On Bots and Content Creation / Aggregation
Sometimes I get confused by the Remix Culture and its various shades of grey. For example:
A good planet is hard to find
Planet Web 2.0 "aggregates the weblogs of the Web 2.0 community. Web 2.0 is about sharing rich data through open, loosely coupled services, enabling new and exciting applications and modes of collaboration."
Sounds great - and in this case it's all automated. Planet Web 2.0 aggregates full-content posts from people such as John Battelle and Chris Anderson. It has reblg buttons all over the show (not imaginary ones either ;-), making it easy for other people to re-aggregate the content on Planet Web 2.0.
This is good, isn't it? After all it's about sharing and mixing content, getting broader exposure for one's ideas, and other social software warm fuzzy-wuzzies. Well, it may mean less click-through on the ads on John Battelle's weblog or personal RSS feed (if he had ads in his feed)... I sense some grey seeping into this picture. But I'm still OK with Planet Web 2.0 - these are all fine people and collobarating with a community of like minds is a wonderful thing.
The Unstoppable Death Star?
So let's take a look at another system that aggregates content. Article Bot is a "Text Manipulator, Story Re-Writer, Content Creator ...the future of content and a new paradigm for anyone who needs unique, relevant, and unstoppable content..."
What does Article Bot do? It basically remixes existing content, written by humans I presume, so that it "can pass as human-generated".
Hmmm, sounds dodgy. But wait - we're "misunderstood", the creators of Article Bot cry out. Don't judge us! OK, I'm a fair person, I'll hear them out. Here's a recent press release from Article Bot:
"(PRWEB) May 23, 2005 -- "The outcry from webmasters around the world for an unstoppable tool that replaces whole staffs of copyrighters, creates organic-feeling, and unbeatably unique content in any language is deafening. The rave reviews Article Bot continues to receive from users tells us we're on to something good," says Mr. Harrold.
"The excitement and controversy around Article Bot amazed us. We said that Article Bot was the future of content-creation, yet we were not prepared for the future coming so soon! With that lack of planning came a need to increase the price of Article Bot," says Don Harrold, Article Bot co-creator.
"Also, Article Bot is about to release a new and shockingly-revolutionary 'Relational Database Article Bot.' We plan to allow only folks who are current Article Bot users, at the time of release, to get their hands on this unstoppable software," says Mr. Harrold."
There's more, but you get the gist - it's unstoppable.
Bots - get used to them
Bots are here to stay on the Web. In fact the era of content aggregating and generating bots has only just begun. Automatic content for the people.
But it's still a very grey area. Some bot-generated sites I like - e.g. Planet Web 2.0 and Memeorandum (which is doing a sterling job of covering the tragic London events of yesterday).
Plus software that makes it easy to re-post and remix - like reBlog and reblg - is something which can be utilised in good ways. This is certainly the case with the people behind reblog and reblg. They're all fine folks, who I'm familiar with via the blogosphere, who want to enhance our social networking and information management experiences.
But let's be frank. Software like that can be utilised in bad ways too, of course. It's a grey area.
Moralising
Perhaps it's a moral judgement we each have to make, as to which bot-generated sites are good and which are bad (hat-tip Andrew for the insight). Article Bot feels morally wrong to me. It contributes to clutter on the Web, by generating loads and loads of content with no original thought behind it. AKA spam blogs. And the marketing of this software is very disrespectful of human content creators - the writers and bloggers and people who make the Web such an invigorating place. Sure you can automate the content of a website, but don't try and route around the people who write the original content you're feeding off. That's what most annoyed me about SuperFeedSystem and its ilk.
I believe sites like Planet Web 2.0 and Memeorandum *do* respect the content creators - and that's why I like them.
But I don't get the same impression from software makers like Article Bot and SuperFeedSystem. They, and the people who end up using their products, are driven by avarice and have little respect for collaboration, conversations and ideas - the things that make the Web feel so alive to me and others.
Now... that's my moral judgement and I make no apologies for it. Actually it's pretty black and white if I look at it that way.
UPDATE, 9 July 2005: Don Harrold from Article Bot responds in the comments: "Stick a price tag on information and you get what you've got now."
Priceless.
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I think you're uncovering some essential quality of content remixing that perhaps hasn't been appreciated before. Aggregating and remixing content needs to be done with respect. We should respect the original author's intent and also the time and effort they put into creating the content.
Repurposing, passing off, non-attribution - these are all disrespectful ways to treat content and people.
Hopefully I'm treating the writers with respect on Planet Web 2.0 (and other similar sites I host). Perhaps a little bit more traffic will flow to them or perhaps it'll help people discover related writers to those they already know. Either way I appreciate the work that goes into the writing and only wish I could write half as well as those I read.
Finally, an example of reblg working, sort of. Glad to see they have seen the light with the original reblog.org and are now working with them. My own cut is that it still takes too much wiring to get microcontent collaboration to work. Very early adopter.
There's a lot of developments on this front, though. Stay tuned. I expect you will see some rather exciting opportunities, particularly from reblog.org.
You'll note by the way that this is an example of microformats entering into Web 2.0. Watch how it changes everything.
Richard: I don't think it's a matter of vague moral judgement at all. It's a matter of personal responsibility, on all fronts.
For example, it's a publisher's responsibility to tell me (via robots.txt) that she doesn't want my spider aggregating her content. And it's my responsibility to respect her wishes, rather than come up with some rationalization that lets me ignore the bar she's placed on the door.
Same thing with full-content vs. summaries. If a publisher wants me to stick to summaries, then she needs to provide them... when given both, I'll always err on the conservative side and use the summary.
When you boil it down, you can't look at a bot-powered site in isolation. If a publisher isn't taking advantage of the available tools and providing guidance, then it's pretty much impossible to tell a well-intentioned bot from an evil one.
Ian thanks - as you're one of the developers of Planet Web 2.0, I'm pleased we're on the same wavelength.
Bud, yes very interesting times!
Roger, how many bloggers and writers are going to bother configuring their robots.txt file? If they even know what it is! Publishers can't be expected to keep up with all the Article Bots and SuperFeedSystems of this world, let alone explicitly ban each one of them in a robots.txt file.
One solution I can think of is a collaborative community response to the 'bad' software. If one of them gets out of hand, then the blogosphere needs to find some way to route around that particular system and/or blacklist them in some manner. I don't mean to sound like a vigilante, but I do think it's beyond the humble individual publisher / blogger to deal with the Article Bots of this world.
Your opinion that Article Bot is not "moral" is interesting. The usages of Article Bot are no more (or less) moral than that of MS Word. For example, see the content at this site: http://www.stockpickreport.com/stocks/sp500/Solectron-Corp-SLR.php
That content is just as "valid" and "moral" as the content about the same stock (SLR) at Yahoo Finance.
Also, see the content at this site:
http://www.truckstopfinder.com
The content at that site was also created with Article Bot. Full of information. FULL of data. MUCH less advertising than at say, "About.com", or Yahoo, or any other mainstream information site.
The ability of Article Bot to "re write" content is just one of it's features. That's why we released the press release that discussed our being misunderstood.
Based on what you wrote, I see that misunderstanding continues.
I am always amused to read about "cluttering up" the internet, too. This is especially ironic because the search engines CHOOSE to spider our pages. We don't ask them, they CHOOSE to do it.
If you do not like the "clutter" on the web, I suggest you either A) start your own "clutter free" search engine, B) complain to the search engines and insist that they have humans get rid of the "clutter" (which they won't do because that would COST TOO MUCH MONEY), or C) only frequent sites with human-edited links to begin with - remember those?
You see, the demise of the internet began when Wallstreet INSISTED on turning information exchange into a "for profit" venture. Libraries in the "real world" are "uncluttered" because they are FREE.
Stick a price tag on information and you get what you've got now.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
Ok Don, let me see if I'm still misunderstanding your product... I accused you of avarice, contributing to the Web's clutter by not publishing anything original or thoughtful, and being immoral in your motives. You:
1) Point me to two websites made with Article Bot that are covered in ads and are made up of content that the website owners didn't write.
2) Blame the search engines for spidering your crap.
3) Tell us all that "the demise of the internet" is because there's now a price tag on information. Bizarrely, that seems to be your explanation for why your product exists.
Now tell me again how I'm misunderstanding you...
Richard: "Roger, how many bloggers and writers are going to bother configuring their robots.txt file?"
I'm suggesting that it's a responsibility... that they don't bother to live up to it is part of the problem. If Blogger Bob is too clueless to configure something as fundamental as robots.txt, then he needs to turn to tools or volunteers to help him. Not bothering isn't an option.
And it needn't be all that onerous. Those of us working on aggregators could simply come together and agree on a catch-all user-agent that we will respect... AllAggregators, for example. If we see AllAggregators in a Disallow directive, we could turn around and walk away, no matter who we are.
There are other options, too... like community-driven blocklists that can be dropped in by novices. Or a less-restrictive variation on AllAggregators, like AllWebAggregators. Or publishing tools that deny access at the app level.
Is any of that going to deal directly with the Article Bots of the world? The tone of Don's post doesn't fill me with hope... but he's beside the point. The point is that if Blogger Bob and Aggregator Alvin are both making a clear effort to understand and respect one another and the environment they share, recognizing the spamvertisers and bad actors for what they are becomes really simple.
And once they're unambiguously recognized, there are all sorts of ways to deal with 'em... complain to ISPs, take 'em to court, etc.
Roger, thanks for the explanation. Now I understand where you're coming from. I totally agree that it should be community-driven.
Ok Don, let me see if I'm still misunderstanding your product... I accused you of avarice, contributing to the Web's clutter by not publishing anything original or thoughtful, and being immoral in your motives. You:
1) Point me to two websites made with Article Bot that are covered in ads and are made up of content that the website owners didn't write.
*** The stock site I sent you a link to is all relevant, valid content. Each stock has charts, news, and links to more content - all of which is specific and relevant. The "Truck Stop" site is the same. So, I do not understand your point. You say, "covered with ads". Well, what about every portal site on the web? Aren't they "covered with ads"? In fact, I get calls from Overture trying to SELL me ad space. Their entire model is AD driven. The Google Adsense program is Google's revenue model.
2) Blame the search engines for spidering your crap.
*** I don't blame anyone for anything. I suggest that you discuss with the engines their policy of SPIDERING what you call "crap". Why do you blame a website owner for what the search engines do with his content?
3) Tell us all that "the demise of the internet" is because there's now a price tag on information. Bizarrely, that seems to be your explanation for why your product exists.
*** The commercialization of the internet is an issue which I am not the first to bring up. If you do not see the correlation between the rise of corporate portals and the fall of relevant information at those portals, I'm not sure I can explain it better.
Now tell me again how I'm misunderstanding you...
*** What you misunderstand (or choose to ignore) is this: Article Bot is a tool. You don't know all of it's abilities. You mention a "moral" angle and then dismiss sites made with Article Bot that do what the "portal" sites do.
There is clearly not a way for me to "win". If you want to see Article Bot as "immoral", I can't change that, I guess. All I can say is that it's a tool that has a myriad of uses. And, like all tools, some of the uses are "good" and some are "bad" (with these words defined in many ways by many people.
In it's most simplistic form, Article Bot can be used as a powerful re-writing tool to help authors re-write things they've written. In the past folks used thesaurus. Now, they could use Article Bot.
I wish you nothing but the best and I hope you will take a deeper look at Article Bot. Your questions about morality are good ones and I agree with your premise that "clutter" is unwanted.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
Roger,
What is your issue with this site:
http://www.stockpickreport.com/stocks/sp500/Solectron-Corp-SLR.php
Please show me the things about that site which you find objectionable. This site was created with Article Bot.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
I'm with Roger Benningfield on this one. The difference between web 2.0 and the other one is that business is conducted using REST, which can be seen as a contract language. If we're doing things on the web as opposed to the internet, we can take advantage of web architecture to resolve disputes.
The down side is that publishers have to take responsibility for doing that; the up side is that they have the ability to do that.
BTW, great essay, Richard. It's a thought-provoking point of view on an issue that I've never gotten excited about.
Thanks for the comment Lucas - I'd never really thought of REST as a "contract language", so I'll have to think about that some more...
Don, thank you for entering into the spirit of this conversation. That's the great thing about the two-way, read/write Web - we can discuss these things in the open and try to come to an understanding of each other.
Here's my response to your latest comments - and I encourage anyone to jump in and add their pov too...
1) The stock sites may well be "relevant, valid content", but my point is that there is no thought or 'attention' behind any of it. So all it does is contribute to the increasing clutter of the Web.
Re ads, your product enables people to make money off content they had no hand in creating. Andrew Chen wrote a post which put this into better words than I can think of right now. Andrew said:
"The issue is that ArticleBot and SuperFeedSystem and whatnot are not paying that price tag - they are neither paying the authors of the content money, nor are they paying the time and effort it takes to create good content. [...] In short, like nearly every other thing worth decrying as immoral, theyíre trying to get something for less than what it is worth, or encourage others (their customers) to think that they can."
http://www.andrewsw.com/news/?p=978
Now, in order to be fair to everyone - I've been trying to think of ways your system is different from e.g. Planet Web 2.0 or even a normal linkblog (where all the content is links and there's no original content). With Planet Web 2.0, even though it is automated and there's nothing 'original' on the site (as it's all been published elsewhere), the creators are not using the automated content to make money - i.e. there are no ads etc. They also clearly attribute the authors and don't try and pass the content off as their own in any way. Their site is not clutter to my mind, because it was built for a specific community and encourages community action (re-blogging and adding new points of view, etc). Those are all aspects missing from Article Bot-generated sites, as far as I can see.
As for a linkblog, well each link clearly has some thought or 'attention' behind it. So I don't see that as clutter, because by linking to something on a linkblog the owner of it is signaling that the link/original content is worth paying attention to. Whereas with Article Bot or SuperFeedSystem and the like, there's no original thought or even attention being expressed in the publication of your content. That's why it = clutter.
2) On blaming search engines for spidering this content, you reply: "Why do you blame a website owner for what the search engines do with his content?"
You're clearly trying to shift the responsibility over to search engines and indeed your users (which was SuperFeedSystem's main form of defence). In some respects it *is* up to the users of your software not to use it for 'bad' means - which I think is what Roger and Lucas were saying. I agree with that. But I also think YOU need to take responsibility for the way you market your products - as I mentioned in my post, I find it very distasteful how your marketing shows no respect for content creators and indeed you promote your software as a way to route around the need to write original content.
I don't blame search engines for spidering this content, I blame the people who are responsible for said content - which is both yourselves and the people who use your products.
3) On clutter, you said: "If you do not see the correlation between the rise of corporate portals and the fall of relevant information at those portals, I'm not sure I can explain it better."
I'm not sure why you keep comparing your product and its output to portals, such as MyYahoo and MSN I presume. Such portals exist to bring together content from a variety of sources in one place, often with a huge number of users who go to the portal because of this content aggregation. But the difference is that the big portals always attribute content and there is always a writer or author or *person* behind each article or story on the portal. i.e. the portals pay their dues to the content creators - they have to, otherwise they'd get sued (that's the practical reality, not a judgement from me).
4) You said: "like all tools, some of the uses are "good" and some are "bad" (with these words defined in many ways by many people."
OK this is the angle that you guys always take and I have to admit there's not much I can do to argue against it. Yes, Article Bot is a tool and it's the user's responsibility etc. In this way, your system is not much different than, say, Planet Web 2.0's system. But, and here's my main point, the difference is in how you promote your system and demonstrate its uses. Whereas Planet Web 2.0 is a model of community and collaboration, the examples you pointed me at were two junk sites full of re-purposed content and adverts. And the promotional words you use on your own website do not encourage anything but avarice and a way to route around people who create original content.
So how can I not conclude that it's immoral and contributes to clutter on the Web?
Hey Richard, thanks for quoting my post. To be honest, that post grew out of what was going to be a comment on this blog, but I thought it got large enough to stand on its own.
Anyway, I think marketing intent is something that it is quite clear needs to be focused upon: the recent Grokster decision indicates this as much. In Grokster's case, it was that they actually suggested people do things that were illegal. In ArticleBot's case... this is just the next generation of SEO, which search engine companies such as Google already indicate that they don't like.
I'd have more respect for articlebot if they actually hired a decent web designer. If their product is doing that good, you think they'd be able to hire such a decent web designer. If their product isn't doing that good, maybe it is because the public rejection of their concept is something they should bow to? In other words folks: put up or shut up.
Incidentally Don, I just came across the pop-up on Article Bot's homepage. It reads:
"Greetings from The 'Bot! Are you new to Article Bot? Would you like to find out more? Does Article Bot sound, "too good to be true"? Hey, we understand. Some days we have to pinch ourselves and say, "Yeah, Article Bot REALLY is that good!" Why not join our free information list? We don't share your info. You're not going to get a bunch of spam. You'll just get the HARD FACTS about Article Bot. Join the revolution today! It's time to take back the internet!"
Take back the Internet?! What does *that* mean?
A note to Don --
Don, you're clearly creating a product which uses syndicated content for its quantitative properties, as a source of entropy, in order to fool search engines. When you say that your product has a myriad of uses, that's a lie to our faces. It has one use, to fool search engines.
I don't blame you for being a capitalist, by the way. Making money is fine with me.
On the other hand, I don't have much respect for SEO as business, because it strikes me as destructive to the environment. This is a business with high social cost, meaning that it makes a little money for one party by costing a lot of money to the mass of users. Users and businesses depend on search engines working; your product is a new way to make them work worse.
Your product idea is somewhat clever, and I respect that. It was a good idea. And it'll be a little hard to defeat -- detecting the randomness of compilations created with your software will not be easy.
On the whole, however, you are plainly in the spam business, so own up to it.
Richard,
It is my style to reply to all that I can. So, bear with me if I'm short on some answers.
>>>1) The stock sites may well be "relevant, valid content", but my point is that there is no thought or 'attention' behind any of it.
*** Okay, so at least you'll give me the "relevant" or "valid" part. But, you are incorrect about the "thought" part. I thought long and hard about those pages. You assume something which is not true. And, besides, what difference does that make? Are you saying that we now are going to judge sites on "how much thought" is put into them? Gee whiz...
>>>So all it does is contribute to the increasing clutter of the Web.
*** No more than any other stock site. Yahoo Finance (I've made this point three times now) is the same as what I've got at my site. If it's okay for Yahoo Finance to produce pages of stuff that they DID NOT WRITE themselves, then, why can't I?
>>> Re ads, your product enables people to make money off content they had no hand in creating.
*** NO. Article Bot CAN be used that way. It can also be used in a million other ways. But, to say in a general statement that Article Bot enables people to do ANYTHING is WAY off base. There are people (myself included) that use Article Bot on MY OWN hand-written content.
>>> Andrew Chen wrote a post which put this into better words than I can think of right now. Andrew said:
"The issue is that ArticleBot and SuperFeedSystem and whatnot are not paying that price tag - they are neither paying the authors of the content money, nor are they paying the time and effort it takes to create good content.
*** Mr. Chen is another person who doesn't understand Article Bot. What is this whole thing about OTHER PEOPLE's content???? Article Bot was written by ME so that I could manipulate MY OWN content. It was written so I could make more of MY OWN content. The effect is that you COULD use it for other stuff, but that's not how I initially created the software.
That said, let's look further at this concept of taking other peoples stuff and not "paying" them: That is how Google, Yahoo, MSN, (et al), MAKE THEIR MONEY. That is the portal business model. They scrape content from our sites and serve that content up to folks. They serve that content (that they paid nothing for) with ads all over it.
So, if you argue that "taking other peoples content" is bad, you need to join US and fight the search engines. They've turned thievery into an ART FORM.
>>> [...] In short, like nearly every other thing worth decrying as immoral, theyíre trying to get something for less than what it is worth, or encourage others (their customers) to think that they can."
http://www.andrewsw.com/news/?p=978
*** WHAT is this guy talking about??? LOL! The pontification from folks who don't know what Article Bot is or does, or its uses is actually funny at times.
>>> Those are all aspects missing from Article Bot-generated sites, as far as I can see.
*** Well, all I can say is that there is no "Article Bot-generated" type of site. They are all creations of individuals. And, furthermore, there are people (again, like ME) who don't use Article Bot just to make sites. I use it for other things. The preoccupation with "sites" completely misses the boat with what Article Bot does.
>>> 2) On blaming search engines for spidering this content, you reply: "Why do you blame a website owner for what the search engines do with his content?"
You're clearly trying to shift the responsibility over to search engines and indeed your users
*** No, I'm not shifting anything. You contend that we (Article Bot) "clutters" up the internet. My contention is that the search engines don't have to steal our content in the first place. But, if they do, then it is up to THEM to figure out what to do with it. If you don't like it you should discuss that issue with them. How I build MY site is up to me. What the search engines do with my site is up to THEM.
(which was SuperFeedSystem's main form of defence). In some respects it *is* up to the users of your software not to use it for 'bad' means - which I think is what Roger and Lucas were saying.
*** What? In the first place, you don't have the right to decide what is "bad" or "good" about INFORMATION. You also don't have the right to tell others what they can or can't create at THEIR SITE. Gee whiz, I can hardly believe you are making this point!
I agree with that. But I also think YOU need to take responsibility for the way you market your products
*** I agree with you on that.
- as I mentioned in my post, I find it very distasteful how your marketing shows no respect for content creators and indeed you promote your software as a way to route around the need to write original content.
*** No, we do not. We show how to MANIPULATE content. But, that's a moot point anyhow. You realize the irony don't you? I mean, you are worried about our computer generated content, right? Well, Google made their name by using COMPUTERS to JUDGE your content. Yahoo, and MSN followed suit over the last few years. Remember when humans did that sort of thing? Yeah, me too. Problem is, it costs money to get real people to "judge" a sites worthiness. So, the engines use robots. Okay, so if they can get rid of people to "judge" sites, why can't I use a robot to CREATE a site? Well, you'll argue that our sites are "clutter". But, that's so AMAZINGLY short-sided that I can't even begin to answer that charge. If you want, we can do a whole thread on that topic.
>>> I don't blame search engines for spidering this content, I blame the people who are responsible for said content - which is both yourselves and the people who use your products.
*** Dude, seriously. You've got to be kidding. Let me point out again: I don't ask the search engines to take my content. THEY TAKE IT ON THEIR OWN VOLITION. These are publicly traded corporate behemoths whose job it is to make money - lots of it. If those folks want to take my content, then so be it. But, I'm not to blame for what they do with it. That's THEIR problem. Why can't you see that???
>>> 3) On clutter, you said: "If you do not see the correlation between the rise of corporate portals and the fall of relevant information at those portals, I'm not sure I can explain it better."
I'm not sure why you keep comparing your product and its output to portals, such as MyYahoo and MSN I presume. Such portals exist to bring together content from a variety of sources in one place, often with a huge number of users who go to the portal because of this content aggregation. But the difference is that the big portals always attribute content and there is always a writer or author or *person* behind each article or story on the portal. i.e. the portals pay their dues to the content creators - they have to, otherwise they'd get sued (that's the practical reality, not a judgement from me).
*** Nothing you wrote so far has angered me. But, this defense of the portals is pretty close. First, I do not compare myself to anyone. What I do ask, though, is that you apply the same standards to my sites as you do the portals. If they can take content, then I can take content. If they can make dynamic pages, so can I. If they can have ads flying all over the place, so can I. As for their purpose, their purpose is to make money. The business of trafficking information is the new paradigm. If the portals can take my content and sell ads around it - regardless of whether you think that's "okay" or not - SO CAN I.
>>> 4) You said: "like all tools, some of the uses are "good" and some are "bad" (with these words defined in many ways by many people."
OK this is the angle that you guys always take and I have to admit there's not much I can do to argue against it.
*** Who are "you guys". And, what do you mean "angle"? It's not an "angle", it's the TRUTH. Article Bot is a tool. Nothing more. A powerful tool, yes. But a tool.
Yes, Article Bot is a tool and it's the user's responsibility etc.
*** Right...
In this way, your system is not much different than, say, Planet Web 2.0's system. But, and here's my main point, the difference is in how you promote your system and demonstrate its uses.
*** Huh? So, you are granting that Article Bot is a tool but you are now contending that the way we "market" it bears on it's "good"ness or "bad"ness... Dude, where does this end???
Whereas Planet Web 2.0 is a model of community and collaboration, the examples you pointed me at were two junk sites full of re-purposed content and adverts.
*** Okay. I quit. I will not reply further. Seriously. Those two sites you call "junk" are full of valid, relevant content. And, your ability to push them aside while you extol the virtues of the portals is all I can stomach. Dude, Google TAKES EVERY SINGLE BIT OF THEIR CONTENT. THEY WRITE NONE OF IT. NONE. NONE. NONE.
...ugh...
Google provides a useful purpose - they help people find what they're looking for.
ArticleBot works contrary to that purpose.
I like Google.
I do ip-deny on most other search engines or things that might scrape my site.
Helping Google help people find what they're looking for is something that I, and others ( http://www.andrewsw.com/news/index.php?p=198 and http://www.unix-girl.com/blog/archives/000852.html ) have been doing for sometime. It is our way of being "good citizens" to the internet community.
Google helps people. We help people by helping Google help people.
ArticleBot seems to be something that aims to do the exact opposite of what I, Kasia, and others have been trying to do for years: ensure that people do not find content repeated on our sites.
Even if run on one's own content, it is still nothing much more than SEO, and it is being advertised as something better than SEO.
Yahoo pays AP and Reuters for their news. Google pays by not actually having the full text - has attribution, linking, etc... - and Google also pays by providing the useful service of helping people find their content.
If sites powered by ArticleBot all did as Yahoo and Google did - paying the authors or providing useful service - then I'd consider it.
http://www.truckstopfinder.com/
produces "news" that begin in the middle of sentences, end in the middle of sentences, and are grammaticaly incorrect. It, along with the other example site, provide click-throughs that are designed to fool the reader into thinking that the link is somewhere on the site.
http://www.stockpickreport.com/stocks/sp500/Solectron-Corp-SLR.php
only provides the excerpt (from the feed) or first paragraph of the content that is being linked to.
Don: show me a site that works on your own content. Show me the original content, and then the articlebot powered site that has rewritten that content. I actually do have a mild interest in having some of my stuff rewritten as I could use an editor to check my spelling and grammar every now and then. If articlebot could do that for me, I might be interested in it. Can it?
Andrew,
>>> Google provides a useful purpose - they help people find what they're looking for.
*** That is your opinion. There are other opinions. Many individuals and companies are suing Google for copyright violations. Just because you like getting "free" information, does not make it okay for Google (et al) to steal it, manipulate it, and profit from it. Google makes nothing original - they TAKE IT ALL. They then store it on their servers. They then decide how to present the data they took. They are the ULTIMATE content-stealing robot. NOTE: The biggest frustration I have when discussing Article Bot is that people like you assign "good" to Google and completely ignore the very serious copyright infringement issues. You ignore the fact that Google TAKES everything and MANIPULATES it and PROFITS FROM IT. Then, you assign "bad" to Article Bot when you don't even know what it's uses are. All you see is that it "makes pages" that are "useless" (based on YOUR definition). But, since you don't have ANY experience with it or even know all it's features you are not in a place to know why you'd like it or not in the first place.
>>> ArticleBot works contrary to that purpose.
*** LOL. You don't even know what it does. And, even if you did, you say that "ArticleBot" works "contrary" to some purpose. Let me see if I can say this again: ARTICLE BOT IS A PIECE OF SOFTWARE. How you use it or why or where or whatever is up to YOU. Article Bot does not "work" to any purpose. Why is that so hard for y'all to understand????
>>> I like Google.
*** Super. That's what they want you to do. Hey, I admit that it's pretty neat to get free information on any topic. What's not so neat is that you are allowing a publicly-traded company to DECIDE for you what is relevant. You are allowing a publicly traded company to pass judgement on what is "good" or "bad" information. You are promoting the out-right theft, manipulation and profit-from information that Google did not create yet built a business around. So, if you think that is "good", then you MUST find favor with Article Bot. Gee whiz...
>>> I do ip-deny on most other search engines or things that might scrape my site.
*** LOL. So, let me get this straight: You love Google so much that you give them exclusive access to take your content? LOL!!!! That is funny. You win the prize, dude. You win the prize.
>>> Helping Google help people find what they're looking for is something that I, and others ( http://www.andrewsw.com/news/index.php?p=198 and http://www.unix-girl.com/blog/archives/000852.html ) have been doing for sometime. It is our way of being "good citizens" to the internet community.
*** There you go again. "Good". I love it. Well, not really. It's pretty sad. Let me say it to you again: Google is a FOR-PROFIT multi-billion dollar corporation whose job it is to MAKE MONEY. Your "love" for these people is meaningless. They are not "good" they MAKE THE RULES. I must admit that as a free-thinker and a freedom-lover, I can't figure out why people like you love a COMPANY. A series of ALGORITHMS. A mainstream-wallstreet behemoth that is crushing the freeflow of information. How in the world you assign "good" and "love" to a COMPUTER PROGRAM is, well, beyond me.
>>> Google helps people. We help people by helping Google help people.
*** Google hurts people. I personally know folks who have lost thousands of dollars a year in revenue thanks to Google. There are multi-million dollar lawsuits against Gooogle for copyright-infringement. Google serves up PORN to children EVERY DAY. EVERY SINGLE DAY. (Ironically, stolen porn, at that.) Your view of the "good" Google is not born out by the facts. What Google is good at is taking content from people, manipulating it, serving it up and profiting from it. If that is what you mean by "good", then, I agree with you.
>>> ArticleBot seems to be something that aims to do the exact opposite of what I, Kasia, and others have been trying to do for years: ensure that people do not find content repeated on our sites.
*** Okay, again, read this: Article Bot does not "aim" to do anything. Article Bot is a piece of software that manipulates text. How it is used is up to the USER. There are people that simply use Article Bot to create different BACKGROUNDS for their sites. There are people that use it to re-write articles that THEY WROTE (me, for example). There are people that use it to create dynamic-feeling pages without having to use a database to pull in their data. LOL. All this talk of what Article Bot "aims" to do is so off-base.
>>> Even if run on one's own content, it is still nothing much more than SEO, and it is being advertised as something better than SEO.
*** Wait, first the argument against Article Bot was that it was NOT someone's "own" content. Now, you're saying that "even" if it is, THAT'S NOT GOOD ENOUGH???? Lol. Sigh.. Once more: Article Bot just manipulates text. ANY text. Words. Numbers. HTML. Whatever. How it's used is up to the user. We advertise it as a way for folks to do just that. And, yes, "seo" is a way to use Article Bot. But, since when is making your site better in the eyes of the search-engines BAD??? In fact, the search engines TELL YOU how to do that. Google sponsors web conferences to SHOW PEOPLE what they consider "good" seo. Lol. Your hero, Google, disagrees with you about "seo".
>>> Yahoo pays AP and Reuters for their news.
*** A) You don't know what arrangement they have for their news. B) Yahoo is not the only one who can display news on their site. C) What is your point? RSS is a valid means of distributing content. Yahoo PROMOTES RSS news aggregation. They WANT YOU to add their RSS feeds at your site. What is your point?
>>> Google pays by not actually having the full text - has attribution, linking, etc... - and Google also pays by providing the useful service of helping people find their content.
*** LOL. Google "pays" by linking??? Dude, you're kidding. Okay, well, then when I build my new site called, "content-we-took.com" I will expect you to write here how "good" we are for paying for that content by "linking" or "attributing" to the original. LOL!!!! And, there you go again with "good". Google is not "good". That is your opinion. And, your opinion is not very consistent. The same things you say about Google you say that if "I" (read: Article Bot) did, we'd (read: Article Bot) be "bad". LOL.
>>> If sites powered by ArticleBot all did as Yahoo and Google did - paying the authors or providing useful service - then I'd consider it.
*** First of all, there are no sites "powered by" Article Bot. You could use Article Bot to create ONE ARTICLE. ONE ARTICLE. ONE PARAGRAPH. Or a whole site. Or a few pages. Or an ad. Or an information portal. Or 100 headlines. Or... Or... WHATEVER. Second, we (read: Article Bot) don't need your "consideration". Don't use it. In fact, here is a plan for you: Don't use the internet at all - too much "computer generated" content (newsflash - Google news is ALL computer driven). lol....
http://www.truckstopfinder.com/
produces "news" that begin in the middle of sentences, end in the middle of sentences, and are grammaticaly incorrect.
*** 1) That site is a listing of 3000 truck stops around the country with information about each one that is VERY useful. I have travelled extensively and have used that kind of information on EVERY TRIP. That site is topical, specific, and valid. As for the news, that is STRAIGHT FROM YAHOO NEWS. If it's grammatically incorrect, you can thank YAHOO NEWS. LOL!!!!
>>> It, along with the other example site, provide click-throughs that are designed to fool the reader into thinking that the link is somewhere on the site.
*** What are you talking about. There's nothing of the sort at that site. TruckStopFinder.com was created to give information to folks who are looking for it and for me to get paid when they do so. Uh, that's still okay, right? I mean, I can still try to make money, right? That's not "bad", right? Wowzers. Listening to you is like a bad dream.
http://www.stockpickreport.com/stocks/sp500/Solectron-Corp-SLR.php
>>> only provides the excerpt (from the feed) or first paragraph of the content that is being linked to.
*** That site gives TONS of specific info. DUDE, it is unreal even discussing this. I can't believe I'm having to defend my STOCK PORTAL. I PAY FOR THOSE CHARTS. I PAY FOR THAT STUFF. All Article Bot did was MAKE THE PAGES. Google PAYS ME for clicks from that site (not much, by the way). I'm aghast at the insanity of this. Here you are making uneducated comments about my sites and I'm actually wasting time defending them.
>>> Don: show me a site that works on your own content. Show me the original content, and then the articlebot powered site that has rewritten that content.
*** STOCKPICKREPORT.COM. That site regularly has Article Bot content. The whole back-end of those stock pages are Article Bot. I PAY for the charts and stock lookup information and Article Bot PUTS THE PAGES TOGETHER. It LINKS THEM UP. It makes the titles. Article Bot creates the HTML. Why? So I don't have to hand type 500 pages of HTML.
Unreal. Just unreal....
>>> I actually do have a mild interest in having some of my stuff rewritten as I could use an editor to check my spelling and grammar every now and then. If articlebot could do that for me, I might be interested in it. Can it?
*** "Mild interest"? There is an entire section of Barnes and Noble for folks with a "mild interest" in re-writing. That section contains thesauruses and dictionaries. In the old days you used those. Now, if you want, you can use Article Bot. But, that's just ONE USE for Article Bot.
I gotta say that when we created Article Bot, I never dreamed of the A) angst toward it from people who have NEVER USED IT, and B) the love for Google (et al) that is borderline manic. All I wanted was a way to make my content creation easier, faster, and more readable than what I could do by hand. To that end, Article Bot does what I need. The fantasy world folks like you put Article Bot in is a place I'm not familiar with. To ascribe to Article Bot the moniker of "bad" and Google the tag, "good" is (at best) intellectually inconsistent.
Where to start... firstly I want to say that none of this is personal towards you Don. I thank you for taking the time to respond.
Rather than do a point-by-point response to your latest comments (I'll be here all day if I do that), I'll take a few of your main points and address those.
Firstly on comparisons to portals, you said "Yahoo Finance (I've made this point three times now) is the same as what I've got at my site. If it's okay for Yahoo Finance to produce pages of stuff that they DID NOT WRITE themselves, then, why can't I?"
My point here was that Yahoo Finance (as an example) pays for and licenses all the data they have on their page - see the footer on http://finance.yahoo.com/. However I see that you too claim to have paid for the data you use on Stock Pick Report: "I PAY FOR THOSE CHARTS. I PAY FOR THAT STUFF. All Article Bot did was MAKE THE PAGES." (comment 18).
If that's the case, then I have no problem with Stock Pick Report if you've licensed all the content contained in that website. That wasn't immediately obvious to me when I first visited the site.
Overall though, I agree with Lucas - you're in the spam business and you're not owning up to it. Your replies on this point are very disingenuous IMHO.
e.g. you said: "Article Bot was written by ME so that I could manipulate MY OWN content. It was written so I could make more of MY OWN content. The effect is that you COULD use it for other stuff, but that's not how I initially created the software."
LOL! Well OK, but regardless of why you initially created it - you're now hawking your product on your website as "a new paradigm for anyone who needs unique, relevant, and unstoppable content". Come on, own up to the fact that this product is all about MAKING MONEY on the Web - for yourself and your customers. That in itself is not a 'bad' thing, but you're promoting the tool as a way to fool the search engines into spidering "organic-looking" content. That's what I take issue with.
In the comments to this post you said: "Okay, so if they [Google] can get rid of people to "judge" sites, why can't I use a robot to CREATE a site? Well, you'll argue that our sites are "clutter". But, that's so AMAZINGLY short-sided that I can't even begin to answer that charge. If you want, we can do a whole thread on that topic."
You're right, that's exactly what I argue - that Article Bot-generated sites are rubbish and clutter up the Web. Is it short-sighted of me to worry about the future of a Web weighed down by millions of pages of content that is "organic-looking", but has no original thought or attention behind it?
When it comes to sites like Stock Pick Report, well I'll grant you that Article Bot may be a useful method of creating such a website - provided the content is licensed and attributed correctly. That's pretty much what Planet Web 2.0 and Memeorandom do, after all.
But this type of thing I draw the line at (from your website):
- "You can have Article Bot re-write content into 1000s more pages of unique and spiderable content."
- "Article Bot content can pass as human-generated any day of the week."
What's the ultimate utility of such a system? It doesn't benefit end-users, because they'll now have to wade through 1000s of 'non-organic' pages of content in order to get at real, 'organic' content. By real and organic I mean content that is infused with thought, conversations, collaboration - the social 'people' aspects of the Web.
But nothing I say is going to stop your product - and that's not my aim with this conversation. My goal is to come to some understanding of:
a) where my own content fits in with this new era of automated websites - I've established that I'm comfortable with sites like Planet Web 2.0 and Memeorandom, and even Stock Pick Report to a degree; and
b) what things should we, as users of the Web, be wary of in this new era of automation. And I think we should be wary of hundreds of thousands of robot-generated pages that have no redeeming social value for the Web and will clutter up search engine results.
Don: your use of Yahoo's content clearly puts you on a different playing field than Yahoo. Your use of Google Adsense clearly puts you on a different playing field than Google. If you want to be considered equal to them, then stop being dependent on them.
I remember the original announcement of when Yahoo started offering news, and it was indeed a paid licensing agreement with AP and Reuters. So I do know.
Google does not give me information "for free" - it gives me a link to a website - and the creator of that website gives me the information under whatever terms they choose. I don't get my information from Google. It is through Google that I find out where to get my information. That is a distinction you appear to not be catching on to.
Ok, so, since ArticleBot is just a program, can you tell me what ArticleBot can do that a set of well-crafted XSLT transforms can not do, and why one would want to use ArticleBot instead of XSLT? They're both programs/technologies and they both can help transform text. Or, instead of XSLT, substutite any scripting-language/templating system in there (PHP, ASP, etc...)? Is the only difference an automated use of a theasaurus?
You have convinced me that you and I have a substantial distance in our views on this matter, and that neither of us is, in fact, understanding where the other is coming from properly. I am going to hold off on making any further comments at this point in time, because I believe that I may yet be able to understand your point of view, if I consider it enough, and I may also be able to yet have you understand mine as well, but to figure out how to formulate it properly will clearly take me some time, given the apparent rather different paradigms we have with regard to notions of "usefulness" "good" "help" "free" "rights" and so on. So I'm going to take some time off from this discussion, and I will revisit the issue in perhaps a few weeks.
I hope that in the mean time, you will be able to find a better web designer - I think that was one of the reasons that I had absolutely no idea that http://www.truckstopfinder.com/ had a list of nearly 3000 truck stops (the logo looks like a banner ad which I tuned out) - and I have no idea how to use the site to find said truck stops either - no listing by state that I can see, nor roadway. Perhaps it is there, but the poor design of the site does not make it obvious to me.
-- Andrew
Don: "Please show me the things about that site which you find objectionable."
The site provides attribution for aggregated articles, so that's the main thing. The link situation is a little problematic, since your configuration denies traffic to source sites if the client has disabled Javascript. You could achieve the same effect without a Javascript dependency by routing outgoing links through a server-side redirect. But all in all, it's not horrible.
Honestly, I only have three questions for you:
* Does/will Article Bot provide a clear, consistent, unambiguous user-agent string on every request?
* Does/will it check and obey robots.txt during every spidering session?
* Would you support a consensus-driven, simple method for publishers to deny access to all republishing aggregators? (Example: an "AllAggregators" rule in robots.txt.)
If the answers are "yes", "yes", and "yes", then any disagreements we might have are academic and relatively trivial. I may not care for your "clutter", but ultimately, that's between you and Google.
If your answer to any of the above is "no" (particularly on the first two points), then it's a different story. In that case, you're actively denying publishers the right to control their own fates, and Article Bot is an abusive spider.
Roger,
Article Bot does not have anything to do with the things you bring up. All it does is manipulate text. It is not a server side application. It is not a php script. It is a desktop app that you put your text into and out the other end comes manipulated, re-written text. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Don: I just sat through several of your screencasts (pretty decent job on those, by the way), so I've got a fair idea of what AB is doing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but AB automatically spiders sites for content based upon search terms. If that's the case, then it should be respecting robots.txt and providing a consistent user-agent string on every request. Simple as that.
Roger,
Article Bot does not spider anything. It is a TEXT MANIPULATOR. It can "scrape" content from search engines but that is just ONE feature. It does not do anything more or less than I've said.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
Don: I owe you an apology. If all Article Bot does is scrape Google/Yahoo and remix the little excerpts of content they provide, then the only real issue is that you're ignoring both engines' respective robots.txt directives.
Should you be doing that? Arguably not, but there are dozens (or more) of other desktop-based apps --some of them high profile, like Copernic-- that crawl search pages.
From what you're saying here, Article Bot is actually very little like the tools Richard has written about recently... SuperFeedSystem, for example. Again, my bad for assuming otherwise.
Roger,
Your apology is odd. I have stated over and over what Article Bot does. Nowhere did I say it only scrapes "Google/Yahoo". That is just one feature of dozens that Article Bot affords people.
Again: Article Bot manipulates text. That text can be your own creation. It can be a website. It can be scraped content. It can be one word. It can be one sentence. It can be 1000 words.
I am glad to see you apologize for assumptions, but I hope you will please read what I say and what Article Bot does.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
Yes, Article Bot manipulates text. To what end? To enable its users to automate the creation of hundreds or thousands of pages around a specified topic, in order to game the search engines and make money. Is that morally wrong to you? Well I have my opinion, but I'm just one person.
I've been browsing the AB Message Board and this is a fairly representative comment from one of the AB users:
"First - SE do not rank web sites - they rank web "pages".
One (and only one) element of getting a page ranked well is good (in SE eyes) content with relevant keywords.
So lets say you wanted to build a "site" about widgets. You write a great article about widgets in general & upload it. Odds are you will be competing with everybody & his uncle & the only page you have is about "widgets".
On the other-hand my A/B site has hundreds/thousands of pages of pages about widgets.Yet only took me an hour or so longer to build !!!
I also wrote a great article but instead of using the keyword "widget" I used the two keywords $$ORIDEColour & $$ORIDEWidgets - so I have pages such as;-
Blue Plastic widgets
Blue Plastic wigdets
Blue Platsic widgets
Blue Wooden widgets etc
ie colour (hundreds) x different types/common mispellings or typo's = lots of pages.
The choice is yours write one article per type of widget or one article, do some keyword research and use articlebot."
http://www.activeboard.com/forum.spark?
forumID=47354&subForumID=111638&action=
viewTopic&commentID=2868926&topicPage=3
Richard,
Why do you persist in this line of commentary? Let me say AGAIN:
HOW SOMEONE USES ARTICLE BOT IS UP TO THEM.
There are blogs full of garbage. There are blogs full of insight. Yours is full of, well, I don't know, Richard. What *is* your blog "full of"?
Guess I'll just lump your blog in with all the garbage. I mean, I've seen some blogs with garbage in them. Ergo, your blog must be garbage, too.
Hey, I've seen some websites that were full of "clutter". Guess, I'll call yours "clutter", too.
On that note, some people use their computer to make naughty emails and send them to unsuspecting readers around the world. Now, I've gotten some of that myself...
...did YOU send it?
I mean, you DO use email, right? And, I've seen that "some people" use email for "immoral" reasons.
Richard, I cannot believe you keep on this worthless rant about the immorality of Article Bot. Give it up, dude.
If you can't see that A) Article Bot is a TOOL that can be used for a myriad of purposes, and B) that I've shown you examples of how I use it in ways you've ADMITTED were "valid", then, well...
This is a hopeless endeavor.
I suggest you unplug your computer and go back to sending smoke-signals to get your point across. Sending smoke-signals meets at least two of your criteria: They take "work" and they must be "created" by humans.
But, I'm not sure how "moral" they'd be. You'd be sending greenhouse-gases into the atmosphere and that would be, well:
Immoral.
Seriously, it won't hurt you to just admit that there's nothing "immoral" about Article Bot.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
You feel better now, after that rant?
I'm not saying the tool is immoral, I'm saying it's being used *and promoted* for immoral purposes. Perhaps you're not responsible for the former, but you're definitely responsible for the latter.
Take a look at the infomercial that is your website (did Article Bot write that? if so it left out "But wait, there's more" and a reference to ginzu knives). And read some of the things on your messageboards.
Don't expect any apologies out of me mate, I dislike your product and the way it's being used.
Richard,
Uh, okay. I guess I'll just have to accept your decree that I am "immorally" promoting a piece of software for which you have no idea how or why to use.
LOL.
Let me know when you start the smoke-signals. I'll be watching the skies.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
I hate it when comments degenerate like this... both sides obviously do not see the other side's point of view and so things get reduced to petty mud-slinging. I'm as guilty as you are, Don, on that. Sigh.
So what to do? Well let me just say that I've seen *how* and *why* your software is being used from browsing your messageboards and even sitting through some of the tutorials. Believe it or not, I do my research before stating opinions.
The smoke signals comments were just pathetic btw.
Let's not continue this discussion, I'm sure it's annoying you as much as it is me. We're obviously never going to agree, so why not call it a day.
Don: So confusion still reigns. Let's try for two simple questions with simple, yes/no answers...
(1) Among its many features, does Article Bot scrape the content from blogs, feeds, and so on?
(2) If the answer to (1) is "yes", does it do so without respecting robots.txt or providing a consistent, blockable user-agent?
Roger,
1) No. Article Bot can scrape search engines, but that is only ONE thing it CAN do. It was designed to manipulate your HAND-WRITTEN content (be it words, html, or whatever).
2) The answer was, "no".
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
Richard,
What I hate is that you are wrong about Article Bot. You are wrong about our intent. You make sweeping moral judgments about us and our software yet you give a complete pass to the "good" people at Google for things like: Stealing content, distributing hardcore porn to children, saying they don't accept payment for placement when they CLEARLY do (ie the "intc" search), etc.
Your position is silly and immature. Your position that our software is "immoral" is misguided AT BEST.
The way you define "immoral" or "bad" is curious. However, you are not the first (nor the last) person who comments on Article Bot to have such a convoluted opinion.
My "smoke signal" comments are a good analogy. You are quick to lump our software into some "moral" or "ethical" area because of the way you PERCEIVE it to be used by SOME people - myself, not included in that list, as you've admitted. So, I simply suggest you don't use the "immoral" or "bad" tools of blogs, email, or the internet to disseminate your opinions.
You continue to ignore facts. You continue to use double-standards. You continue to throw out "red herring" arguments about how SOME people use our software.
That's not a discussion, that's an AGENDA.
You close with, "We're obviously never going to agree, so why not call it a day."
Hey, your use of the word "never" tells a lot about you. My opinion is swayed all the time. I change what I believe based on experience every day.
"Never" is not in my vocabulary.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
Don, you're very good with words (ironically perhaps). You've rather conveniently ignored all the issues I've put forth and continue to use silly analogies like smoke signals and standard arguments like 'Google does it, why can't we'. I really have little patience for those kinds of arguments or these kinds of word-games.
I've stated my position several times now and it's pointless to keep going back and forth like this.
The only "agenda" I have is to call attention to people that are polluting the Web with hundreds and thousands of pages about Blue Pastic widgets or Blue Plastic wigdets or blue wooden widgets etc etc - i.e. thousands of pages of CLUTTER designed to take advantage of the search engines. You protest your innocence and say it's nothing to do with you that people use AB this way, yet your website and messageboards are full of content that confirms that this is EXACTLY what your product is used for and is the reason why people should purchase it.
All your 'but it's just a tool' arguments and comparing yourself to portals and so forth is just defensive bluster and - to twist your analogy - smoke signals in the wind.
The proof is in the pudding and I need look no further than your own messageboards to see *how* and *why* people use your product.
Richard,
There you go again. Saying things which are not true. Putting words in my mouth.
You say that I say, "'Google does it, why can't we'. "
That's not what I've said. Not even close. It's funny to read your misquoting.
What I've said is that you apply a set of standards to Google that you do not apply to the INANIMATE Article Bot.
So, you give a pass to the porn-peddling, content-stealing, "good old boy networks" of the portal world while you ascribe the tags, "bad" and "immoral" to Article Bot.
I do NOT say that "we" (whoever that is) want to be like Google. No. What I want is the search engines to follow the same laws the rest of us must follow.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
Richard,
Regarding "clutter": If you do a search at Yahoo, Google, MSN, Ask Jeeves, and oh, any of the other 100 search engines for ANY term, you'll get roughly the SAME results.
That's not "clutter"?
LOL
Of course, you "love" the search engines, (especially Google), so your reply will be that they do "good" with their "clutter".
But, ironically, you continue to move right past the whole issue that the "clutter" they provide was TAKEN from sites like yours and mine.
But, alas, you won't address that issue, either. If you did, you'd just say it was "okay" to take content and manipulate it and serve it up and sell advertising around it...
...As long as someone's not using Article Bot to do so...
LOL!
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
Richard,
I forgot to mention this: You've not ever replied to the fact that the search engines CHOOSE to take our content. (By "our" I mean, yours, mine, whomever) They then profit wildly on that content.
You are more upset about what you perceive as "clutter" (still amazingly undefined, by the way) than you are at the Search Engines for PROFITING from that "clutter".
Now, if you'd like to see a decline in "clutter", there is a way to achieve that: The search engines could actually (pause for effect...) PAY for the content they take.
If the search engines PAID for what they took, you'd see a very steep decline in "clutter". But, there is a tit for that tat. The downside is that...
...that would not be a very profitable business model for the search engines.
There are "free" information repositories in the world. They are called, libraries. But, uh, they don't make any money.
Which is what would happen to Google if they had to pay for content. I mean, it's pretty cool to be able to have computers take other people's stuff, repackage it, and sell ads around it, while not paying a dime to the original content writers.
But, wait, we've already been through that. Sorry, I digress.
I don't suppose any of this logic is making an impact on you but I sure hope some of your readers will take notice.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
You're certainly persistant Don, I'll give you that... but much as I'm enjoying this exchange [rolls eyes], I think I'm going to leave the conversation as is. I've said everything I want to say on the matter.
I'll leave the comments open, as Roger may still have a dialogue going with you. And others are welcome to say their piece too.
Richard,
While you roll your eyes, Google served up more porn and took more content. If you blink, you'll miss it.
In any case, there is not much satisfaction watching you concede every point and ignore the fact that I replied in earnest to your putting words in my mouth.
It's sad to see someone use their website for such clutter.
Let me ask you, though, why do you ignore every point I've made about the search engines and their lack of morality? Why do you ignore the fact that I've asked you to explain your double-standards many times? Why do you ignore the fact that I did NOT say what you said, yet you based an entire line of argumentation on it?
I think I know. It's because you know I'm right. Seriously. You KNOW what I say about the search engines is true. You also have a lot invested in your "Article Bot is bad" comments. So, you're at a crossroads. You can't agree with me about the search engines and you can't continue to defend your position on Article Bot in light of the clear discrepancies in your logic.
So, I bid you adieu. This will go nowhere until you either apply some standards equally, or drop the silly notion of Article Bot being "immoral".
Not sure you'll do either any time soon.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
thebot@articlebot.com
"I think I know. It's because you know I'm right."
No, it's because I'm sick of this conversation. It's going nowhere Don - give it up. I'm only letting this drivel from you continue because I've been told off before by my readers for closing down a conversation on my blog when it had gotten out of hand.
So by all means, keep up the drivel. But I for one have got many better things to do with my time than to argue with you about Google and heaven knows what else you'll come up to defend your product.
I don't know what it is with people like you - if I respond to the above arguments point-by-point, a) I'll waste the rest of my day; and b) you'll just come back with a platter full of *more* arguments.
So, I'll say it one more time: I've said everything I want to say on the matter. Period. Full stop. End of discussion. Over and out.
But wait, there's more...
You want the last word, don't you? Well go ahead my friend... the floor is yours.
Richard,
This is my last entry in your blog.
It is surreal to know that I've brought up substantive issues regarding the engines and you ignore them every time, then you actually say, "I don't know what it is with people like you - if I respond to the above arguments point-by-point, a) I'll waste the rest of my day; and b) you'll just come back with a platter full of *more* arguments."
Richard, I don't know how to say this, but:
That's called DISCUSSION. You see, when you make sweeping, general comments like, "Article Bot is bad" or "Article Bot is immoral", or "Google is good", that's not discussion. That's grandstanding, point-making, and argument STARTING.
If you think it's a waste of time to DISCUSS things "point by point", then, SHUT YOUR BLOG DOWN.
Whether you agree or not is academic. But, there is no way you think it's "good" that Google takes content they don't pay for. There is no way you think it's "good" that the engines serve up porn to kids. There is no way you think it's "good" that the search engines profit from our content in ways that they tell us NOT to do.
Right? I mean, come on, Richard. Use your blog for good here, man. At least admit those things. If you want to continue to believe that Article Bot is "bad" or "immoral", that's another conversation, I suppose, but just at least give up the fact that you do not think the search engines are "good".
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
Richard,
I apologize for this entry (I said above that was my last entry).
Your opinion about too much clutter is shared by me. I believe there is way too much clutter on the web.
The answer to the problem is for the search engines to pay for their content (as we all do). If they proactively chose what they indexed and paid for that content, the amount of clutter would drop to statistical ZERO.
People would still use Article Bot (and other programs) to create content. The difference is that the way they use it would be shaped by the way the search engines index sites.
The first step in cleaning up the clutter is to make the search engines play by the same rules as we must. If that does not happen, you'll continue to see "clutter".
Here's an example: What if you did not monitor the comments on your blog? You could get folks using your blog to advertise their "widgets". The people that read your blog would eventually get tired of "widget" advertising. You would be at fault for not cleaning up your own blog.
That analogy is actually one step removed from the real analogy: You go out and grab comments for your blog from other blogs. Some of them would be off-topic and "clutter". All of them would be duplicate content found at other blogs.
Sincerely,
Don Harrold
Don, I really don't know how to end this so-called "discussion". I just don't think your Google analogy is relevant at all. Like I've said more than a few times now:
I'm not saying the tool is immoral, I'm saying it's being used and promoted for immoral purposes.
As is Google, no doubt. As is the Web. As is the Internet. Any "tool" you can name in fact.
But take a look at your messageboards and try to read the content with an objective eye. The people who use Article Bot are using it for one main purpose: to create hundreds and thousands of pages of content around a specifed topic in order to get good search engine rankings and make money.
That is what I'm trying to highlight here. I honestly can't see the point in arguing about Google, because it's got nothing whatsoever to do with the issue.
So let me re-iterarate: I'm NOT making what you call QUOTE "sweeping, general comments like, "Article Bot is bad" or "Article Bot is immoral", or "Google is good"" UNQUOTE. I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that Article Bot, the tool, is being USED and PROMOTED for what I've termed "immoral" purposes.
Let me just end by saying this is MY opinion only. Anybody crazy enough to read this far down the comments will make up their own minds.
I suppose I brought this "discussion" on myself, so if you like you can respond to this and continue with the Google analogy. But really, I said what I wanted to say about 10-15 comments back. I don't know how many more times I can say it.