Bye Bye Traffic Bots/Camping

Yes they are at a disadvantage.
That's not my problem.

Yes, if you don't have a couple of eyes (i believe even one is enough). So there are ppl around tping and buying the first s*it they see? Good! They deserved it.. they will learn eventually in the future to spend their money in a better way.

I repeat:-

You didn't say that - go up and read what you wrote. My reply was about the competitive advantage - not about the search system itself.

As you've said, it's competitive advantage - in other words, if _everyone_ works and learns, it breaks down.

It is, however, a problem with the Search system.

What I said:



You can't agree with one but not the other. If it's about competitive advantage, then it wouldn't work if everyone worked and learned, because then everyone would be the same and there could be no competitive advantage involved.

I know Phil says no, but I have some anecdotal evidence that suggests having those accounts login for just an instant might matter. I don't know the timescale, but it seemed like an account that's been idle for maybe a week stops counting as an IBL. From what little I could observe, it looked like "all or nothing," not at all duration-sensitive, so to your larger point these momentary logins wouldn't be much of a load on anything, especially if scheduled for non-peak times. Again, it was just a couple of data points, so Phil probably knows better.

It's no more of a problem than ALL search engines have. It's the way of things. Accept it.

Ideally.. but it's not, recently one of the biggest IT company (in the world) named: NO_NAME, has been put on the shame list because their SEO hired for a couple of 100k USD named: NO_NAME and supposed to be one of the smart SEO on the face of this (real) world pumped that company to the google glory spamming the links everywhere (even on the blogs he were maintaining) in a subdole way.
So don't believe that a SEO have a sort of "morality", the smartest and the much paied ones aren't so... and they are paied so much because of a reason: they do what the company ask them to do: "score higher"... with *any* way.
Welcome to the "future", if it is a film i would say: "Mate, it is a damn war!".

It is important to differentiate between
- SEO as structuring the page content intelligently to optimise for search and
- Search Engine Spamming by creation of artificial inbound links, repeated key words (so tired) etc.

People who use sledgehammer exploits to try and gain higher rankings should definitely be delisted.
LL should be on the lookout for link bots and the like.

Well, this flaw has become ubiquitous in *web* search, but certainly not in general content/context search algorithms. This, however, is not even the worst case of SL limiting its own horizons with the Grid/Web and viewer/browser metaphors.

... but when finally we checked out the third page of search, WHOA! We found the most beautiful castles, gorgeously textured, and so finely detailed. Just stunning.

...the same might happen for this new SL search, if a place gets too many picks too fast and is outside of the normal pattern they will be penalized.

Google Search Appliance is meant for intranet indexing where you can reasonably assume that all content is going to be honest and "pest"-free so there's the question on whether GSA is actually set to handle the deceptive resident input LL is feeding it.

Guess we're all screwed in that case.

But you've also previously said that manipulating the search system was a part of competitive advantage.

I wasn't saying anything to contradict that. My point was that you are getting significant furniture sales that are based more on the search listing than the furniture itself. I'm not claiming that your stuff isn't worth buying either. You are clearly getting extra sales as a result of having a better understanding of how the search engine works. A furniture creator that focusses all their energy into creating furniture is at a huge disadvantage regardless of how good their furniture is.

Major search engines have to invest continuing effort in protecting their product from the lowlifes who try to subvert real relevancy.
LL should invest similar effort in their Search. Their track record generally is so bad that one has to suspect that such will not happen.
It may be left to concerned residents and competitors to name and shame the lowlifes - to pressurise LL and ridicule any obvious holes in the system.

What it all boils down to is that there will always be system gamers. It's a fact of the internets and there's not much anyone can do to stay a step ahead of the people who choose to compete in such an unscrupulous manner.

As for SL, I'll always be wary. I'll never buy or tp to a store that is obviously gamed. This is not my way of finding the best product. I do find the new search helpful. I like clicking that link and having a full page of what the store's about show up on the screen. It's good and helpful to see the items that the store sells.

Just for instance, and an excellent example, last night my partner and I were looking at castles. We tp'd to almost all of them on the first page and everything we found was just meh....granted there were some nice ones, but when finally we checked out the third page of search, WHOA! We found the most beautiful castles, gorgeously textured, and so finely detailed. Just stunning. We still haven't purchased one however, because we want to see what else lies hidden in pages 4, 5 and 6.

So gamers of the system, you might want to try to place yourself a little lower in the search. Being top dog isn't always a good thing.

I know Phil says no, but I have some anecdotal evidence that suggests having those accounts login for just an instant might matter. I don't know the timescale, but it seemed like an account that's been idle for maybe a week stops counting as an IBL. From what little I could observe, it looked like "all or nothing," not at all duration-sensitive, so to your larger point these momentary logins wouldn't be much of a load on anything, especially if scheduled for non-peak times. Again, it was just a couple of data points, so Phil probably knows better.

I personally think that if a creator/builder is good enough, people will find them, and people will come solely based on word of mouth.

Hey Sling,
Do you mean to call people who pay an inentive to have their store in Picks lowlifes, or am I reading your posting wrong?

that's not Phil's fault.

also, if a bunch of poeple like a place so much that they save it in their picks or whatever, then who are you to tell them their idea of quality is wrong. beauty is in the eye of the beholder. the end.

I personally think that if a creator/builder is good enough, people will find them, and people will come solely based on word of mouth.