| LED Digest 2612: Finding Thieves in Referrals |
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The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" Data > Information > Knowledge > Wisdom http://www.AudetteMedia.com : the LED's Publisher Boutique Internet Marketing: SEO, SEM, Social Media http://www.SEOToolSet.com/training/ : the LED's Premier Sponsor Bruce Clay's Search Engine Optimization Training & Certification ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest adam, led-digest.com http://www.led-digest.com .............................................. March 24, 2008 Issue no. 2612 .............................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ====== NEW ====================== <Moderator Comment> ~ Link Building Fundamentals --== Monitoring Referral Traffic ==-- ~ Abu Haider "...the referrer list pointed out sites stealing content and design from this [us]." --== Selling Digital Video Downloads ==-- ~ Penny Stewart "Does anyone know how this is done?" --== Unattainable Web Standards ==-- ~ Will Bontrager "Why are 'web standards' so frigging messed up?" ==== CONTINUING ================= --== Evading Email Harvesters ==-- ~ Will Bontrager "The LED issue you're reading uses a fool-proof method." ~ Michael Linehan "...I added a form to the site." --== Domain Parking ==-- ~ Dan Rosenfield "I have a warning and a question about domain names." ========= NEW ===================================== <Moderator Comment> Greetings LEDer, I wrote a new blog post that I'd love your feedback on: Link Building Fundamentals: A Primer http://www.audettemedia.com/blog/link-building-fundamentals Please also consider subscribing to the RSS feed if you like the post: http://feeds.feedburner.com/amedia We'll be moving to our own sub-domain for the feed soon, for now use the above URL to subscribe. There are still many kinks to work out on the site, and many pages are unfinished, but we're making progress. Also a question - does anyone have experience using Google Sites for intranets? http://sites.google.com This looks like a pretty cool solution (Google bought JotSpot and seems to be integrating their CRM tools into this service.) Have a great week, Adam ----------------- From: Abu Haider Subject: The referrers to your website... It's nice to see how other people send visitors to my Website. It means many things to me: how many inbound links are actually working, new inbound links to the site and of course it is a measure of popularity or how important other Websites think my Websites are. However, as it turns out, they are not always just links or websites that send visitors to me. Recently I was paying close attention to the referrer stats of a fairly old Website of a Web hosting company in Bangladesh, and interestingly, the referrer list pointed out Websites stealing content and design from this Website. One was another Web hosting Company in Bangladesh that stole the server and network configuration etc. from this Website, and the other was a leasing company that stole the design. The reason they showed up on the referrer list is probably because during the process of copying and updating their website, they clicked on links on that page that were not updated to point to their website yet. Of course, not all the website that is copying your design or content will show up in the referrer list, but it was still a big help. Another interesting trend I noticed about the referrer list is services relevant to the Web Masters advertising by pretending that a visitor came from their Website. It is likely to make the site owner curious and visit where their visitors are coming from. I won't say it does not work. For sites with fewer visitors, I like to checkout every referrer who is sending us visitors. Anyways, I thought it would be helpful to the LED community. Abu Haider Web Hosting in Bangladesh: www.ancbd.com -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Penny Stewart Subject: Pay Per View Videos On Demand Hi, Y'all This is my first post and I have been on this list since it was all about banner ads. I have been creating my own web sites and selling stuff on the internet for 12 years. I started with Videos and Cassettes, moved to DVDs and CDs. The CD market has all but dried up since people can download the files from the net. So now I want to enter the market of Digital Downloads, but I have no idea where to begin. I have been contacted by a company which it turns out is a Multi-Level Marketing group, so I do not want to get involved with them. Been there. Done that. Here is a link to a site that sells the downloadable music that I used to sell via CD in the mail: http://payplay.fm/dolphina I know that this is going to happen to the DVDs as well. Does anyone know how this is done? Is there a reliable company who can do this? I have belly dancers who want to offer their programs online so people can purchase and digitally download the file maybe to an account on the net or something. It would eliminate the cost of duplicating the DVD, packaging, shipping, etc. I know this is the wave of the future, but maybe it is too soon for this technology to be viable? Or maybe I already missed the boat? I know you need lots of bandwidth, DSL, etc. Help. Thanks. Penny Stewart aka The Pink Gypsy www.pinkgypsy.com -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Will Bontrager Subject: Unattainable Standards Software engineer, Joel Spolsky, published an article today (Monday) with fodder for both pro and con standards stances, and also for those who prefer to be entertained from the sidelines. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/03/17.html A few quotes: "You’re about to see the mother of all flamewars on internet groups where web developers hang out." "Why are 'web standards' so frigging messed up?" "It’s not a fine line. It’s a line of negative width. There is no place to walk." "And the whole problem hinges on the little tiny decision of what IE8 should do when it encounters a page that claims to support 'standards', ..." If you are at all interested in what might happen to your web pages when IE8 is released, give this a read. Budget at least 15 minutes. And be prepared to smile even through the cloud of seriousness. Will Bontrager http://www.willmaster.com/ ======== CONTINUING =============================== From: Will Bontrager Subject: Harvesters > That got me wondering if these simple email > masking methods work at all any more. If it > works just like a mailto in a browser, then > couldn't that information appear to a > cleverly designed spider just as easily? - Erik Perkins, LED 2611 - http://www.led-digest.com/content/view/2026/190/ Yes. Obfuscation with HTML entities no longer effectively protects email addresses. Well, it depends on the spider, I suppose. Translating HTML entities (things like © and —) is so easily coded that I expect all but the most sloppy spiders do the conversions. Obfuscation with JavaScript still works, it seems, or at least much of the time. Yet, think about the fact that some JavaScript interpreters that browsers use (Firefox, for example) are open source and available. When spammers get desperate enough, I expect them to direct their programmers to incorporate JavaScript interpretation into their spiders. Obfuscation by browser redirect can't be guaranteed to work, either, if the redirect is to your real email address, even though the email address may be absent from all HTML source code. Test the link with http://www.willmaster.com/library/tools/Server_Snooper.php and you'll see your address in the header for all spiders to grab. But there are ways to solve it. The LED issue you're reading uses a fool-proof method. It's the http://... email link at the top of each post. That is a redirect URL, but to a one-time use, self-expiring email address. Your real email address is never revealed to the sender. It works a treat. I know, because I built the thing. Another way to solve it is by using a form instead of a link. Use secure software so spammers can't use it to spam other people. Auto-submission protection would be prudent, also, lest you get spammed through your own form. A combination of the above can be put on a web page, giving the site visitor a choice of clicking a link (albeit harvest-proof) or filling in a form. Will Bontrager -------- new post - same topic -------- From: Michael Linehan Subject: Evading Email Harvesting Spiders > How well, if at all, do the little email > masking tricks work these days? - Erik Perkins Hi Eric, I don't know. I even had a spammer tell me he could easily write the code to gather my similarly encoded email. But maybe that's the key word - "could". Perhaps they can decode, but they don't bother with the overhead. That would all take extra time, and why bother when there are hundreds of millions of completely exposed emails waiting for them to gather? About a year ago, I added a form to the site. But until then, I had used similar encoding, and never received more than about zero to six spam in a day. Michael Linehan, Marketing Alchemy www.marketing-alchemy.com -------- new post - new topic -------- From: Dan Rosenfield Subject: Domain Names Hello: I have a warning and a question about domain names. First, the warning. Although I generally use Network Solutions, I bought a few domain names from Yahoo, one of which I allowed my son to use. You would think Yahoo would enable me to now simply transfer the domain name to him. While it is not literally impossible, it is difficult enough to do so that it is damn near so. Until they streamline their procedures, I'd very strongly suggest that folks not buy domain names from Yahoo (although my son is happy with their hosting). Now, the question. Does anyone know what needs to be done to will your domain names to your family? For those of us who hope our online businesses outlive us, it is an important question...one to which I've never heard an authoritative answer. Dan Rosenfield http://www.college-scholarships.com (c) Copyright 1995-2008 Orange Wheel, LLC. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "On all that made you up, you depend." - Andre Gide |
