your internet and mine. If nothing else, it serves as a wonderful lesson to others on my end of the spectrum, as well as the lawyers who use backlink services to boost their pagerank, of what can become of them when they allow commercial interests to cloud their judgment.
I imagine that there are plenty of places where you, and Angela, can go where you will be appreciated. But blawgs like this have no use for drive-by comments. Value is added by the community that develops around this blawg, and backlinkers have nothing to add to the community of lawyers who come here. So yep, it’s spam.
I suspect that some of Angela’s spammers were surprised to learn that they weren’t welcome. Perhaps some will look at what they’re doing and wonder, is this what I want to do to myself to gain a backlink? Most won’t, and care only that it puts their garbarge website, incapable of gaining any google juice on its own merit, on page 1. It’s a lesson about what being on page 1 means as well.
I did, of course, delete your backlink. Glad you won’t lose any sleep over it. And you’re absolutely right about GoDaddy, though my interest in the tech aspects is almost nil except to the extent that I became the object of Angela’s affection.
The mind boggles. Forgetting — just for a moment — that it’s your blawg and that you get to set the rules, the notion that a spam comment somehow adds value because the spammer has spent a few moments skimming the entry and spitting out a quick, thoughtless sentence that is vaguely on-topic is, well, stunning.
As is, for that matter, the notion that some dillhole has scammed a lot of folks into thinking that they can spam their way to fame and fortune via this crap, and paying for it. PT Barnum was even more right than I’d thought.
Damn, you’ve been missed. Good to hear from you.
You probably will not post this message either (my 2nd) but you will stay a board owner until you learn that what you call nasty spammers are just people who are trying to get their WEB sites up. P-E-O-P-L-E
Ah, the voice of narcissism and entitlement. No, Francine, it’s not P-E-O-P-L-E, you ignorant, self-serving twit. Just like it’s not your right to break into someone’s home and take their possessions because you like them. You don’t get to make the rules for everyone slese, that just happen to be good for you, because you want to get whatever garbage you’re selling on the first page of Google. It’s not people, Francine, but narcissism and entitlement. Stop spamming and go find a psychiatrist who can cure your disease.
Its P-E-O-P-L-E. See You Tube IT’S PEOPLE!
You are a sick man. Even I didn’t go there.