You Comment, I Follow

08. Feb, 2008 15 Comments

I just learned the other day that WordPress, by default, attaches a ‘NoFollow’ tag to all homepage links added by readers in comments. This acts as a deterrent for spammers abusing a blog’s commenting features, trying to gather a bunch of inbound links to increase pagerank.

Although I do agree that spammers shouldn’t benefit from this sort of behavior, it takes away link love from the everyday reader involved in discussions.

So, I decided to install the Lucia’s Linky Love WordPress plugin and will now be allowing DoFollow on links for regular commenter’s. I may receive some additional spam related comments, but I think it’s worth the risk. Plus, I’m using the Akismet plugin so I’m not too worried.

I have also joined the No Nofollow | I Follow | DoFollow Community in hopes of encouraging the DoFollow movement.

UPDATE: I added the following image to the comment section as a reminder of the DoFollow advantages of participating in discussion.

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15 Responses to “You Comment, I Follow”

  1. Barbara 08. Feb, 2008 at 3:30 pm

    Hi David,

    I’ve been reading up on this issue too. It’s good to see a post about it. I’ll be curious to know how the “I follow” works, re comment spam, as I just wrote about that today.

    Let me know how this affects your incoming spam.

  2. Dr. Nicole 17. Apr, 2008 at 1:07 pm

    wow I learned something new today. Thanks! there is so much to blogging that I have absolutely no clue about.

  3. MBA Colleges 26. Aug, 2008 at 8:39 am

    It’s a shame Wordpress doesn’t have it built into the platform so that you could turn it on or off as required. Still the plugin does a good job. I use commentluv to spread a bit more link love.

  4. Simon Burgess 03. Dec, 2008 at 12:55 pm

    Hey David,

    Thanks for raising that issue…I didn’t have any idea that that was a problem. Still I’m pretty new to the whole blogging thing! Is it pretty easy to install that plugin for wordpress? Where do I get it?

    Cheers,

    Simon

  5. David Lano 04. Dec, 2008 at 9:44 pm

    @Barbara – I can’t lie. Removing the NoFollow has increased my spam load significantly, but it’s well worth it in my opinion.

    @Dr. Nicole – Glad I could help! :)

    @MBA Colleges – I agree. I wouldn’t be surprised if they integrate the functionality into future releases. Sure would make things easier!

    @Simon Burgess – You’re welcome! Yeah, super easy. Here’s a link: http://tr.im/1vgo

    Let me know if you need any help.

  6. Jeremy Reeves 20. Dec, 2008 at 11:02 am

    Nice David!

    I forgot about that – I might have to do the same for my blog ;)

    Thanks for reminding me!

    Jeremy Reeves
    http://www.controlbeatingcopy.com

  7. Sohail 18. Jan, 2009 at 8:09 pm

    Thats great way to say thabks for comment :)

  8. Barnabas Nagy 22. Jan, 2009 at 5:16 am

    Hi, I did not know about the wp nofollow thing, they could alert us about such.. anyway, thanks for the info I’ll work on the dofollow :)

  9. Simon Burgess 22. Jan, 2009 at 3:15 pm

    HEy man,

    I hope the new year is treating you well. Quick question. Can you implement this on a wordpress account that’s web based or only the hosted version?

    Am thinking of converting my blog to a hosted version just because the web only one is too restrictive. Would be good to get your feedback on using it on your own hosted site.

    Laters man,

    Simon

  10. David Lano 26. Jan, 2009 at 10:58 pm

    @Jeremy – No problem! Glad I could help. :)

    @Barnabas – You’re welcome! Glad I could help.

    @Simon – Good question! I know there was some talk about implementing such a feature in future releases of Wordpress (Both web based and hosted). I would definitely recommend the hosted route – requires a little more maintenance and money to keep up and running, but well worth it. Having the ability to install plugins, custom themes, etc is critical in my opinion. :) Let me know if you need any help in the migration.

  11. Amy Shields 02. Feb, 2009 at 12:11 pm

    My February Poll question was much more interesting…

  12. Greg Sidberry 13. Apr, 2009 at 7:59 am

    can others use your image

  13. David Lano 13. Apr, 2009 at 10:45 pm

    @Greg – Yes, absolutely! :)

  14. Sad11 10. Oct, 2009 at 6:41 pm

    Sometimes though we will persevere if we are hearing from someone in a place where we have trouble speaking to people. ,

  15. Dwippy DoFollow 24. Nov, 2009 at 10:45 am

    I maintain a dofollow blog list and like to let the blogs that are on it know about it so they can choose to not participate if they would like to.

    I’m currently going through the PageRank 2’s and it’s your turn to be notified.

    On the subject of dofollow vs nofollow I tend to believe most links should be followed and a lot of the spam control needs to be monitored by the webmaster.

    There are probably as many pretend dofollow blogs as there are spammers so on the morality side, there are always going to be people who try to cheat.

    I can understand to an extent no wanting to follow comments but I believe all links within the content of a post SHOULD be followed, if the link is good enough to be mentioned in your blog you should at least give the other site a real link.

    That is all.

    Dwippy.

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