Squidoo Struggles with Nofollow bugs
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| Click the image to enlarge |
For the past few days, many people who create new Squidoo lenses have been met with an unpleasant surprise. All the links on the lenses have been turned to nofollow, as demonstrated in the screen shot on the right. Apparently, this is a bug that popped up after Squidoo changed servers. The lenses are jammed in WIP mode, and in this mode, all links (including internal Squidoo links) are nofollow. It normally only takes the daily lensrank update to break free from this mode and, in turn, have all the links transformed to dofollow. The bug can be traced all the way back to April 9th, so it seems a bit funny that it still hasn’t been resolved.
Hopefully, this bug isn’t a preview of things to come. Most people would flip if Squidoo actually added nofollow tags. Although, Jason Calacanis might be pleased since he views Squidoo as nothing more than an outlet for spammers.
We’ll have to keep an eye on this one. It seems like a long time for a bug to still be acting up.
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10 Responses to “Squidoo Struggles with Nofollow bugs”
By thefluffanutta on Apr 16, 2008 | Reply
These issues have now been fixed, and lenses are coming out of WIP (and nofollow) within 24 hours.
thefluffanutta
By new zealand tourism on Apr 16, 2008 | Reply
Lots of people would jump ship if this feature stayed around. Building a Squidoo lens and getting it popular takes time, and this should be rewarded.
By Shell Harris on Apr 16, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for the update. I still wonder if it is only a matter of time before Squidoo follows Flickr into the land of nofollow.
By captain squidoo on Apr 16, 2008 | Reply
The nofollow status only shows up on wip lenses. I have a feeling that this is intentional to reduce possible spam issues. I think that there is almost zero chance that squidoo will nofollow published lenses, now or ever.
By Will on Apr 16, 2008 | Reply
It doesn’t sound like it’s been totally fixed. It shouldn’t take 24 hours for the lenses to leave WIP. It didn’t take that long on the old server; the links were dofollow as soon as you published the lense. But I guess as long as they are eventually converted, that’s good enough.
By Marius on Apr 17, 2008 | Reply
Squidoo is nothing more than a website full of spam and clickbank links. I really don’t understand why Google trust it so much. I really hope they will use nofollow for good.
By Kimberly at Squidoo on Apr 17, 2008 | Reply
Lenses don’t leave WIP until LensRank refreshes, and LR doesn’t refresh more than (or less than) once every 24 hours unless we have problems.
WIP isn’t a bad thing. It gives you a chance to polish your lens before people start visiting it. Take the time to make it shine and it will get a great welcome.
~Kimberly
Squidoo’s Community Organizer
By Shell Harris on Apr 17, 2008 | Reply
Thanks for the explanation, Kimberly. I think Squidoo has value for both marketing and making money online. I think some people overvalue it and get disappointed it. It is a tool like anything else on the Internet.
By Olivier on Apr 28, 2008 | Reply
This explains a lot. I had the unpleasant surprise to find my lens completely nofollow. What a shock! Especially since they advertise that one can promote ones own blog with squidoo, exactly what I’m trying to do.
Thanks for covering this issue!
Olivier.
By Will on Apr 29, 2008 | Reply
Glad we could help, Olivier.