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Well, its actually the Thanksgiving Holiday weekend here in Canada and I wasnt really planning on posting anything. The problem is that I sat down to my puter and made the mistake of looking at my reader. I am starting to wonder if folks are Blogging just so they can post it on Sphinn or what? So much crap and it seems to be getting worse.
You gotta be kidding me?
 Today I saw stuff from a reasonably respected source, namely the Search Engine Journal on a speculative Backlinks update and even worse the ToolBar PageRank export. I expect such trite from SEO forums as those rabid animals still value such garbage. I certainly dont expect it from reputable SEO Blogs etc
. And I don't even mind that, except the furor it creates amongst the rabid-SEO crowd.
To start with, it is speculation. Secondly, the toolbar as any kind of valued metric to ANY serious SEO should be nada, zilch, butkis. I even question the value of knowing Googles latest backlink export truth be told. We can certainly get a picture of backlinks from Google, Yahoo and so on
but we will never know EXACTLY what Google sees and how they are valuing them. So, for me, both metrics are nothing more than a passing novelty. But the fine folks of the Sphinn community sure think it is a Hot non-Story
So much for letting the people have editorial control via a voting system, huh?
Sphinn me!! Sphinn me!!
Now lets add to that one with the fine folks that are using Sphinn to flame bait everyone from Jill Whalen to Rand Fishkin. Regardless if it is flame bait or not, it aint freakin NEWS
its personal bullshit! I only recently started hanging at Sphinn - as I am always interested in participating in these kind of sites ( SEO Yak earlier this year and more recently with Bad SEO). For a while I kept the Sphinn Feeds in my reader to try and keep  myself abreast of things. I noticed that lately, there is a bit of a problem with not only quality of posts, but much like the world of Digg people are trying to write FOR the Sphinn
not for the quality of the post
because one shouldnt be posting for the sake of posting right?
If its not Flaming a prominent figure, then it is kissing their ass ( love bait ) to get noticed. There was Local SEO's version of a love in with Andy to get attention and a while back Lyndon explained how to get the attention of top bloggers ha ha ha.. I liked that one at least. There is a new game afoot and we shall call it Love Bait. Further to that, putting names of someone prominent in the post - is also a sure fire way to get some Sphinns
Or hey, any post with Matt Cutts name in the title should fly well. This can even be used to write stories about Sphinn
much like this one, except they are usually ways to get Sphinns or lists of why Shinn is so great or Ideas to stop Sphinn spam or Will Sphinn ban users sure, I wrote a Sphinn Spam story but really was simply trying to get some attention to Spam that seemed to be hanging around un-mod-ified
the attention it got though, freaked me out some. Yikes.
Title Bait
Another thing I also get riled up with is folks that write a Sphinn-able post with a catchy title where the actual content was more than a bit light on quality. These are generally a post that are no more than a few hundred words long or less with information and is less than useful
Great Title though - ( If you want to learn how to write titles and still - almost always- put some content behind them - see Lyndon's Blog.)
Who the hell puts these Title-bait, content light entries up on places like Sphinn anyways?? Is it more of the famous marketers nepotism? I Sphinn/Digg/Stumble your crap and you do mine - so it looks like some one other than the twit that wrote it is actually interested in such regurgitation?
I think it is simply hilarious how marketers are using the same tactics on the rest of their own community that they do in performing their job function each day. When done well and there is actually some useful content on the other end, I think it is great. Many times, it seems, the titles are the only redeeming quality of the actual story. I have to believe that the entire post was geared at Sphinn users to get some traffic NOT because the author was interested in educating or informing the end user. Remember - I dont Digg getting Stumbled Upon!
The Fire Horse guide to Sphinning your wheels
I havent been around Sphinn all that long and my early enthusiasm is waning. I have never been big in the Social Media stuff though, it seems temporal, inconsistent in nature and I wonder about the long term ROI in  general
.. but here is some great CRAP if you want to get noticed on Sphinn, in no particular order
it all works!!
Write about Black Blue whatever hat SEO
Flame someone prominent
Compliment someone prominent (or interview them)
Write about Sphinn (like this post ha ha ha ha)
Make an outrageous claim
Give it a whacked out title (regardless of the content underlying it)
Write a post that is contradictory/in addition too, a recent Hot Topic
Write about Paid links (and mention Matt Cutts)
Anyway, I am going to go back to enjoying the day, (though overcast ) and leave this behind. I simply felt like ranting with my morning tea
. My reader was clogged up (after a whole 24hrs off?) and I was getting pulled into posts only to find it a waste of my precious clicking energy. I rant because I must it is part of my therapy, part of my relaxation. Trust me, no one is ever going to pay me to do it :0)
Over and out!
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1/ (180 sphins) ...Sphinn to top 100 Sphinns - about Sphin
3/ (127 sphins) Sphinn to top 100 Sphinns... - about Sphin (again)
5/ (114 sphins) Why the SEOmoz SEO Quiz Is Completely Wrong - about prominent people out there
9/ (99 sphins) Linking to Wikipedia is lazy - about a well known resource (like the above one)
10/ (95 sphins) - Happy Birthday Danny Sullivan! - about the prominent person (like the above two)
11/ (93 sphins) - Michael Gray Interview... - again...
12/ (89 sphins) - ...Paid Links or New Algorithm? - about paid links
13/ (87 sphins) - Google Doesn't Penalize your Rankings if you Sell Links!... - paid links again
14/ etc
I am not saying that all the above articles were written "to be sphun" - but that's what really works - these headlines!