[WikiEN-l] Reasons never to remove nofollow

[Jeff Raymond]

phoebe ayers wrote:

> You know, while I despise spammers as much as the next person, it's worth
> remembering that the "power of Wikipedia links" can be used for good, as
> well. For instance, there was recently a project by librarians at the
> [[University of Washington]] libraries to add relevant links to their
> online
> special collections -- like collections of WWII photographs -- to the
> appropriate Wikipedia articles. Surprise, surprise, their traffic
> skyrocketed -- always a good thing for libraries looking for funding, and
> a
> bonus for us as we get good, curated, non-profit links to collections
> people
> might not find otherwise. Of course *we* know this but people at
> institutions might not; libraries and museums and the like should always
> be
> encouraged to add relevant links to their collections if they can.

And, of course, the nofollow tags screw these institutions, as well.  Even
though they're getting the traffic through us, they aren't seeing the
results in their Google hits, even though they might have great material
we (bone-headedly) can't use.

It's too bad we can't have a meta-list regarding what should and should
not have nofollow on it, similar to the spam blacklist.  Not that the list
wouldn't be abused the same way the spam blacklist is now, but it would at
least work the best of both worlds.

-Jeff
-- 
If you can read this, I'm not at home.