Is Paying for Links in Profile Picks Cheating?

whether or not i agree or disagree is moot. ethics is not going to change any outcome of war, love or video games.

yes but if you included keywords and your slurl in all your posts... that would count for the all search...

hence the signature and the little thing on the left.

i blog a lot on the japanese SLmame ... that i think is what gets me to page one in all...
so posting here with your slurl in your signature and on the left in your profile thingie..
and some keywords in the signature too .. would count as well.

i dont think too many ppl have me in their picks.. maybe about 30 at a push.

My original comment was much smaller - Marcel asked for an explanation and Gabi made a comment --- try to keep up.

I am not setting Forum etiquette, I was just offering my opinion. That it follows basically how most people on these forums have behaved for over 3 years might have something to say for it.



If they *HAVE* removed Picks bearing on the search entirely then surely there is a reason why. One very likely explanation is Picks Gaming.

Ahh interesting.

So should the ethical ones shelve ethics and go for a scorched earth conflict in order to wake up LL into action?

After all that would get it fixed, but at the cost of an alt for many of them in the eyes of the unethical.

But to them it might cost a good bit more.

So which should it be let the amoral greed of the few drive SL into oblivion, or set aside morals and grind SL to a halt in order to force a fix?

Or post to the forums, send im's and emails, and other things.

Inactivity or becoming the opposition are not options for some of us.

I'm actually expecting the amoral greed of LL to drive SL into the ground, but that's just me.

the OP asked if paying for links in profile picks was cheating. i believe it is not.

is it ethical? should one remain silent or rise up and oppose something that goes against their personal ethics and morals?

well, now that is another matter entirely. i say fight fire with fire. then it all evens out and the whole strategy is moot. protesting it only leaves you vulnerable and broke.

That's your opinion, based on your imagination and nothing more. Yes, I could have realised other possibilities, but I didn't, and there's nothing irresposible or unethical about not realising something.

Mort was apparently ahead of everyone and what he found really was a problem, so he reported it. According to Mort, what he found is no longer possible and it seems as though they've dealt with it. According to you, your jira was closed as "Resolved" recently. We've had a server update since then, so it seems that what exists now it what LL intend to exist, and using it can be assumed to have LL's ok - at least for now. I imagine that you mentioned my use of it as an example when you reported it. Nobody from LL has spoken to me about it, and nothing about what I do has been changed so, if you did mention it, it can be assumed that LL is currently ok with it.

You make me laugh, Kitty. It seems as though you're trying to make it a moral issue. You're not getting anything more from me, and neither is the forum. That's all there is to it. Be grateful for what I already gave, because I'm not giving any more. It's the nasty people here who caused me to stop. They simply don't deserve anything. It's a pity that they've caused the general forum readers to miss out, but that's what they've done.

I want to emphasize that I haven't stopped sharing because some people disagree with me about some things. I shared all the search stuff *after* it was well established that they disagree. It's because of the nastiness of some people in the forum that I stopped sharing. There's no way that I'm going to give those nasty people any assistance of any kind.

It took you long enough to catch on

With them, it's *always* the other side who is at fault - never them - they are never critical of each other. For instance, someone insults me, and I insult back. Who do you think started the insults? The other person? >>> WRONG <<< It was me, silly. How could you be so blind? That is how those nasty people are in this forum - literally.

The choices you offer a lacking. For one thing, there are no unethical people invloved, so your first question is irrelevant.

Secondly, it's not a matter of morals, so your next question is aslo irrelevant.

How old are you, Mort? I keep asking, but you keep ignoring the question. I don't want to know your exact age - just the decade will do - teens, 20s, 30s, whatever. How old are you?

Advertising my business in this thread?
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As many posters do, I have my store in my signature. Furthermore at the left side where my name is, my store name is right under my name. Now of course that is advertising, and an allowed form of it. Not connected in any way to this thread, though I post here. In any posting I make in any thread, my store is visible, and as long as that is allowed, I would be crazy not to use it.

Now as for advertising my store in this thread, I did mention that I sell Low prim furniture. As my signature also says, so not that big a surprise. The reason I said so in some postings is to make examples, and the easier example is ones own situation. Nowhere in the postings I referred in an advertising way to my store though.

So Colette, you cannot be that surprised I was not suspended for it, can you? If I would get suspended, every person with their store in their signature would be.

TOS
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Many times the TOS is referred to, with an interpretation of it. Now I do understand that everyone wants to interpret that TOS to their own situation and opinion, but in fact it is all nonsense. The TOS can be read in many ways, but the only way that is important is the way LL does. Today, bots and picks paying are allowed. Tomorrow things might be different. No one will probably shed a tear, because if one store is not allowed to use it, no one is.

Ethics
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Let me say the following: If I pay for picks, ore use bots, everybody is entitled to say that behaviour is unethical. We do not all have the same view upon ethics, we do not have the same values. So no problem with that.
To say that a bot or picks user is an unethical person, is another issue. Just because I do one thing different from your view on ethics, does not make me an unethical person.
This is the last thing I will say on ethics (yeah right), because it is a non-argument to me. Saying you find my behaviour unethical, can only result in a: yes you are right. Because it is your view, not mine. In my opinion, its not unethical, and that is also right. Because it is my view.

Its cheating about the same BMW Germany did for a better index at Google ones. And they got banned from Google then:
http://pcworld.about.com/news/Feb062006id124621.htm

That wasn't cheating - it was for containing things in the site that Google didn't want to have in its index. Google needs that site in the index much more than the site needs Google, and Google made sure that the BMW site was only out for a *very* short time. No site has to comply with any search engine's wishes.

In order for something to be cheating, it must cheat someone, and nobody has come up with anyone who is being cheated.

Whether that was cheating or not is in fact irrelevant. LL is not Google, they just use the GSA. As soon as LL puts a blog up that paying for picks is forbidden, you might be right. But at the moment they are aware of the fact it is done, and do not seem to care. Seen anyone banned from the GSA for paying picks?

You analogy does not hold up.

Outside the protectionism of your clique.....you won't win hearts and minds with your current general attitude, that's all i'm saying. Readers can and have seen you, for what you are.
This forum is not my "home" so it doesn't really matter how i'm percieved, I don't camp here 24/7 on here or on other known forums. I will always fight the good fight, to prevent you and your ilk brainwashing or forcing your views on the general public, especially when their are valid alternatives & opinions. If i felt you were right....i would also agree with you.

What i don't like and have seen on a lot forums are clicky groups that bully or drown out minority views and opinions. That is not correct in my view and one of my pet dislikes. So if you want to continue to take pot shots at me 24/7, feel free to do so........i won't be disappearing anytime soon!

Personally, i think it's a deliberate tactic.....when you present a valid argument or alternative opinion....and then you get "Joe public" joining the thread like they have done and stating that their shopping habits are not influenced by such and such events....they then resort to lowering the whole tone of the thread into a slanging match.....thus the opinions that don't match their arguments are quickly diluted or even buried several pages deep. The chances that those lone voices ever being read are slim especially if a thread runs into 100's if not over 1000 messages.

I'm not sure LL will even ban Picks, i think they have already taken steps to reduce the significance of picks as a relevant IBL, by adjusting the weighting. I really don't think Picks has the same impact as it did during the early months of All Search.

They resort to lowering the tone all too quickly. Their posts are often laced with it. Nasty people.

Some even just pop in to fire one or two insults, and then pop out again. But who is it who starts the insults in any bots thread you care to name? I'll give you one guess And which ones are *never* criticised for throwing insults? You can use a group name to answer that one (It's not the cartel group, btw. There are good and bad in that group).

Stronger even, I am pretty sure they will not ban them. But for the argument I showed that they can, and only if they do, it is forbidden, not before that. So the idea that they would ban someone for paying picks is just plain stupid.

Your observation is correct too, picks clearly have not the weight they had. If that was true, I would not be on #2 anymore too. The reason that I keep paying the people that participate is to reward them for being loyal, they helped my back then so why stopping with it now.

No, you wouldn't. Possibly, you would have to ask each person who logged in a series of questions to find what their subjectivity was; or maybe we'll have the USB brain scanner by then.

Another case of you not grasping what I was saying. Don't worry about it.

I know you're very good at spin, Phil, and I can't help but notice that you didn't say I was wrong, only that the answer wasn't researched. In other words, as far as you've actually said, I could have guessed right..



You should care - you could be the one to invent it, and you would probably make much more money selling it.



Since the customers and sales are - as you say - tied to the rankings, their movement is the same as that of the rankings. If everyone games search as much as possible, then the ranking is the same as it would have been with no gaming, and thus the customers and sales are influenced by the ranking in the same way they would have been with no gaming. And, all the gaming effort has been, ultimately, wasted.



Not yet, but is the conclusion of the race in progress.

That's still human input. No search engine will ever be able to rate quality as perceived by humans. It could only happen in science fiction, imo, but if it ever does happen, it won't be in our lifetimes, so it's irrelevant.

You must be reading a different series of threads, Rene.

The "clique" in this one is you Phil and Marcel.