Forum Moderators: open
The issue at hand is our policy on not allowing links to blogs. The main issue is that of trust and accuracy. While blogs can provide incredible vehicles to staying informed, they also pose a risk of misinforming us. The following covers some of those issues - a few more as well - and we'd enjoy hearing from you on the subject.
The biggest change I made recently was taking most of January-March to write the new mod reporting system and thread recommendation system. That system is/was at the request of mods going back 4-5 years. It was designed to reduce mod work load and make their life around here easier. From all accounts and comments - it has been the best addition for moderators ever. I have had mods all but cry on the phone thanking me for it. I think there is no question that it has been one of the most successful additions to the WebmasterWorld software since 1999.
Second, I do try to handle as much stuff in private as I possibly can. Public discussions of personal business are best avoided so that no one gets embarrassed or loses face.
> "no linking to SE blogs" come up?
Changing a major rule like that is not something that can be done over night. If we open up blog links, it is a flood. There is no putting that genie back in the bottle easily. It has to be done at a snails pace.
I have talked and talked with the admins about it for quite some time. We totally agree that there is the need to open things up a bit - the question that no one has an immediately answer for: is HOW can we do that? How do we do it and not get spammed off the net with junk? How do we say a link to Googles Blog is ok, but Fred Pharm and Phentermine blog is not? No one has come up with a line item policy that would work? It would be a nightmare to moderate and admin. Until we can come up with a policy that will work for everyone, allowing links would be a stake through the heart of the moderators. They wouldn't know what, when, how, or why to catch links and we wouldn't know how to explain it. It would turn the forums upside down overnight. Turning on blog links at this point with out a policy would be the worst decision we would make in 6 years here. Hence - I don't think it is going to happen until a policy is formed we can all live with.
I think part of the issue is that of senior member/moderator perception of the current posting policies. I don't think there is an appreciation for the mods that came before and all the work that was done in those early days to set the current policy. One ex admin said, "Other tech forums should get on their knees and kiss the feet of WebmasterWorld for getting the spam out of their own forum". In other words, we don't currently see much of a spam problem here because of all the work and member education we have done in the past.
If you haven't read the Professional forum spammers thread in awhile, it would be a good read:
[webmasterworld.com...]
There are hundreds of people now with the job of buzz marketing in forums. From simple whisper campaigns (we miss many of those), to pure drops, we don't get many serious problems any more. The "blog as propaganda and sales and self promotion" phenomena is growing and only going to get worse. There is no way, that we have the ability to determine the difference between a honest blog drop to an important breaking story, and a promo drop. We all have blogs and would like to promote them, but moderators not self promoting is one of the core tenants of WebmasterWorld life. We want people to trust as much as possible what we say.
What is a bit surprising to me, is the lack of appreciation for recent history here. Did you not see a few old members burn out and leave over the last few years? On their way out, in the Google forum several of them said (and have since maintained the view in public) that we were too close to some of the search engines. One exmember has accused me of working directly for Google in public. Most recently at another forum, someone posted that I clearly work for Yahoo because we named the last Yahoo update - Update Tim. Still another thinks I am Paul Gardi because Paul gets to speak at WebmasterWorld conferences. Therefore, I am hyper sensitive to allowing engines to come in here and drop self promotional/self authored blog links. It is why I tend to give 2nd tier engines some undue exposure to try to lean the other way as much as possible. Fact is, Google is running 60+% of the referrals on the net and getting 95% of the webmaster/site owners attention - so that is where we also focus and also what gets the attention.
It is also important to remember that people have figured out every way imaginable to drop links in the forum as false spam reports. From asking about the site in my profile (which wasn't his), to a blog drop that was really a spam report - we have seen it all.
We must provide a safe environment for people to read and work in. The golden rule of not reporting on thee neighbor is slowly getting tarnished. We don't want to be a contributing factor to that, but rather one that upholds and enforces it in our little corner of the web and encourages others to do so.
> suggestions 6 months ago
There are several in there that have been done and several that are on the drawing board (database forum etc, spam report forum). There are also many that are simply not possible legally (supporters forum suggestions, admin policies..etc).
> conference
Sorry the conference date slipped into the summer, but between new house, new wife, honeymoon, hiring/training people, and the inevitable post-vegas exhausted crash - there just wasn't time to get it done in march-april. Waiting appears to have worked out though with the largest conference we've ever done coming up (it is going to be a blast and we are planning on the biggest bash ever). I appreciate the vote of confidence that we can do all this stuff over night, but I don't have an S on my chest and going from one employee to 4 is a major leap for any business.
> search
I've asked and asked for suggestions on a search engine. I have tried all the major se packages from mngo to aspseek and nothing will work for here - it is just too much dynamic content.
> New mods
Are coming on line at a pace. Engine is slowly doing that for us. Thanks! It takes alot longer than one would imagine to setup a new moderator. There is alot of back-n-forth that goes on. I think a new mod takes about a month to setup and manage.
> Db/SQL forum
Will happen. Just a matter of finding a mod, and then the day it will take to set it up and move a bunch of posts into it.
> other stuff
Some of the other work has to be delayed. Like that recent change that took about a week to program, there is another one coming up after New Orleans that just has to happen. We are breaking the file system here with over 500,000 files now - that can't be continued. So, what I'm saying is that for every public minute we do something (like an sql forum), there are 10 support minutes (fixing the db system) that is going on under the hood.
Quote of the day:
One of the things I like best about WW is I perceive it to be a place that helps people learn how to learn about - almost how to think through - web issues and develop their own solutions, as opposed to only handing out solutions to immediate problems all the time. - ken_b
> but why not link to the actual source,
> and in some cases cover it first?
I still think that would have some serious repercussions. The biggest being deciding what is and isn't news of value.
The issue becomes even stickier when it is a moderator that is wanting to "break" the story on his/her blog site. We have had numerous incidents where mods have wanted to promote their own site in the forums. Sometimes in the past, we stuck our head in the sand and looked the other way.
See, policies are fine-n-dandy and look good on paper and give you a crutch to lean on. However, given the nature of the bbs system, the nature of human interaction, of our vast communication differences, not to mention sex-politics-religion, and the general nature of textual communication - the ultimate policy is simple: keep the peace. Sometimes that is easy to do and other times it requires bending a rule here or there. It also often involves me falling on my sword for the site or for a admin/moderator.
Then there is also the issue of keeping the doors open. Trying to do this site without any direct advertising income (yes *wink wink* on the "exhibitors" logos) is more difficult than people think. aka: [searchengineworld.com...] The subscription model is very difficult to sustain and has required many choices I have not been comfortable with. It didn't always work (eg: see WebmasterWorld 98-2003 in the hole for well over a hundred grand building the site and keeping it afloat. There were numerous days when the doors were almost closed. It was only by the good graces and commercial inspiration of a few mods that the system even exists today.)
Then there is the issue of competition. After doing forums/bbs's for 21 years... ummm, I've learned a thing or two you know? Given that some mods do mod their own forums, and others have come from/gone too other forums, - sure, I flat admit there are some strategy points I keep too myself. After all, I don't' know of too many people who put their own biz strategy on the web for all to see. Most of the bigger points about forums are already out there anyway. However, I get the question all the time about why WebmasterWorld can do 7 figure page views while others struggle to hit 5 figures a day? It is just an accident really - you can't do WebmasterWorld again today ;-) ya, that's the ticket, it's just an accident ;-). Then there is all the legal stuff and work that has been done. I know it grates on a few people here, but I do not talk about the legal work/rulings we have had done here, and on going stuff that is even being done right now. All that costs a fortune, but I feel it is the difference between being here and not. It is hard to see how that relates to this conversation, but when you think about some of the legal actions that have taken place by large companies/sites against bloggers, forums, and the like - it is very significant.
back to frogs and blogs:
Right now, there is so much junk on the web (multitudes more than ever before) that people don't know what to believe. They are reading stuff generated out of thin air and taking it as fact.
In the last couple of months, I have seen two blog stories go mainstream that ended up to be wrong. One even involved a top 20 sites legal department to get corrected. Those stories involved WebmasterWorld members to a certain degree. They also were blog entries that people wanted to put into the forums here as news worthy. At the time, I did not know if the stories were correct or not, but I knew we weren't linking a blog for the source on it. As it turns out, the policy served us in spades. We also did not get into a soap opera tit-for-tat drama-of-the-month with them on the story.
With soo much inaccurate info being shoved on the web, I feel strongly that we must link to accurate, authoritative, and generally accepted as high value sources. That is true for code and education matters, and it is 10 fold as true for timely news sources.
If we did implement such a policy (link to quality blog stories...which is sorta what we having been doing off-the-cuff anyway - eg: first define blog), it would come down to a judgement call on a per moderator basis. Those would sometimes be right, and sometimes be wrong. I believe those kinds of conflicts would cause difficulties on moderators and problems with members and hurt the quality of postings out there. I believe that the quality of the postings in the forums is a good - if not better on the whole - than they have been in quite awhile.
The blogshere is growing exponentially and this would simple be too much for the mods to handle in terms of judgement calls and maintenance...with the value of WW as it stands...there are simply too many "uninformed" individuals running blogs for advertising reasons ... they will do anyting to generate traffic for their adsense/banner or whatever... ... as opposed to the pure play blogs that are trying to enhance and diversify news and general social information threads.....
...and, of course, blogs are becoming a huge force in the political arena...
Keep the links policy in the arena of actual factual/standards based information that supports each of the topic centric threads on WW .. this way the authority of the site remains intact (internally and externally) and the usability of the site will remain clean...not the mention the reputation of the site..
Brett..
Growing pains is always difficult...stay true to your core beliefs about how you want your site represented in the vast ever expanding space called the Web...
You are doing a fantastic job in the view of these bloodshot eyes..keep it up...
That's not to say any of us think it will work or should be ventured. However, since it's ultimately Brett's call, we might serve him if we vote first, then contribute something to the design of an experiment, just in case he decides to run a test.
Unless you can formulate a policy that can be cut and dry, you could be opening up a floodgate here. If the rules allow for a lot of subjective wiggle-room, you are not only going to have a lot of difficulty in keeping this ship chart the course you have envisioned, it would also make it very difficult/awkward for the Mods if their subjective calls are routinely reversed and/or questioned by others.
Personally, I find WW to be an unique platform that allows discussions to remain focused on issues and subject matters, rather than debates that focuses on specifics of a site. I sure hope you keep it that way.
IMHO, link-drops would open up backdoor to a lot of abuse, including pseudo spam-reports, and self-promotion. Linking out to resources beyond your control may also expose WW to added liability.
Brett, I am sure you must have had to deal with this issue more than a few times during these years. IMHO, it is this we-don't-do-specifics and no-links-allowed-here policy, and strict enforcement of the same by the Mods and Admins here that has largely made WW what it is today.
(Now to contradict myself slighty, links to the Yahoo, Google and MSN blogs often have "official" statements unavailable anywhere else, and those three, those exact three, should be allowed.)
Now if I was a representative of of AJ, Dogpile, Mamma.com, Mirago etc I could take exception to
this statement.
stever
If you do decide to do this, and I would join the chorus against, then perhaps only allow blog references by admins or mods and with a blanket ban on blogs run by web marketers?
and what do you think the mods and admins are? Angels who give their time to police the SEM community?
ecomagic
Each user gets only one SPAM/HAM vote on a link and as soon as the spam ratio is hit the link
is removed and no future voting is possible. Though a mod could perhaps come and override a spam ruling and reinstate the link without voting continuing.
Naive - start doing some reading on public proxies.
Liane
Maybe, just maybe you might want to open another forum just for linking to blogs and keep that stuff out of the rest of WebmasterWorld.
Interesting I like the idea of lumping the blogs together - an 'In the Blogs' forum could work
given that it could have headers such as 'Rumours from the blogosphere' etc etc. And if it got
out of hand it could be closed down.
Caveman
Sidenote: I see that the number of ads supporting the Conferences is increasing ... always a good
sign, and one that indicates that some publisher wiggle room exists. Personally, I see no reason
why the logos supporting the Conferences could not link out to the advertisers. In fact, I've always
found it sorta odd that they don't. There is a text link there for those who want to get to the
Conferences page. So let the graphic ads link out, and charge a bit more for them. That doesn't have
to be a slippery slope.
This is really interesting, and I think sums up where many people think that WebmasterWorld is at the moment,
where does 'the slippery slope' start - it is very like trying to decide if you are a drug addict.
I think much of the reason for this thread is that what always has been the realm of the 'traditional
media', i.e. breaking news stories has now become much more fluid, a few may break in the traditional media but many more are now breaking in blogs (whether corporate, commercial or personal). WebmasterWorld/Brett has to decide how this is going to be handled, is it stick with trasitional media and maybe suffer the pain that is going to happen to traditional media sources over the next few years, or does it embrace the new ideas which are changing traditional news reporting. If it is going to be the latter then how is it going to embrace these new news outlets.
For reasons of longer term strategy some people think that WebmasterWorld is a little archaic in its policies
regarding blog links, hence this discussion.
My personal views:
I think that WebmasterWorld has done a great job in becoming a source of useful information to the Webmaster community and has been 'generally' unbiased in its approach. However I think that over the last year the 'blog' has become much more mainstream and with the introduction of 'corporate' blogs the boundary between blogs and mainstream news has become much more blurred.
Many of us would not read a newspaper unless we are disconnected from the internet for a period of at least two minutes (unlikely given broadband and similar technologies) and can foresee the demise of traditional news media - therefore we also see that these sources are going to be less reliable over time (due to their being able to hang on to a much smaller share of the avertising revenue available (IMHO this is a topic that warrants discussion in its own right so I won't go into all the details here)
With the demise of the traditional media - those sources that we have always considered the most reliable are being challenged by new sources of news/information - i.e. blogs/corporate blogs etc. Can a site such as WebmasterWorld afford to sit back and watch the balance of power change and say it is only going to link to sites that are traditional news outlets (potentially 'losers' when it comes down to current changes) or does it say we need to look at a broader picture and embrace the best of the upcoming sources, together with those parts of the traditional media that 'get it'.
I'm not sure that the quetion is 'Should WebmasterWorld allow blog links?' but more 'How does WebmasterWorld allow blog links without compromising its integrity?'
Create a page with quality blogs that you approve, a blogroll if you will. Then if a reference is made to an approved blog in a thread, the link will actually go to the WebmasterWorld approved blogroll page. If a reference is posted to a nonapproved blog, it is zapped.
On this approved blogroll page we will find the link out to the blog's homepage. We should all be able to find the story from there.
Example:
Just read a post on ¦a href="WebmasterWorldApprovedBlogs.html#G!Blog"¦ G!Blog ¦/a¦ that G! plans to triple CPM for all WebmasterWorld members.
It doesn't give me a direct reference to the story but at least I have a starting point. More times than not any story that someone references on here is one of the first few posts in the respective blog.
This system would not work much different than visiting your conference sponsors. A click on sponsors listed in top right takes you to a sponsor page rather than directly to the sponsor itself.
Just a thought.
The idea that non-official blogs, in general, are a "news source" is offensive. What on earth is the rationale for starting to refer to rumors as "news" instead? To even see this ludicrous idea suggested seriously is nothing less than an example of the trivialization of things of importance in today's world. Forget the idea of corroboration from two independent sources, my Aunt Myrtle and the blue hairs at the beauty shop are now in line for Pulitzers.
The National Enquirer is not "news". The vast majority of what gets posted on blogs is not "news", unless you have the veracity threshold of that character Jon Lovitz played on Saturday Night Live.
Said blogmod (picked by WebmasterWorld supermods) could blog away, link out to stuff, etc.
Brett would be a good one to start (wouldn't this be interesting to see what BT reads / trusts / etc?) - then maybe rotate after that - maybe bring back some of the Classic WebmasterWorld Mods (think Jeremy Goodrich, etc) who've dissappeared as "guest bmoders".
Bmoders would have to pledge to an editorial policy about being balanced as best as possible on controversial topics - give us the data, let the reader decide...
Folks could comment but not drop links unless if approved by the bmod.
Said hybrid blog would be set to not pass PR for any links and allow links only by the approved bmods.
This hybrid should have some sort of automatic anti-linkrot bot to deal with what happens through time - say what happens if a blog dies, gets taken over, turns extra weird, whatever...
I turn to blogs now for certain kinds of news, commentary, opinion. Whatever happened to the blog here?
Yes, WebmasterWorld could stand a bit of controlled opening up, definately!
Times they are a changing -
When I look at other webmaster forums like "digital point", "a best web", even "search engine watch" - I see clutter, at best 10% content and 90% self-promotion.Here I see 90% content and 10% conspiracy theory - but still exponentially more valuable than some blinkenlights banner advertising an ebook that will let me make a million dollars on the internet in 10 minutes.
Says it all. Don't try to "fix" what is decidedly NOT broken. The present approach serves my needs splendidly.
Thanks for the insight into the realities of managing the behemoth, Brett!
and what do you think the mods and admins are? Angels who give their time to police the SEM community?
Not quite sure where this came from, Ian, but for the record, yes, I appreciate the workload the mods & admins have and, yes, I understand that they are probably involved in web marketing themselves.
My point, such as it was, was that few blogs (on the topics of WebmasterWorld) produce unique and compelling news. That level is drastically reduced on blogs run by web marketers.
You mention the balance of power changing between blogs and traditional news media. However traditional news media still have (for the most part) internal checks and balances along with the fear of legal repercussions. Standards may have eroded greatly but they are still light-years ahead of the anonymity, irresponsibility and lack of disclosure that feature in the blog world.
When we talk about news and blogs, are we really talking about the "news value" of blogs? Then yes, as I said earlier, primary sources of news (such as the Google blog announcing that Google was abandoning spidering in favour of toolbar data) would of course be worthy of mention.
But how many blogs are actually primary sources of news?
In reality they are mainly commentary. And now we get into why commentary may be valuable. Is it because of the author (Nielsen, Cutts)? Is it because of the content or the point of view?
How useful does one, as a user of WebmasterWorld, find it to read the start of a thread which says "Joe Blow, over at ImportantWebThings.com, mentions that he heard that the Google..."?
How tempting does one, as a user of WebmasterWorld, find a possible slashdot effect for promoting one's (masked) blog?
Perhaps the answer is that WebmasterWorld try its own "community blog" - as has appeared in other places. This would answer the apparent need expressed by some and allow blog references to be walled off for those who are disinterested.
(I'm sceptical of this idea though, as I think the level of traffic at WebmasterWorld is too high to make such an undertaking work.)
>>> While blogs can provide incredible vehicles to staying informed, they also pose a risk of misinforming us.
There is misinformation in this industry everyday - on this message board, spouted by "respected" industry people in various articles and news stories, given at conferences - misinformation is not a reason not to link to blogs.
And in an industry based highly on opinion/testing/theory - deciphering what is "misinformation" can come down to one persons opinion over another.
Again, I'm not debating linking out - personally, I like the lack of spam here - and bottomline is that it comes down to what management wants and what mods can keep up with.
But giving misinformation as the reasoning isn't the way to go, IMHO.
The first question is a simple yes/no. The second question needs to be rephrased to "Can WebmasterWorld allow blogs links without compromising its integrity?"
Much of this discussion depends on how you characterize blogs with regards to news and reporting. The former journalist in me is repulsed at the comparison, but I can understand how many cant see much of a difference as traditional media continues to lower the bar.
>Forget the idea of corroboration from two independent sources
No kidding!
Some here consider the Google update threads more than a little annoying ... now imagine 40 or 50 threads just like the update threads with hundreds of people discussing the rantings and ravings contained in some blog!
If the blog floodgates are opened, it would have to be in a very contained area (its own forum) with a strict set of guidelines and careful pre-moderation.
I can't imagine which mod or mods might actually want to volunteer to do this, but I can see no harm in beta testing a forum to see how it goes.
One never knows what might take off and become a very important part of WebmasterWorld! I don't think we can state (with blanket certainty) that allowing links to blogs would be a disaster. It may indeed prove to be a case of the tail wagging the dog for the moderators ... but if the guidelines are very carefully thought out and strictly adhered to, it could prove to be a popular, if not necessarily valuable forum!
You'll never know until you try.
The only thing I would ask is that Brett gets that "My WebmasterWorld Control Panel" operational prior to launch so that those who are not interested in blogs (and other forums) can switch off the blog posts in the "Active Posts" list! ;)
'How does WebmasterWorld allow blog links without compromising its integrity?'
I don't agree with this. I still think the original question is (or at least should be) "Do we allow links to blogs or not?".
Personally, I think the answer is "not". The really high value blogs are high value due to the subjective opinion they offer. I know of many brokers in several different fields who actually follow blogs for this reason.
If I want subjective opinion I'll go get it at source.
All I want here is reporting of newsworthy items that affect us. People here offer their own views to any such thread.
We do not need to link to opinion. We need to continue to link to reports.
TJ
One thing I want to bring up is the issue of "which is
a blog"? I think the lines are blurred.
- What is a blog?
- Where does a blog stop and a feedback, bbs, email list, or forum system start? Is there a line, or is it just all gray matter?
- is WebmasterWorld itself a blog? - some argue it is. Some would argue - this very thread is a prime example of a blog.
- is slashdot a blog? - some argue it is, and isn't.
- is drudge report just a blog? - some argue it isn't.
- Are the corporate blogs anything more that low grade press offices?
- Is a newsletter a blog?
This is an outstanding discussion.
I happen to run a fairly popular Search Marketing Blog, which I won't link to.
I know in the past, I linked to it and it was removed, even though, IMO, it added value to the forum. But as a moderator for over three years at 3 different SEO forums, I totally understand the snip. In fact, I respect it a ton.
But also, I have found many referrals from this site (WebmasterWorld) to my blog. And I have seen normal members here, sometimes mods or admins, link to my blog in part of the discussion. I believe there is a huge distinction to blog owners or authors linking to entries they wrote themselves over outside readers linking to someone's blog. Of course, you have the issue of people registering multiple aliases to hide the fact that they operate a particular blog that they would like to link to. So moderation with that is a pain.
I do like the idea of a blog "whitelist". But again, also like the no tolerance policy for this forum.
But back on to what is a blog and what is not a blog. Ever since I went through my blog's redesign, I tried to not refer to the site as a blog. In fact, if you have been reading, when I refer to my blog, I rarely say "blog" or I try not to. Why? Not because I think blogs are not authoritative but it is because when I talk to people about blogs, they don't take it seriously. I get comments like, "yea my 12 year old daughter has a blog." So, I am actually trying to move away from the "blog" associate on my site and become a "news site" instead.
Hope that adds to the discussion.
I recall launching a dialogue, either in Forum or Community Building, or directly with you (Mr. T., by sticky) about the blurred lines between forums, blogs, zines, online media that offers a "feedback form", etc. I'm not certain if there's an insight to be gained by mining for that thread.
After the questions about the authority and reliability of the outside/outlinked authority, perhaps the next most important issue, mentioned by others, is the impact of WW traffic on the outlinked authority.
Will routine linking (on the "approved list of blogs") cause the blog operator to have to spend more time culling bogus posts? Will such outlinking force the blog/media operator to have to spend more time deciding on who to approve for reply posting? Etc.
because when I talk to people about blogs, they don't take it seriously
I think you hit the nail on the head with this statement! Blog to me means someone either parroting the news wires, plagiarizing, whining about their homework, or just flat out spamming. I don't have much respect for blogs since the target of every single one is self promotion to pump up adsense revenues and make the user dizzy with banner ads and animated gifs that beg you to shoot the monkey or some other absurd thing.
In my personal view (may be skewed by my intolerance of the obnoxious advertising which currently proliferates the web) forums like this are so highly evolved that WebmasterWorld could never be considered a Blog. (maybe a Clog… Community log? :) ) I was personally a little worried when the advertisements for conference exhibitors started showing up here. I thought "Oh boy, this is how WW's de-evolution is going to start..." Thankfully, I've learned to look past the links AND am very happy that the links take you to a page inside of WW instead of directly to the exhibitor's site.
I would like to echo a statement that was said earlier... I don't go to Blogs for news. I don't trust them. I go to the big sites that I know that I can trust. I tried out the Blogs during the last Presidential election here in the US looking for some ammo to shoot at the opposition. I was so quickly disgusted with self promotion, horrible fallacies, (I was still disgusted by the misstatement of facts even though it was about the guy I didn't like) and largely sophomoric discussion. I find WebmasterWorld to be a highly respected community of professionals where people can go to learn. Even the Foo forum here was off-limits to real political discussion with respect for the subject matter of the site.
Even though I may not have found them yet (because I don't look) there may be several Blogs out there that could be beneficial to discussions in WW. SO, I'll keep an open mind to the subject. I do agree with some others here that said that a "whitelist" of sites we can link to could be compiled. This is an unenviable task as the focus of a Blog could quickly change as WW starts sending it traffic. WW users sent to a blog would probably find self promotion talk very quickly.
Brett- You might consider making a "pilot" program. Allow Blog links in test status in a few different forums. See how that goes, what the mods think of maintaining it, and then decide if you have the manpower & desire to launch it sitewide.
WebmasterWorld is the benchmark by which all other sites should be measured. I'd hate to see the quality of the site diminished by allowing blog links to go un-checked. I think it should also be policy that after a blog is linked, it should be rechecked to make sure the Blog's topic has stayed true to what a WW user expects to find when they arrive. Sure, this may require 2 or more mods per forum, but it might be necessary. I'm sure that there is no lack of people wanting to bring their expertise to the forum by being a mod.
In closing, I’d like to thank Brett for bringing this subject out for the supporters to comment. This is something that is appropriate for group discussion, but still out of the public view.
The issue at hand is our policy on not allowing links to blogs.
I have a question: What is the objective here? What is the issue behind the issue?
Is the feeling that WW is missing opportunity in some respects because of the blog traffic that is not being fully tapped into currently?
Or, is the issue one of better integrating WW into the full flow of news and event coverage that now exists on the Web, which moves faster and more effectively on sites considered to be 'blogs'?
Or, something else?
My guess is that there's a feeling inside WW that some opportunity is being lost. That's probably true short term, but may not be as clear when you're in a game for the long term. Hence my questions. What is the real objective?
WW has been brilliant when it comes to planning, growth, matching tech advances with real and future needs, etc. Wisely, the powers that be here tend to take their time when making major decisions.
Currently, there are probably lots of questions being considerred.
1) Is blogging going to get bigger, or is the wave about to crash? (Around the time that everyone has launched one, people will stop reading them so voraciously.)
2) If blogging is going to get bigger still, or is here to stay at least, how should WW get more integrated into the blogosphere?
3) To what extent is the issue a matter of plugging into the blogosphere, versus doing a better job of covering breaking news and events?
Not only have we seen some mods move on over the past year (not sure this is much related to the issue at hand or not), but also, some other valuable news/event/reporting resources have emerged. In Brett's place, I'd sure be asking similar questions.
I for one am impressed that he's put it out to the members for debate. There is, after all, a downside to that. But the truth is, we can all see what's happening anyway.
In my former life as an ad exec, one of the biggest issues I tried to help clients with was sorting out the question of when a trend was going to become integrated into everyday life, and when it was going to vaporize. That's harder than it sounds. (When computers first started appearing in offices, there were a ton of people who thought it was a techo fad, and that was in ad agencies, where folks are usually quick to embrace change. I even remember debating with a client over whether the word "cool" was just a passing fad (like "rad") or whether it was here to stay ("cool" had been around before, but was re-popularized by 'the Fonz' in Happy Days, and this time, it stuck, as it turns out).)
IMHO, there is at least a possibility for WW to extend its already impressive reach and presence by doing a better job at becoming a news resource. But part of how to do that almost certainly involves changing the policy on links. That policy may be the single most important decsion WW has faced in a very long while.
I think the misunderstood issue presently is: This is viewed as a potentially slippery slope. It doesn't need to be. It's more a matter of editorial policy and decision making; something WW has excelled at. In the end, if WW goes forward with linking out in the way being discussed, how that is executed is going to be determined primarily by the gut instinct of the site's leader and guiding force. (That's why people like Tina Brown are highly prized in publishing. Policy = people, pure and simple.) The policy in this case should be: "Because Brett says so." And that's not only OK, it's a good thing. It's good to be king. ;-)
When I see a link posted here, I want to be able to trust that it leads to a true authoritative site.
If that's a blog, or some other truely authoritative doesn't seem me to be as big an issue as the real authoritative nature of the site.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding the issue.
The more I think about this issue, the less I understand why linking to "blogs" should be managed any differently than linking to any other site.Maybe I'm misunderstanding the issue.
Maybe I am too Ken but then I don't use blogs, which is perhaps why I am failing to see the significance of this. Am I missing something?
Wow. Do they take network news seriously? Journalists? Media pundits? Do they assume the truth is being told because it is ink? Or being relayed by an anchor?
Bestowing faith (or lack thereof) in veracity based on the medium is silly at best and dangerous at worst. Placing trust in an anchor or journalist has been proven in the past to be somewhat naive.
Ahh yes, bloggers have agendas. So do editors, pundits and journalists.
Blogs are commentary. Then again, so is much of the evening news. Hard facts are boring. People want discussion, commentary and controversy.
Simply put, veracity isn't dependent on the medium. Blogs can provide additional viewpoints and insight. Bloggers often challenge traidtional viewpoints. Facts should be challenged, ideas should be challenged, the more information available on a given subject, the better.
"Informed" opinions simply aren't made on the basis of where the news comes from, but the understanding and formulation of a belief in the veracity of the news. If we are to accept at face value "trusted sources" then we may as well close up shop and mind and move on, as each of us will differ in where we place our trust. It is when we challenge each other's ideas and beliefs that understanding grows.
There's a place for blogs. I believe the question is, is that place here at WebmasterWorld? Personally, I think blogs could be incorporated, and as previously mentioned, would work well with strong editorial control. Is it a worthwhile endeavor? Sometimes you have to try to find out eh?
Would blogs muddy the truth? Bah, no more than the countless posts that base "truth" on nothing more than anecdotal evidence. Truth or worthiness is a decision that individuals must make all by their lonely. Personally, I like to have as many options open to me as possible to make that decision.
Do I need to find blog links here? Probably not. I can find those blogs I deem worthy of reading all by myself. Sometimes it is frustrating to run across a really good bit of info in a blog and not be able to post it here, but I can live with that.
>>bloggers will self-promote
Wake up. The place is filled with marketers. Promotion and the art of promoting products and services are why we're all here. What isn't acceptable is blatant self-promotion merely for the sake of promotion. That's why we couch our assertions in language like, "during my research, in my experience, after studying the "facts", etc.
>>blogs are commentary and opinion
Of course they are. So is much of what we read here. Without the commentary and opinion we'd be reduced to "Google Updated" and "Adsense is a viable way to earn money".
I know a lot of people that get their "World News" from a single U.S. newspaper, and consider themselves to be "informed" about world events. Much like people that get their news from a single TV news source and consider themselves to be armed with the truth. The truth is, the "truth" can be a difficult fly to swat, so I prefer to arm myself with lots of flyswatters. In the end, I'm still left with my opinion.
I have tried to read other forums, and simply can't do it... This is the only forum I can actually read. Please, don't 'fix' it, it's not 'broken'. I don't see how blog links would help... maybe there are some of great value, but I can find those if I need to.
If you really would like to add blogs, maybe you could do a sub-domain in a directory style and have categories that mirror the main WebmasterWorld site?
Then you could actually have the best of both worlds... you could link to the blogs (or even sites) from the sub domain, and people could highlite the blogs they think are of value by linking from their post to the page of the sub-domain that has the link to the blog on it.
This way those of us who come to WebmasterWorld to read WebmasterWorld would not have to deal with a bunch of 'off site' links and you would not have to worry as much about 'spamming up' the pages here, but blogs could still be highlited in posts, through an indirect link to the sub-domian.
Justin
Now don’t get me wrong I believe in freedom of speech, however when I joined WW it was because I enjoy a healthy debate of issues with individuals who are experienced in my industry, not someone who has joined so that their own blog can somehow get more attention.
I like the idea of a sub category created for this and only in that category will links to blogs be allowed.
That to me would be a compromise; you are allowing links in a certain area…
After all isn’t that what all the categories were created to do, allow an area for targeted discussion?
No doubt it will make searching for real content on WW a pain….imagine the results you will pull back when all the self promoters start posting…
noindex, nocache. Nocache is a rule of thumb at WebmasterWorld.
And, I've noticed that the people that "get it", would rather get a tooth pulled than post their own URL here. The people that don't get it, either learn over time and contribute valuable posts, or they keep refusing to learn and end up not being able to post.
Is anyone willing to put in the time and effort to keep a "blogosphere" forum clean and useful? If so, it could become a useful forum for monitoring reaction, gathering news and judging impact. Not to mention, offering additional viewpoints, from some people that might not ever participate in a forum environment.
>>not broken, don't fix it
Yeah, yeah, phonographs and Model As weren't necessarily "broken", but improvements were made. Do blogs need to be included? Not sure. But I'm not sure they need to be excluded either.
So, what's wrong with a trial run? If it doesn't work, abolish the forum and chalk it up to experience. It needn't be carved in stone that once begun it must continue. Frankly, given our field, I find it amazing that so many people are unwilling to try something new. OMG! What if it worked? Damned if I don't hate whatifs...
