The thing is... is there even any profit or gain in this? Are the people visiting shitty AI generated articles actually buying anything or clicking on Ads or whatever? If not, what's the point? Or is it just yet another grift where he can use this as evidence to sell some kind of course or service where he helps others to do the same?
This stuff is cancer. Searched for "Game XYZ crashes with error ZYX" - First page on Google is now filled with Ai Crap saying: "Update your driver and make sure your pc fulfills the minimal system requirements"
What the fuck...
We don't need websites which only exist to lure people with worthless Ai crap into them to show ads.
It worries me that some people believe it's ok to brag about these shitty behaviours & attitudes in the open (It most certainly means that they have a wide audience who also believe the same; which is even worse than the publicised fact in itself).
Thats 489509 people who now think that company is trash for wasting their time with AI generated chaff pages, the company will die like kelkoo¦bizrate¦pixmania¦dealtime¦pricerunner¦dooyoo¦pricegrabber¦pricewatch¦ resellerratings¦shopbot¦comparestoreprices¦ciao¦unbeatable¦shopping¦epinions¦nextag and may others who tried that before them
Hence the need for hand-crafted, manually curated lists of websites and content! This is what Yahoo was back in the day. This is basically what a blogroll is. Takes some conscious effort but it's something anyone can do.
This is part of why I switched to Kagi Search instead of Google. They actively work to downrank these garbage websites because they are garbage, and you can block their domain(s) from your search results if you still see them. Very much worth the sub
@ploum @drewdevault because it genuinely does happen, all the time, they're just not hiding it any more and actively trying to get people to do it through them
I’m not saying that this Jake Ward character is himself a Nazi, but this tweet is a good reminder that when genocidal authoritarians seize control of the technocratic state, a certain kind of geek will treat the perpetration of genocide as a series of “interesting technical challenges”.
Could you please add alt text on your images for the visually impaired ?
For instance :
Tweet from Jake Ward We pulled off an SEO heist that stole 3.6 million total traffic from a competitor. We got 489,509 traffic in October alone. Here's how we did it:
We pulled an SEO heist using AI.
Exported a competitor's sitemap
Turned their list of URLs into article titles
Created 1,800 articles from these titles at scale using AI18 months later, we have stolen:
I wonder if there could be some sort of copyright infringement case with the copying AND the-type of use for the URLs? I believe copying URLs is ok, but the way they were used here is different in that they are not linking back to the original articles. @mgeist
People like this look at the Internet and AI with the same eyes an oil executive looks at a nature preserve... an unexploited resource, and they don't give a shit how much chaos they cause in exploiting it.
Right, let me get this straight. He makes sure his AI written articles (i.e pure shit that's useful to no one) show up above a competitor on google. The ONLY money he's making on this is from the malware ads on his site, destroying any reputation his business ever had in the process, and he's bragging about it like he invented the wheel? Average shitter user IQ on this one, clearly 😂
What is even the point of this, though? Like, _how_ did "stealing" all this traffic turn into revenue, if it in fact was good for anything but bragging rights?
Content Growth is an SEO-focused content marketing agency that helps software companies get more qualified traffic, leads, and customers through content.
@campuscodi one of the downsides of social media is that you can say things without consequence that if you said them in person, you'd get an incredulous "what the fuck is wrong with you?!?" at the least, and more likely a very deserved smack in the mouth.
That is truly unethical. I would never get a product from that company or even use their service. He even has the audacity to brag about it online. I hope he and his company gets sued big time for what he has done.
I saw a (somewhat) less egregious email newsletter a few weeks ago where a dev bragged about using identifying a spreadsheet full of keywords for his content and then feeding those keywords into ChatGPT to generate SEO-optimized headlines and then making another pass to generate the post content. Which seemed less predatory at first glance, but then it's still just automating content farming and providing nothing new to society.
@PragmaticAndy that explains why it had been impossible to find anything on Google for the last 9 months. I am teaching class and looking for illustrations I used last year, but all I am finding are coding bootcamp advertisements.
The whole point of "search engine optimization" is to con someone to click on their link instead of the one that contains what the searcher was trying to look for.
1) their site/client's site was significantly more authoritative than this competitor. (Either that or the competitor's content was woeful, the only ways new pages could beat old pages so quickly)
2) google isn't yet good enough at penalising AI spam. Mostly because it is only an AI itself, so it has exactly the same shortfalls
Wait a year or two, AI spam content will disappear and the companies who did it at scale will also disappear.
This is garbage, but probably not because it actually worked. If this really worked they would not brag about it and let everyone else know what to do. The guy is likely just trying to get clout through hate-reposting.
@Barredo Does he say what “AI” tools they used to do this? ChatGPT isn’t 18 months old, so I’d love to know what he’s talking about. I don’t want to do it, but I’m 50% curious and 50% pretty sure he’s lying about something in this timeline.
encountering stuff like this all the time, and before GPT it was just random pages filled with keywords or sites that scrape sources and just repost their content. I'm surprised search engines don't have tools to block results from specific domains on all future searches (or I haven't found said tools).
yep, but they are clearly bragging about it because the guy's company is selling scam-as-a-service.
Sadly it's only a matter of time before clients start asking us web developers why we are not building them sites that generate thousands of garbage posts per hour, because that's what it takes to make the front page of Google.
"we made a huge pile of shit, then pushed people (our potential clients) into it (so they waste their time being covered in shit). We're very proud. Also trendy word." I miss the old internet sometimes
we're running out of time. how long until the ads/tracking, clickbait, influencers, trolls and spam completely ruin the open web? time to start stockpiling useful information before it's all buried under a mountain of seo spam bs. maybe I'll go buy some books?
wait... This guy is proud about having directed millions of people to nonsense pages written by AI most likely not containing any logical information, especially not the info those people were looking for?
So they get all the traffic and have to pay for it. The competitor doesn't get much traffic anymore. Was that the goal? Because luring users to a nonsense page won't sell their own product or service.
This sounds like just straight up trademark violations but for search engines. Like how is "we got a lot of new customers by tricking them into thinking we were one of our competitors" valid in this persons mind?
Add this to the many "I did this thing that takes other people's effort and makes me money because I'm a greedy piece of shit and capitalism loves people like me." list.
I thought simple news aggregators were shitty enough and then some fuckhead like that dude comes along.
His LinkedIn profile reads like a crypto-bro (honestly, WTF is a "blog-investor").
imagine having such confidence that you proudly announce you created vast quantities of garbage just so people would look at your site (which is filled with garbage) instead of another site (which presumably has actual information)
Yaksh Bariya
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Pēteris Krišjānis
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Dani 0×1B
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Edgar de Almeida
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Renato, aka Krull
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Fuchsiii~~~
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •cliophate :ok:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Marc
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •fedithom
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •et konsept fra BAR
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •your_huckleberry
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •localzuk
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •mark
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Adam Cafolla
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Are the people visiting shitty AI generated articles actually buying anything or clicking on Ads or whatever?
If not, what's the point?
Or is it just yet another grift where he can use this as evidence to sell some kind of course or service where he helps others to do the same?
Mirco da Silva :(:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Rich Felker
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Gavin
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •He seems so happy about making writing on the internet completely pointless.
Perhaps there is something in that ‘dead internet theory’ now…
It is grim.
MJJ Mori
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Mother Bones
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •dizzyspiral :donor: :Fire_Ace:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Arsimael Inshan
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •This stuff is cancer.
Searched for "Game XYZ crashes with error ZYX" - First page on Google is now filled with Ai Crap saying: "Update your driver and make sure your pc fulfills the minimal system requirements"
What the fuck...
We don't need websites which only exist to lure people with worthless Ai crap into them to show ads.
🌚JR🌝
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Apicultor 🐝
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •>We got 489,509 traffic in October alone
If I inject 3 traffic today, is this how it ends?
Catherine is Tired
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Andreu Casablanca 🐀
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Robin Bradshaw
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •resellerratings¦shopbot¦comparestoreprices¦ciao¦unbeatable¦shopping¦epinions¦nextag and may others who tried that before them
BeeCycling
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •KonradW
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •bad sneakers
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •івась тарасик
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Niku
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Mike 🏳️🌈
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Jari Komppa 🇫🇮
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Fabio G.
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •British Tech Guru
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •happyborg
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Complaining is pointless because this guy is not the problem.
Realise this is capitalism, the problem is the system we allow to exist, and that's it.
Either we recognise that and change the system or we have to suck it up.
Yes he's unethical, because capitalism is unethical, as defined by legislation and those who lobby and craft it with our consent or acquiescence.
This guy is not the problem, we are.
Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮
in reply to happyborg • • •Phil Rees
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Fabien
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •I think the brand damage they've done to their site is massive.
Little Detritus
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Jer-Bear, Snakes-for-Hair
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Reese Armstrong :verified_su:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Melissa :verified_trans:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •ploum
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •@drewdevault : before any outcry, ask some basic questions:
1. Is this traffic number real? Or mostly populated by bots? (like most web traffic).
2. How could he even know that the traffic has been "stolen from a competitor" or been caused by SEO?
3. Besides costing more on the AWS bill, has that traffic improved anything for the business? Are there really more customers?
Remember: this kind of business is "feelgood-lies-as-a-service" for ill-advised CEO.
Nothing to see…
Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮
in reply to ploum • • •ivory
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •mycorrhiza
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Content warning: Nazis
The Shinxposter
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Derek Caelin 🌱
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Voron
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Marcel Gitlab 💛🤍💜🖤
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Could you please add alt text on your images for the visually impaired ?
For instance :
#ALT4you
Yaya.Cout
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Edwardo Lobo
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •raaaaage.
Thanks for shitting up search, asshole. Like it wasn't bad enough BEFORE this.
AskPippa🇨🇦
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •WestonGPT
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Aral Balkan
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Rob Bos
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Keith (karmajunkie)
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •craftycat
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •cinnamon muffin mint
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •MatthewPCooke
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Bas Schouten
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •JimmyChezPants
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •jz.tusk
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Resting Facebitch
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •klausfiend
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Wildduck
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •coldclimate
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Content Growth - The SEO Content Marketing Agency
www.contentgrowth.comDarwin Woodka
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Joris Meys
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Petrichor Squirrel
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •nev
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •this you?
(friends don't let friends share alt-textless screenshots.
actual source for previous toot:
https://nitter.net/jakezward/status/1728032634037567509#m
http://web.archive.org/web/20231127124816/https://nitter.net/jakezward/status/1728032634037567509#m)
Jake Ward (@jakezward)
NitterMatt Palmer
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Sacha Obado
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Tobias Schächtelin
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Jeff Dillon
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Bored Baby
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Andrei Kucharavy
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Greg Nilsen
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Can we re-brand them as "misdirection agents"?
The whole point of "search engine optimization" is to con someone to click on their link instead of the one that contains what the searcher was trying to look for.
JTW, Cornell '91
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •mike805
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Boswell
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •this only worked because of 2 things:
1) their site/client's site was significantly more authoritative than this competitor. (Either that or the competitor's content was woeful, the only ways new pages could beat old pages so quickly)
2) google isn't yet good enough at penalising AI spam. Mostly because it is only an AI itself, so it has exactly the same shortfalls
Wait a year or two, AI spam content will disappear and the companies who did it at scale will also disappear.
Sean O 🎃✂️
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Neil Kandalgaonkar
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Lee101
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Netwrck AI Chat, AI Characters, AI Voice Chat
NetwrckDorky moo girl
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •I am mostly baffed by the unit of "traffic"
What is one traffic? A car, a road, a locomotive?
(Also I can assume it means clicks, but just... use clicks???)
Matt Birchler
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Probably a winter crop
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Sibachian
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Mat
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •DerangedCrone
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •█████ [redacted]
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •yep, but they are clearly bragging about it because the guy's company is selling scam-as-a-service.
Sadly it's only a matter of time before clients start asking us web developers why we are not building them sites that generate thousands of garbage posts per hour, because that's what it takes to make the front page of Google.
ReindeR Rustema
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Benjamin Egon
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •It's-a me Shaw
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Daz
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Erik Uden 🦣🍑:coffefied:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •http :verified:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •The competitor doesn't get much traffic anymore. Was that the goal?
Because luring users to a nonsense page won't sell their own product or service.
:copyleft: Kiri :tux:
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •D's lack of faith in humanity
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •Add this to the many "I did this thing that takes other people's effort and makes me money because I'm a greedy piece of shit and capitalism loves people like me." list.
I thought simple news aggregators were shitty enough and then some fuckhead like that dude comes along.
His LinkedIn profile reads like a crypto-bro (honestly, WTF is a "blog-investor").
Leonard Ritter
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •BrazMogu (i.e. Bruno Guedes)
in reply to Liam @ GamingOnLinux 🐧🎮 • • •