Blog Comments, Spammers, Backlinks and NoFollow
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While I was moderating a comment, I realized, after deleting the spam, that the valuable comments weren’t rewarded with a link back.
That’s because the blog code automatically inserts a ‘nofollow’ attribute to comment links.
The reason behind this is to prevent spammers abusing comments to spam to get better SE rankings using anchored links.
That is exactly the reason why Wikipedia implemented the nofollow attribute to all outgoing links.
I never gave it much thought, but I realized that the good comments you get, aren’t rewarded with a nice link back. And backlinks are the only reason why the Internet ticks!
In fact, using nofollow was supposed to be a solution for spamming, NOT to punish great commenting!
So spamming should be solved by plugins like Akismet and Did You Pass Math?.
These plugins minimized the problem, but you still get comment spam and that’s why I have my comments moderated.
The main problem is, spammers still spam!
Read this Interview with a link spammer.
So, I decided to investigate this a bit more.
I remembered reading a post about the topic on Andy Beards’ blog.
Then I began to realize, that the implementing the nofollow attribute is useless.
- 13 Reasons Why NoFollow Tags Suck
- Prepare for more comment spam, not less
- Wikipedia Nofollows by Matt Mullenweg, founder of Wordpress
So, I decided to remove the nofollow attribute.
I went back to the blog of Andy Beard and read his post Ultimate List of DoFollow & Nofollow Plugins - Banish Nofollow From Comments and Trackbacks. Lots of options there.
In the comments of that post I found a great plugin called Nofollow Case by Case (Hey, What’s In A Name?) and implemented that one.
Then, suddenly I also remembered Michel Fortins’ post How to Get More Comments, Less Spam, where he talks about the Comment Timeout plugin and after reading the features I added that one too.
So, now my comments are moderated, open for 120 days and the nofollow attribute is gone.
Big Advantage: everyone posting a great comment will be rewarded with a link back to their site!
Case
PS
Comments anyone? 
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June 4th, 2007 at 8:37 am
For most of my Blogs I use Spam Karma 3 Plugin, It’s a huge program but it automatically checks trackbacks, contacts a database of Spamers, etc.
With it I hardley have to moderate, it auto deletes the spam, checks the trackback, keeps spam at an all time low.
June 4th, 2007 at 9:11 am
Hey Eric,
Does Spam Karma 3 Plugin deal ok with false positives?
Can you rely on the software?
Anxious to know.
Case
July 22nd, 2007 at 3:44 am
yeah… !
Wonder what happen if we all use nofollow on our websites? And how about DMOZ & Yahoo directory.
Have a good one.
December 7th, 2007 at 10:48 pm
I use Akismet on one site and nothing on another. Akismet does a really great job, but it’s interesting to watch the rubbish that comes through on the other.
December 14th, 2007 at 2:57 am
Getting a good link is as good as having a good neighbour next door that helps you when you are in need. But things will never always be what we have in mind as such if that neighbour next door would like to sabotage then how? Think of it this way if yours is a clean site, will you want to allow funny comments that gives a link to S.. site?
What i did was to screen through all posted comments before they can be readed on site.
December 24th, 2007 at 12:27 am
Comment Moderation & Comment Blacklist … are there lists of already known words to add to these sections for new bloggers?
December 24th, 2007 at 5:56 am
Chris,
You should be very careful with such lists. Adding the word ‘ass’ does not only delete comments including that word, but also assistance, passionate, assumption, etc.
During a huge spam wave, I’ve included words like poker and casino, but deleted them after the surge was over, because someone can have a site including these words and still deliver useful comments.