“You were awarded 5 stars”
Posted: October 22nd, 2008 | Filed under: Tips | Tags: 5 stars, award, idiotic, spam | 2 Comments »
Half a year ago we were promoting The Product on many software download sites. By many I mean thousands. Now the time has come and some of them coming back with these idiotic messages notifying of the ratings they awarded after careful reviews of whether it’s the application quality or the absence of viruses, or … you name it. In fact, the smallest and the least known sites show the most activity bombarding us every week. Why are they so kind?
All is very simple as usual. When you put their 5-star award banner on your site, you link to them. So what? So the rating of your pages, combined with ratings of other happy winners, contribute to the rating of their site. They don’t really care about you, forget it. It’s another wave of spam, yet more intelligent and nicely veiled. The page rating builds up and up until finally, they wake up one day being a well-known and highly rated software site. Google knows about them, your users/readers know about them, rating is high, life is good, and all you got is their 5-star banner. Enjoy!
Clever trick, isn’t it?
The Ruby on Rails addict, industrial photographer and amateur electronic music composer. In the mean time I build great web applications, contribute to OSS and help AVAAZ to save Great Barrier Reef.
Oh yes it is, too bad some people (like you and me) really see it for what it is, besides I guess you wouldn’t just plaster stuff like that on something you created before investigating it well
Well, yes you wouldn’t. In fact, it does sound useful and authentic when you post your app to someone’s download site and they call you back with a 5-star grade later (after a thorough review supposedly). Still, their pursue their own needs, not yours.
And just to make it clear, I don’t mean these respected awards or well-known long established sites. Just, these little ants… all… around… Hey, you! Leave my coffee alone!