[WikiEN-l] Nofollow and sister projects

[Seth Finkelstein]

> Andrew Gray
> (This has caused much elaborate conspiracy theory in the past
> revolving around nofollow and "favoured" Wikia links, etc)

	Well, in defense of critics, I think it's important to
acknowledge that there are many aspects of the situation which
certainly *look* suspicious. And the tendency of *some* (not all, but
*some*) Wikipedia people to react by making name-calling personal
attacks, along with longstanding antagonism against SEO's, doesn't
help. It pretty much makes a mockery of the idea of "civility".

	I've investigated the "nofollow" issue, and come to the
conclusion that there's less there than meets the eye. But I certainly
do understand where the harsh criticism of Wikipedia comes from. For
example, speaking as a journalist, I've never been able to get a
straight answer as to who was ultimately responsible for changing the
"nofollow" policy. There are conflicting public accounts from the
people involved. Moreover, the most obvious interpretation of that
discrepancy is very negative. Now, I'm not saying I believe that very
negative interpretation; for several reasons I think it's incorrect.
HOWEVER, I wouldn't say someone who did take a cynical view was being
irrational.

	Pre-emptive rebuttal: At this point, someone usually rushes to
explain to me that the nofollow exemption applies to all wikis on the
interwiki map. I know that. But then they argue that aspect refutes any
implication of favoritism from Wikipedia to Wikia, Inc. I don't agree
with that. There's a kind of favoritism which come not from outright
discrimination in the application of rules, but needing to know the
right people and make the right requests in order to get a benefit.
When you have the co-founder of a venture capital funded commercial
start-up being highly involved with policy changes on a top-ten
website that affect all such start-ups, it's really quite reasonable
to examine the situation very carefully.

	Pre-emptive rebuttal: It's legal. I know. That's not the point.

-- 
Seth Finkelstein  Consulting Programmer
Web site - http://sethf.com/
Infothought blog - http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/