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Everybody has an opinion: Squidoo versus Mahalo
By Matt Keough | July 13, 2007
Since it is the talk around the water cooler, I thought I would weigh in on the Squidoo versus Mahalo debate. For those who have not followed the unfolding drama, Danny Sullivan has an excellent chronology. Danny states that he never really cared much about Squidoo. I kind of like Squidoo’s concept. I still like it better than Mahalo’s.
The problem with Squidoo is not unique. Any time there is an opportunity for the masses to contribute website content there will be attempts to manipulate it improve search engine rankings. However, even recognizing this, there are degrees of manipulation. I suppose there are those that would contend that Squidoo should be totally devoid of any commercial interest at one end. At the opposing side of the spectrum are your black-hatted spammers who found the iframes irresistible and hijacked traffic to pornography sites.
My main gripe with Mahalo is the same gripe I have with DMOZ, Wikipedia and the evening news. Human editors are always going to be human. Try as we might, we are all subject to our biases, our assumptions and “common knowledge”. Those attempting to play it down the middle and determine what is "best" (a loaded word) are no different.
I’m sure algorithmic search has some bias as well, but machines are more predictable than humans. Thank goodness! What makes the online community so interesting is the competing voices.
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July 13th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
For those using Squidoo without SPAM intent, please be aware that you’ll need to add at least 3 modules in order for your lens to get published. I found out the hard way, as their system doesn’t tell you this! I thought it was a bug so I contacted Squidoo support:
“I just created a new lens and have added content, published, but when I go to view the lens no content appears! I expected the lens to be live but it was not. Please help.”
Here’s what they wrote back:
“It’s probably because of the new policy on published lenses outlined in a recent blog post http://www.squidoo.com/blog/?p=155. Lenses with LESS than 3 modules (not including introductions, and excluding guestbooks, which aren’t really updated by the lensmaster) will now appear as unpublished until the lensmaster has a chance to add a bit more content to the lens.”