Why there are no trackbacks at vowe.net
by Volker Weber
I switched them off last year, since more than 99% were spam. There you have it. You can stop asking.
Comments
Many thanks for your "official" response :-), it seems that I am not the only one who was asking for that.
For guys who are using WordPress, I recommend using SpamKarma & the Akismet plugin for Spam karma. There are lots of blogs in the US who really have many, many views per day and do not have such problems since they use SK2 (and additionally Akismet, some of them use in addition Bad Behaviour -- almost no spam will ever come thru).
Unfortunately do I not know solutions for blog systems not based on Wordpress.
Since you referred to your comment, you made a good point why trackbacks don't add a lot of value. The post on your own site basically says the same thing as your comment here. Why would people need to go to your site, when you are perfectly able to comment here?
I'm sure there's a well-working anti-Spamplugin for Movable Type as well. Therefore I cannot understand the argument with 99% spam.
However I have the feeling you don't see any sense in trackbacks and that's the main/real/whatever reason for not enabling them. That's legitimate.
I'm sure there's a well-working anti-Spamplugin for Movable Type as well.
Good. Tell me which one. For MovableType 2.661 please.
Anti-Spam Plugins for Movable Type:
http://akismet.com/development/
http://www.kahunaburger.com/index.php?p=189
http://www.jayallen.org/journey/2003/10/mtblacklist_stop_spam_now
http://jayseae.cxliv.org/2004/12/17/mt-approval_0.1.1.html
...
I dont't know how good they are or if they work at all. It's just what I found with a little googling.
I can google myself. You said "I'm sure there's a well-working anti-Spamplugin". Now you say "I dont't know how good they are or if they work at all." So, what is it?
Ok, let it put me in another way: I'm sure there is, but I don't know them. =o) I know that Akismet works for WordPress and I can't see a reason why it shouldn't for MT. The MT-Blacklist sounds not bad at all, but I did not test it and can only tell you what I read and - as you said - you could read yourself.
My point is just, that it's not a thing of "there are none" but of "I don't want". I don't blame you for that, it's your decision and I don't like reading you less without the trackbacks. Maybe it's even better for the lucidity.
Martin, you don't seem to know anything, but you are sure. You can think you can predict what I really want, even if you can't. It looks like you are qualified to run for president. ;-)
Sorry if I interrupt your private conversation ...... ;-)
And to be clear from the beginning, this is only my opinion.
Vowe: I am with Martin in that respect, that saying "... for Spam reasons ...." sounds plausible, because there may be technical solutions available.
On the other hand, trackbacks do have their inherent drawbacks. As you said to Michael, in most cases referring back to ones blog doesn't make much sense for the reader of the comment-thread: it is switching away to a totaly new branch on a very different location and there is seldom a lot more value over there. Hence, usually these comments would have been better placed at the original location of the discussion. We probably see some "advertising ones own blog" here, which is bad motivation. From the perspective of the reader, this is simply annoying. So thubs up for you, vowe, disabling trackbacks is a good thing for a blog.
Last night a lot of trackback-spam has accumulated here at vowe dot net again. There is no other way to get rid off it than to close the trackback functionality permanently. Since we are forced to live with these parasites of the web for the rest of our virtual lives ...
I'm sorry, Cem. Yesterday night I worked three hours on those plugins that Martin was sure they worked. They kind of did. But there were still around 300 spams getting through in four hours.
I try to learn something new every day. And I conclude, it is still not worth the effort. More bad news for people who would like to promote their websites: All links in comments are now "nofollow". I was getting a bit weary of comments I had to moderate out.
Nevermind, Volker. Think positive: The amount of spam is an indicator how popular vowe dot net is ;) - No risk no sex ...
Concerning Wordpress and Spam:
Two weeks ago I completely turned off the comments and trackback function when I suddenly received a lot of spam out of the blue. Noboy has ever been commenting in my blog since it really isn't important at all, but suddenly people ask why I don't just install spam plugin XYZ and open the comments again. The answer is very simple: the problem seems to be at a more fundamental level.
I had always enabled the option that only registered users can post, but the spam kept coming into the moderating inbox without a single user registered except me. Why should I install spam plugins when it is possible to circumvent registration?
More bad news for people who would like to promote their websites: All links in comments are now "nofollow".
That's why I didn't create a link last time I refered to an article at my blog. I thought you/some might take it as an rude attempt to promote my site.
Anyway, thanks for trying my suggestions. Pity that they don't work.
I will throw my comment in, for the record, that as a reader I definitely prefer a comment over a trackback. It is just much easier to follow a conversation (though that brings up threaded conversations in blogs, another topic people have been arguing about).
As an author, I could see a value to trackbacks (without spam, of course), in that you get to see the extended reach of your content - it is also probably a beneficial thing in terms of slightly lowering a bloggers ego - you see yourself more as a component in a larger blogosphere than the hub of all content. Of course, if you have tons of trackbacks, it could be just the reverse, making the blogger think more of themself than any particular person probably should :-).
They are probably relevant in the area of tracking the blogosphere (I hate that I used that word twice already in this comment) for sites like technorati, but they probably can track just as well without the trackback actually enabled.
Re: spam in MT - I do remember many forum topics on Textdrive's forums talking about how MT spam itself was responsible for DOSing their shared servers - as compared to their Wordpress sites which suffered a lot less. Spam sure does bring out the vitriol in people.
