User generated content problems

[realmaverick]

One of the big sites I run, is largely user generated content. It's an art community, a similar example would be deviantart.com.

Titles, meta etc are automatically generated based on the title of the upload from the user.

The galleries that hold the content, works in the same way.

Ultimately it does lead to a lot of similar titles but each upload is unique and a lot of people do search for the content and as a result we get a lot of traffic.

The Panda update has effected some of my US ranks and thus US traffic. It's really quite pissed me off. As many of the sites now ranking above me, are opportunist blogs, who are stealing my users work and creating posts about it, 99% of the time not crediting the author or the website it was stolen from.

Before now, I've not been concerned with duplicate titles, I figured Google was smart enough to realise why and also recognise it was a level playing field. Competing sites all work in the same way. Other than these god damn blogs who steal our content.

We work our asses off running contests, creating new features, featuring work, blogging collections of work etc etc etc. It's a full time job, we work so hard to keep our community happy and these bloggers just come along, take what they want and rank.

One of my big galleries recently slipped from number 1 to number 21. With tons of thieving blogs outranking it.

There is nothing different about this one particular gallery, in the way it works to the others on my website. So my concern is the rest may follow.

I'm not entirely sure what I can do. I've absolutely no issue with creating unique content, I already do via the blog etc. But the big traffic comes from the content the users create.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks :)

[Staffa]

I know exactly what you are talking about and possibly am a frequent visitor to your site.

It always riles me when I read a post like "I love this, added it to my blog"
To the creator of "it", who maybe doesn't know any better, it may sound like a compliment to me it sounds like just another freeloader grabbing content.

I guess what your users upload remains their copyright so unless the user objects you can not really forbid the use of "it" on another site, however I would try to push that boundary by sending the grabber an email with the choice; demanding a link back to the original post "originally posted at" or a permanent ban from the site.
I know it's a long shot but maybe worth a try.

[goodroi]

Take a step back and ask yourself what unique value does your site bring to the party?

If you have a hard time answering that question you need to go back to the planning stage. Maybe host a live chat interview with a different artist each day. This will generate content (interview transcripts) and backlinks as people will promote the interviews of their favorite artists. Something like this would help to separate your site from those blogs.

[realmaverick]

The users are very funny about other sites taking their content. One of our competitors is a corp, who's staff come and take my artists work, to share on their own website, they request removal but rarely does it happen.

The unique value we add, is just as you suggested, we do many things similar to what you outlined. But that said, it's always good to revisit that question, "what can I do, to make my website more unique". I'll think about some more.

[TheMadScientist]

Update your TOS with a clause to act on the content owner's behalf wrt content reproduction when it's determined to be in the best interest of the site and then DMCA away...

[realmaverick]

Thanks for the suggestions.

Another issue I've come across, is if two users upload a piece of art with the same name. It causes a duplicate title.

I have two obvious options; 1) Include "By Username" to the title or 2) Include the unique ID of the file at the end.

Which of the above would you recommend?

With option 1, it's still possible, if the same user uploads 2 pieces of work, with the same name. Option 2, will always be a unique file name.

What I don't want to do, is dilute the title too much, because the competitors are all highly targeted, as are mine at present.

Thanks :)

[brotherhood of LAN]

I would go with "By Username" as it would allow visitors to search on a search engine for a users particular contributions (maybe useful if your site does not do that already), adding the unique ID of an upload doesn't really add value to anything other than perhaps being a reference people might remember (otherwise bookmarks would be effective in those cases)

[g1smd]

I prefer adding the ID at the FRONT of the URL, and having the script validate the title matches the ID, issuing a redirect to the correct URL if the two things do not exactly match.

This allows you to change the title at a later date and the system automatically redirect all requests to the new URL so created. It also allows you to strip the title and just post the domain name and ID number as a "short" URL in Twitter and other message services.

[realmaverick]

I want to revert the change and perhaps add the unique file ID, to the title as well as the "by username". Obviously this will cause a less targeted title, but will help avoid duplicate titles.

My concern, is making such a big change, twice in the space of a month, may flag something with the search engines. Perhaps make it look like I'm trying to reverse engineer their algo.

The first time I made the change, there was no drop in traffic and all of the new titles were indexed within a few days.

I feel I need to make the change, to fix all of the duplicate titles but concerned to make it, because of the points above.

What are your thoughts?

[realmaverick]

Eureka moment. Rather than username or fileID. What about if the title contained the first 3 tags. Each upload has to contain at least 3 tags to help identify it. This would add extra context to the titles and keep them unique.

It appears ideal. But then I'm still worried about the implications of a second big change.

[realmaverick]

Any thoughts on this one guys? It's a huge change, I think it's necessary but I'm anxious. Any suggestions on how to make the transition easier, limit the risk?

[g1smd]

Yes, three tags could be it, but NOT separated as if they were folders, use only hyphens. However I still prefer front-loaded unique ID as the key.