Creating Web Pages in Wikipedia

To Promote Sites in Google

[crea7or]

Adding of the relevant pages in to the wikipedia highly increase visibility? I see this on the interesting for me websites. Even if it not increase the visibility, the wikipedia pages moves to the top positions in the google and the external links have no rel="nofollow" tag. It's so easy to catch google visitor just with creation the page with your keywords. Google should do something I think.

[Kufu]

No, Google shouldn't do anything. People should just stop spamming Wikipedia. Plus, Wikipedia does a pretty good job of keeping their pages 'clean'.

[zCat]

Linkspam is a growing problem in Wikipedia, but the Wikipedia community is growing ever more vigilant and finding creative new ways of keeping it under control and making it ineffective or even counter-productive for the more prolific spammers.

[crea7or]

But wikipedians voted against nofollow link attribute

[abates]

If anyone creates pages to promote their own site, they're likely to be banned from Wikipedia. Wikipedia takes a dim view of that sort of thing. :)

[Kufu]

I don't think someone should be banned for adding their own site if it actually fits in with the topic and ads value to the article.

[roodle]

I added a handful of relevant links to one of my sites from different pages on Wiki. All but 1 were quickly deleted. I don't think it's that easy to spam. I also read that you now have to register to edit pages anyway.

There's no longer a "nofollow" attribute on outbound links as far as I know.

[curlykarl]

I don't think it's that easy to spam

It is.

[BillyS]

I believe that Wikipedia will eventually collapse under its own weight. Search engines rank Wiki pages like they are the ultimate authority on everything. The pretense is that anyone can contribute, but that’s far from the truth. I’m surprised that no one has called them into court over their stated policy versus what actually happens.

Garbage in, garbage out. The website has all kinds of mistakes on it, stated like they are facts. It’s easy to get links if you move slowly. (and yes, I do have them)

But - if you trip the spam alert, they’ve got a pretty good way of figuring out all of your entries and they will remove everything they can find (even if it’s good). Overall, it’s not really a “community.”

At least with DMoz (another community) you know where you stand – while I might not personally agree with their policy, it is very clear. In the end, they get my respect for being consistent and abiding by the rules they’ve established.

[Matt Probert]

Garbage in, garbage out. The website has all kinds of mistakes on it, stated like they are facts.

And I thought it was just me that didn't like Wikipedia <g>

Incidentally, the article and link about the site I administer, in Wikipedia was created by an unknown third party, I simply corrected a few "facts" in it which were wrong. Before anyone accuses me of spamming!

Matt

[crobb305]

I am not familiar with Wikipdia. Are you allowed any links to your site, perhaps in an author resource box?

C

[Kufu]

OK, I am testing it out! I actually made an addition to Wikipedia a couple of minutes ago. It is not really a spam link, but I do have ads on my site, so it has to trigger some type of a red flag and get removed once someone gets to review the addition.

I'll update the thread as to the outcome.

[beren]

If anyone creates pages to promote their own site, they're likely to be banned from Wikipedia. Wikipedia takes a dim view of that sort of thing. :)

But you don't have to be a registered Wikipedean to change pages at Wikipedia. You can do it anonymously. I'm sure they will kick out registered people who misuse the system too much, but that doesn't stop anything.

Also, there are plenty of pages on Wikipedia that just don't deserve to be there. Has anyone ever tried to get a subject deleted? It's put up for vote. The one time I tried it, some new people regstered at Wikipedia and their first action was to vote to keep the article. Friends of the writer/promoter no doubt.

I love Wikipedia, but there is much potential for abuse.

[Kufu]

Update!

A few posts back I mentioned that I had posted a test link on a Wikipedia article to see how long it would take them to remove the link. The answer: 2.5 to 3 hours.

That's pretty good. Even though the link I had added did make somewhat of a contribution to the article, because I have ads (particularly adsense) on the site, it got taken down.

So, as I mentioned before, they are pretty good at monitoring the spam on the site. I am sure there are some that get through, but overall I've found Wikipedia to be pretty 'clean'.

[SFReader]

Wikipedia gets a lot better position in Google SERPs than it deserved.

[Pedent]

Wikipedia gets a lot better position in Google SERPs than it deserved.

Agreed, but it's a lot better than it was last time I looked. With the number of authors they have things can move quickly.

[crea7or]

I have added 2 pages to deletion three days ago - there is no result until now ( they in the delete log ).

[Vadim]

I read in a trusted source that it was special study that compared Wiki with British Encyclopedia. The result was that Wiki has even smaller number of errors (comparable, but smaller). It means that Wiki deserve its authority. You may not like it but you may trust it.

[Haecceity]

Wikipedia says, "WIKIPEDIA MAKES NO GUARANTEE OF VALIDITY" (their shouting, not mine). Of course other more traditional encyclopedias would do well to post the same statement since they all contain mistakes, but the open nature of Wikipedia give it unique problems regarding its accuracy. I've heard of people who wrote very knowledgable articles who gave up editing there because they got fed up of ignoramuses who would constantly vandalize their work.

There is the famous case of John Seigenthaler having been credited with being under suspicion for Robert Kennedy's murder (not true). Check information online at the wrong moment and you could be reading a complete load of #*$!

Unless something changes in Wikipedia (like some kind of accreditation for editors) it will ultimately be a case of the most persistent editor winning in the end. And there's no one more persistent than a loony.

[giga]

i found a way to defeat any and all spam filters. Those guys really pissed me off so I had my team build a super spider. It adds my link at a random interval of time, with a random phrase of text. We own a dialup isp company, so we dial in from a differnt IP to check if the link still exists and to reinstall a new one if missing. This has proven so effective that they are powerless to stop it, so what happens is they turn the entire page off, and put it on lockdown. The spider then hibernates, and waits until the site opens again, and goes back to its spammy way (uhhhh adding 1 freakn link to a page 100% relevent to our website, we actually wrote 1/4 of the articles on the page). Oh i forgot to mention the domain is also randomally generated by a "tinyurl" type sever which immediatly redirects to the proper domain. I really dont like their pretend open policy so i post this for any frustrated programmers to build on their own. Oh and you can use any old dialup connection to grab the new ip per call (be sure to have an unlimited local calling plan however, as it will be dialing every 3 minutes possibly to work initially)

[beren]

Unless something changes in Wikipedia (like some kind of accreditation for editors) it will ultimately be a case of the most persistent editor winning in the end. And there's no one more persistent than a loony.

You might be right about that. Others would argue that errors are speedily corrected, so we should trust the community there.

My only beef with Wikipedia isn't with Wikipedia (which I really like); it's with the search engines that place them highly in the rankings.

[SFReader]

" I read in a trusted source that it was special study that compared Wiki with British Encyclopedia. "

If you are refering to the Nature study, it was small (only checked 42 entries), checked only science entries, and Wiki averaged 33% more errors.

Keith

[BillyS]

>> read in a trusted source that it was special study that compared Wiki with British Encyclopedia.

I'd be very interested in seeing that study. Wiki is riddled with errors - especially when it comes to quoting numbers. I feel sorry for students that do their research via Wikipedia.

To the "average joe" looking for information, they might be fooled into thinking it's right. If you think someone is checking all the facts and figures that go into Wikipedia, it's just not happening.

As with most things, you get what you pay for... Wiki is free and they've got no systematic way to check information. It's run by editors that are using their "gut" on what's okay to keep in and what's not.

[Vadim]

If you are refering to the Nature study, it was small (only checked 42 entries), checked only science entries, and Wiki averaged 33% more errors.

You are right. I wrote by memory. However only 33% difference (and no difference in the number of serious errors) still indicates that Wiki is pretty reliable.

Vadim.

[Vadim]

I'd be very interested in seeing that study.

Nature 438, 900-901 (15 December 2005)

Google Nature + wikipedia

It is online.
Vadim