mbauser2 - 5:06 pm on May 7, 2004 (gmt 0)

No, it's illogical to say "I think it helps give them a boost" just because a few high-ranked sites have the tag. Operafan's response was a basic fallacy of induction: He saw a few safesurfed sites doing well, and suggested they're doing well because of the safesurf tag.

By similar logic, I could "think" that Google boosts sites written in Italian, sites hosted on islands, and sites written by guys named Bauser. (After all, I've done searches recently where such sites ranked well.) None of those inductions would make sense either.

See, logic, at its heart, is about connecting cause and effect. Operafan's logic was on the level of "some fast horse have spots, therefore spots make a horse fast". That doesn't fly in the real world, shouldn't fly on Webmaster World.

In as much as two people here are disagreeing with something I hadn't said, I'm forced to call "straw man" on them. I'm deeply disappointed (and a little worried) that I have to call "straw man" on a moderator.