Category: Music

WordPress.org engaged in some weird gaming of search engines

2 Apr 2005: Matt has posted a very nice response to the concerns and taken all the weird stuff down. That still leaves him/them with the questions of how to pay the bills, but it seems clear that future steps will be more community involved, which is a good thing.

As reported on Waxy.org (with some corrections by jluster), WordPress.org has been doing this weird deal with Hot Nacho where they’re hosting a nearly 200K “hidden” articles whose sole purpose is to pull in search engines and generate advertising revenue for other folks. WordPress.org (clearly a most worthy cause) gets a cut, which helps defray web site and development costs.

Now I’m all for supporting WordPress. I think it’s a great tool, and we’re using it for our family blogs and for a community group working to support our schools. I’d gladly contribute to a pot that helps keep these folks cranking this thing out. I’ve made sure that it’s quite clear that we’re using WordPress and that the links to WordPress.org are front and center. If having those links to WordPress.org help keep the project alive, then they can count on us.

But gaming search engines is frankly pretty icky, and I’m not so keen. I’d much rather put a ten spot in the hat as it goes by than indirectly support deliberate attempts at manipulating the perceived value of web sites. (I realize that this will happen regardless, but I don’t have to be an active part of it.) I would also much rather have something like Google AdSense ads on WordPress.org which our links would help (in a very small way) increase in value than be part of this strange backdoor game. If WordPress.org has value, and that value can be used to help fund a worthwhile project in a way that the involved parties can agree on, let’s be explicit and up front about it.

It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.

Currently listenting to: “Long black veil” from Charming Hostess’s truly spiffy album Punch. This is a quite splendid new release from ReR and is probably my favoritestest album at the moment. Even Sub-Evil Boy likes it!

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School levy in Morris: Rock, rock on!

We just got back from a very energizing School Board meeting where a number of people did an excellent job of making it clear that the kind of cuts being consider would really hurt, and making a strong case for alternatives (like increasing our levy).

Of the many people who spoke eloquently for this vital cause, stand-outs for me were Greg Thorson, Arne Kildegaard, and Dave Erickson for the MARQS group, and Dave Johnson and Dot Vick on behalf of the teachers. Greg, Arne, and Dave E. made it clear that the community realized how serious and difficult the problem was, but that there were options other than deep cuts (e.g., increasing the levy), and that there was significant support for exploring such alternatives.

Dave J. and Dot did a great job (in very different ways) of pointing out what would be lost on the arts side if the proposed cuts went through. Dot used the names of the various kids of the School Board members that had been, were, or might be involved in the music program as a great way of really bringing the message home to the Board and got a great round of applause.

There were also two very well spoken students (don’t remember their names, I’m afraid) and Athena Kildegaard on the importance of the arts for students, and a group of bus drivers who expressed significant concerns regarding the possible privatization of the school bus system.

A number of other people who spoke on behalf of not gutting important programs, and dozens of people (like us) who were there to clap and cheer at appropriate moments but didn’t actually speak. I was really impressed by the turn out, and I think the applause at various moments really helped emphasize the broad support for the message.

Pumped by all that, WeatherGirl and I worked up a MARQS logo that I dreamt up (literally – maybe more on that later). We’re thinking t-shirts, bumper stickers, etc., maybe from CafePress. I also should get it plugged in to the MARQS web site, but CSS continues to drive me crazy. I really need to just get a book and learn the rules instead of guessing and flailing :-(.

Heading to my wish list, Perfect tracks on Blue Note. It’s featured on the cover of the latest Electric Fetus catalogue, and it sounds very cool.

Currently listening to: The brilliant “Mercury blues” from David Lindley’s El-rayo X.

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