Affiliate Links and Inclusion

Welcome to the Remedial Language and Literature Forum, sponsored by the Open Directory.

The technical term for use of "swank" in this context is "collocational clash." It's not hard to find examples of this sort of transition anywhere from Dave Barry to Aristophanes, and of course check out Aristotle's analysis of it in Attic Greek literature. In literature predating the Greek comic poets, the difficulties of identifying the connotative verbal distinctions upon which the irony or humor depends become daunting: but I suspect the phenomenon is nearly universal.

As a non-editor I had attempted to apologize for contributing to the destruction of this thread. As you can see it’s the editors whom wish to instigate further variance from the primary issue at hand.

Bizrate this is what you can expect from the meta community pure and simple babble! If the meta wishes to carry on Id suggest beginning a new thread.

Actually I believe it was mentioned that the bizrate issue was being looked into so I don't really think that a so called destruction of the thread is going to make any difference in the outcome. Lighten up wayfarer, this is a new forum and we are just trying our best to help.

This is rapidly getting useless. The best part is that with any consideration given, I will hear nothing of it from anyone associated with the ODP. And I will end up sending even more inquiries and wasting more people's time. Pointless for both sides.

Here we go. Hutcheson. You may not recall but in April we exchanged email on issues related to BizRate's inclusion. You referred to us as "a classic spammer site" and later retracted your statements suggesting we contact "someone possibly more knowledgeable than I about the particular area."

When asked how I could appeal to the good senses of the editors to consider our site as truly legitimate for the category, you responded that you were "really pushing the envelope." Your arrogance has apparently yet to retreat and your reluctance to pass judgment is quite absent in this forum.

For the sake of setting the record straight, let's address a few of the more troubling issues you've brought up:

1) Patience: I've waited for six months without a single email or action taken by the ODP. I've followed every rule and suggestion and wasted immense amounts of time. I remain a relatively polite and cooperative individual willing to stand in line -- you'll still find me here six months from now if nothing has changed but I'll be less polite. I define patience, so please don't patronize me.

2) "Now, you have a site that in many respects fits the profile of an affiliate site"
WHAT IS THE PROFILE?? This is the entire point of the post!!!

3) "its apparent purpose is to induce surfers to traverse its affiliate links" --
This is the structure of EVERY comparison shopping site in the category. What distinguishes BizRate from any of the other sites listed there with affiliate links?

I dare you to answer and actually define a rule.

4) Please stop insinuating my site is a spam site. Say it or don't say it but don't waste time with innuendo. I realize your policy is to shoot first and ask questions later but not every site is a spam site. Read the news. Search for BizRate.com and with a little reading you may discover several editors and writers salaried as experts by America's top publications may have contentions with your characterization of our site.

If Consumer Reports uses our rating system, it might carry some weight as actual content. But then again, who's Consumer Reports? Probably a bunch of spammers.

5) "issues spammers are concerned with are not those which concern the editing community: one wants profit to go to a particular site, the other wants information to flow most efficiently"

Again, please establish how I'm a spammer or what makes the site a spam site. The presence of affiliate links does not make BizRate a spam site. Similarly the abuse of a vocabulary will not make you a writer. (cheap but necessary)

"But even a spammer can look like an honest person, given enough patience."
Do I say it again? What's this hostility Stephen?

"The ODP's reputation for nonresponsiveness to spammers is a significant part of its quality control effort."

...or it's just a sign of the utter disrespect a large group of volunteers can cultivate towards all web sites with even a slightly commercial purpose. At least maintain an autoresponder that states "you will get no response."




And from Hutcheson’s second post:

1) The ODP Guidelines: aside from reading as if written by someone with the attitude of a 13-year-old, the guidelines on the whole provide little value to a site that has conformed to them yet remains maligned.

2) "We don't accept all sites, so please don't take it personally"

When people can lose their jobs, livelihoods, money for their kids educations, or any financed part of an American life, it becomes very personal. The ODP has never come to terms with the fact that it allows itself to be used in a commercial manner (part of an search engine algorithm or directly as results) and as a result must bear the burden of this responsibility. Don't like it? Disallow the commercialization of ODP results. (AOL/TW might have an issue.)

--->I'm skipping a great deal of the second posting from Hutcheson.

3) "I was surprised to eventually discover that the price comparisions do sometimes work."

You must be kidding. Close to 150,000 people today have used BizRate to comparison shop today. This is a shortcoming of the ODP. One man's arrogance versus 150,000 positive experiences. Sure. Trust the editor instead. (lunacy)

4) "At times I had the feeling that bizrate.com was little more than a (fairly close, but partial) knockoff of smartshopper.com's categories and listings, and in that context the argument "it's no less unique than smartshopper.com" sounded especially, um, curious."

Careful, Stephen, you're bordering on libel (at least ethically speaking). We've been around for years. What is smartshopper??

You might be referring to SmartShop. This is the way MySimon is duping the editor with a redirect. Try it. It's fun.

http://dmoz.org/Home/Consumer_Information/Price_Comparisons/

If you're going to say it, you'd best be ready to back it up.

"I suspect that this will be most shoppers' reactions"

(And you're suspicion would be ungrounded, irresponsible conjecture)


---

The one saving grace to all of this is that the ODP is fast becoming irrelevant to the interests of anyone searching the Web. To all frustrated parties reading this, rest easy knowing the ODP will eat itself (appetizers have already been served).

If you truly believe the ODP is verging on irrelevance, perhaps you could save us time by devoting your attention to directories you deem relevant. If, on the other hand, you wish to continue this discussion, please tell us what we can find on your site that constitutes unique content. Is your rating system the extent of your unique content?

Thank you for letting us know about the smartshop redirect.

http://dmoz.org/Home/Consumer_Information/Price_Comparisons/desc.html

I don't think anyone has referred to the above link. It's been in place, unedited, for a good long time, certainly longer than 6 months.

Also, http://dmoz.org/add.html is clear that not all sites will be included in ODP and once listed, no site is guaranteed permanent placement.

You're asking how the site differs from some that have been listed. What you don't seem to realize is that question can't possibly lead anywhere. If the answer is "not at all", then the site isn't unique and should be rejected. If the answer is "in these ways" -- then the site is different, and there's no reason to suppose that it shouldn't be rejected.

On the other hand, you're answering the wrong question.

You've told us how much money you're already making from affiliate links -- x thousand victims at y cents a pop. Sorry, we can't verify that information, and wouldn't consider it relevant anyway. ("don't know AND don't care!")

What you need to answer is how the site DIFFERS from all those that have been REJECTED. The guideline that you need to meet is "prominent, unique, relevant content".

That guideline is not lowered by every borderline site that is listed; quite the contrary. The standards are based on the sites that are already listed -- the first price comparision site was by definition unique. The second by definition isn't. Yours isn't the first or second -- and the bar must have been raised by every listing.

What, based on all the sites we already have listed, can you ADD to the value of the Open Directory? What, in short, is your unique content?

Note that the capability of accepting user feedback is not unique content -- it is merely the potential of future unique content. (If all those x thousand daily visitors actually give feedback, the site may someday be worth listing (perhaps in consumer information/reviews), even if it isn't now (or even if it isn't ever listable in price comparisions). If not enough of them have so far, then you need to show some other unique content.

arlarson, thank you for your constructive approach. I'd be happy to point out the unique content on our site with an explanation as to how it is unique.

I in no way expect a guaranteed inclusion in this category. I simply want someone to point out why we would not be included. If it is the presence of affiliate links, the argument fails with the inclusion of our competitors. If it is simply that the category is closed or an individual editor believes our site is inferior, that's his/her prerogative and I must accept it. However, it would be nice to receive a constructive response that indicates realistically how our site is deficient. I'd like to remedy it. I would not pretend for a moment that there are no areas for improvement. This is the case with any database driven site.

Hutcheson, you are ridiculous. What we all should realize is that this discussion is actually pointless. Nobody here, as far as I know, edits that category. I would be amazed to see someone actually do something about this matter. I would bet anyone here that nothing happens. And as I respond to each one of Hutcheson's barbed questions, he'll find another way to justify your completely untenable stance.

"You're asking how the site differs from some that have been listed. What you don't seem to realize is that question can't possibly lead anywhere."

Wrong. It leads to understanding our deficiencies. Very important. The ODP can either take the stance of maintaining some mysteriously superior judgment or it can take an active role in contributing towards making sites on the web BETTER.

"You've told us how much money you're already making from affiliate links -- x thousand victims at y cents a pop."

I never told you x or y. For all you know, I make no money on them. As you say, it's irrelevant so don't bother commenting on it.

I said that approximately 150,000 people found valuable content on our site yesterday. This is to help you understand that it makes absolutely no sense that you found nothing of value. You might consider that this is not an indication of how much money we make (agreed irrelevant) but purely a sign of the popularity and common, successful use of our site.

"The standards are based on the sites that are already listed -- the first price comparison site was by definition unique. The second by definition isn't."

No, but the second may very well be better. Your original contention, as you may recall, was that the presence of affiliate links made us a "classic spam site". This is why I make the comparison.

Follow close because I'm going move in a circular motion and in the end there's going to be a POINT. Younger sites with far less unique content and many affiliate links are listed. These sites have been in business for only a few years. We've been at it since 1996. You claim our site has no unique content. You claim that they had the content before us. You are wrong as we do have unique content and many of these sites employed the same features well after we had them. You claim affiliate links are keeping us out. Affiliate links did not keep them out. So in the end, you have no point.

"Note that the capability of accepting user feedback is not unique content -- it is merely the potential of future unique content."

It's there. Here are examples of unique content:

Product Reviews:
http://www.bizrate.com/marketplace/product_info/reviews__cat_id--402,prod_id--6289330,format--,de_id--325.html

Collecting and displaying hundreds of thousands of reviews IS in fact unique. Nobody has as many fresh reviews constantly accumulating. We collect more each day. The product reviews are each unique.

Honest Store Reviews:
The Good
http://www.bizrate.com/ratings_guide/cust_reviews__mid--30823,cat_id--402,prod_id--6438586,price--46999.html

The Bad
http://www.bizrate.com/ratings_guide/cust_reviews__mid--31062,cat_id--402,prod_id--6438586,price--43800.html

Unlike our competitors, we don't try to send people to the highest paying merchant, we want them to come back to us because they found a safe, quality place to buy online. This is what we do. We are, in effect, both a business and a consumer advocate. They are not mutually exclusive. Nobody on the web has a system like ours.

Product Comparisons:
http://www.bizrate.com/marketplace/compare/product_compare__cat_id--402,de_id--,pid-6438586--on,pid-6438587--on,pid-6438577--on.html

We automatically pull together similar products for comparison.

Savings:
http://www.bizrate.com/marketplace/merchandising/savings_center__de_id--299.html

We pull together offers from across the web to help people save money when they shop online.

Some of our competitors in the category have variations of some of these features. Others have none of them. We've very likely had them long before many of them ever did. Several of the sites featured in this category have features similar to each other.

We haven't defined unique content. We haven't defined affiliate link rules. We haven't established a single effective means of remove bad listings and ensuring we are categorized correctly.

We've talked a lot here, but accomplished nothing.

Why will the ODP fail? Case in point, the link I showed you. How many links are there? 20? 40? Clicking on it once a month (not a big deal even for a volunteer) would eliminate this problem. Will it happen? Nope.

I'm done arguing this point. I have a site to work on and, like many of the shoppers on our site, I have little need for the ODP. I've tried to constructively approach this. I've followed every rule and guideline. I've tried to understand how it works, decipher rules, engage in a simple dialogue. Now, looking back six months, what has changed? I've lost days of productivity, engaged in endless emails and postings, and I've accomplished nothing. My users still can't find me through the ODP, unlike every other relevant site and directory on the web. Very impressive, guys. Very impressive. Good luck.

With a Google PR of 8 this is a very important site.

Whilst it is possible that Bizrate has managed to spam the Google Algorthim, it is unlikely to have got this PR unless it was seen to be one of the most important sites on the web

Everyone needs to stand back, lighten up, and see it for its use across web users

>>It's there. Here are examples of unique content:

>>Product Reviews:

>>Collecting and displaying hundreds of thousands of reviews IS in fact unique. Nobody has as many fresh reviews constantly accumulating....

This sounds like "unique content."

>>Honest Store Reviews: ... The Good ... The Bad
>>Unlike our competitors, we don't try to send people to the highest paying merchant... Nobody on the web has a system like ours.

Again, that's the kind of answer you need to be able to say.

>>Product Comparisons:
>>We automatically pull together similar products for comparison.

This is less likely to be seen as unique content.

>>Savings:

We see way too many sites, all looking the same, all with affiliate banners disguised as online coupons. The mere presence of anything looking like that, can make a whole site look like more affiliate spam.

Site design plays a part in the expectations editors have, and when an unfavorable initial impression is confirmed by spot-checks, a site will get rejected quickly -- as has happened multiple times here.

----------------------------
If what you say above checks out (and a spot-check seems to suggest it is plausible), then perhaps the parent category (simply Consumer Information) would be a better fit. Thus, part of the difficulty has arisen from pushing the site in the wrong categories; part also may have been in not emphasising its truly unique aspects in either site design or submissions.

One source of confusion: It is never the mere presence of affiliate links that condemns a site! It's the lack of unique content. When an editor describes a site as an "affiliate banner farm" or "affiliate links", another editor would recognize that as a shorthand for "the only, or nearly the only, content on the site relevant to the subject is the affiliate links." The shorthand is based on editors' experience is that the vast majority of sites that prominently feature affiliate content simply do not have other relevant content. This is how a site can "conform to the pattern of an affiliate banner farm" -- it prominently features affiliate links and advertising banners, while not having conspicuous links to the other content. And this is why citing another site that also has affiliate links is not to the point at all.

The PR of 8 is not an infallible guide, but links from reputable sites in the CI area (which this site apparently does have) will be taken into consideration.)

Hutcheson wrote: “The guideline that you need to meet is "prominent, unique, relevant content”

Relevant to who- You - The ODP editors? The directory was created with an end user in mind – it wasn’t created as an editor playground. If those three guidelines you just stated were enforced across the board, the ODP wouldn’t exist! Furthermore I don’t think those criteria are part of the ODP guidelines … I believe Bizrate.com meets and/or exceeds the current ODP guidelines http://dmoz.org/guidelines.html#Making Whether or not it meets your individual guidelines should be irrelevant.

Bizrate wrote responding to hutcheson: “You claim affiliate links are keeping us out. Affiliate links did not keep them out. So in the end, you have no point”

He seldom does. IMHO each point he attempted to make had absolutely no merit. I view his comments as a vehicle to say “I (we) don’t like the way you’ve challenged our qualifications and/or editing practices so were not gonna add your site.”

Personally I think your site is clearly worthy of being included in this “project” but I wouldn’t fret about not being included – you seem to be doing very well with out them.

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr><p>Hutcheson wrote: “The guideline that you need to meet is "prominent, unique, relevant content”

Relevant to who- You - The ODP editors? The directory was created with an end user in mind – it wasn’t created as an editor playground.<p><hr></blockquote>We editors are also end users. We use comparison shopping sites, book selling sites, fan pages about moveis and TV series, and every other kind of site listed in the ODP.

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr><p>What we all should realize is that this discussion is actually pointless. Nobody here, as far as I know, edits that category. I would be amazed to see someone actually do something about this matter.<p><hr></blockquote>Well, don't be too amazed. If your site ultimately ends up not being included in ODP, then the sites in Home/Consumer_Information/Price_Comparisons/ will be reviewed, and the ones that don't offer enough unique content or value will be removed. A while ago a submitter who couldn't get his site into Games/Gambling/Directories complained that 90% of the other sites in that category were pretty much the same as his; we realized he was right, and ended up removing the whole category.

&gt;&gt;I (we) don’t like the way you’ve challenged our qualifications and/or editing practices so were not gonna add your site.&lt;&lt;

I doubt anyone would be challenging our qualifications and/or editing practices if we were including their site. You have the cart leading the horse.

The purpose of this forum really was not to argue about individual sites. But this thread has at least made a lot of us think about various policies, including affiliate links.

The Internet has changed a lot in the last three years, and our policies and practices have had to change with it. But with over 3 million sites in the directory now, there are going to be categories that do not conform to those policies. We do re-evaluate categories, and some categories disappear, some sites are removed, but you will always find categories with sites in them that wouldn't be listed under the new policies. For this reason, pointing to sites that are listed as a reason why your own site should be listed will rarely make a difference. Though that will bring our focus to that category, and that category will very likely be cleaned up.

Most editors I know, including Hutcheson, do not review sites as it appears in these threads. The patterns of editing for other editors often follow mine, so I will go over mine.

When I enter the category, my thoughts are on finding as many sites as possible that fit there, and that will make the category comprehensive. The sites need to be relevant and unique, though some duplicate data is sometimes acceptable--even desirable--as long as it is combined with unique content.

So as I go through each site, I don't look for what is wrong with a site (though if there are things that are very wrong they will jump out at me). I look for reasons to include the site in the category. If there aren't any, I look for reasons to include it in a different category (while looking for a category it might fit into).

But this is not the approach any of us use when someone asks why their site wasn't included. Then we go to the site and look for reasons it wasn't included.

When I approached the bizrate site as if I had just found it in unreveiwed, I looked for reasons to list it. At first, I thought I would. But I shortly found it to be confusing in areas, with data that was wrong in spots, and not particularly useful in the areas I checked.

I wouldn't personally use the site. But then, I wouldn't personally use Yahoo; a lot of other people do. Of 150,000 people who did price comparisons, how many went away frustrated? I don't know. And I DON'T want to consider that when considering the usefulness on this site. It can be too misleading.

I've been vague on what made the site of so little use to me. As I web designer, I can see some things that would help. But that's really not important either.

The only thing that matters is whether the site will add something to the category, so that the category contains links to as much relevant data about the subject as possible.

I haven't really said whether or not I'd list this site if I was editing that category, and I won't. Unless I find evidence of gross incompetence or ulterior motives in the editors that edit there, I will have to trust their judgement.

Everyone here needs to cool their jets. There is no conspiracy here, one way or the other. Different editors have different opinions, which is one of the things that make the directory useful for our users.

Bizrate.com is being actively assessed as to its suitability in the directory. A decision will come soon.