"nofollow alternative"

@arvgtaMar 30.2012

Hello all,

I’ve invented the following nofollow alternative:

~~[url]~~http://4nf.org/nofollow-alternative/[/url]

What do you think?

Thanks in advance and kind regards

to post a comment

JavaScript

67 Comments(s) _↴

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #stumbled across this thread:

http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/27836/since-google-reduces-the-value-of-links-alongside-nofollow-links-what-is-an-alt

...where the author proposes the following syntax:

<span hrefs="http://link" rel="nofollow" link="true">Link Name</span>

...with a JavaScript file replacing

-"span" with "a"

- "hrefs" with "href"

...for all spans with link set to "true"

If you compare my solution:

<an href="http://link">Link Name</an>

...what would you prefer, keeping in mind that mine does not rely on JavaScript to work!

Any kind of feedback at all is greatly appreciated...

@hyperionXSMar 30.2012 — #Both methods serve different versions for user and google (User sees link, google doesn't). This is against google guidelines. Just use rel="nofollow".

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Thanks for your reply!

Sure, it's not there for Google to be all enthusiastic. Google's not supposed to notice a thing. I don't think that Google's current version of nofollow is an option if you care about your PageRank...

The main aim is to increase PageRank of the site in total by reducing outbound links, most notably to higher PR domains like Twitter...

What do you think about the syntax?

Can you think of any better syntax?

Or any other feedback?

@hyperionXSMar 30.2012 — #Ok, that article you mention is 3 years old. Also, nofollow is supported by google from 2005 and it really does what it says: Doesn't pass link juice (page rank) to linked content.

If you are concerned about the number of the links on your page, you can actually insert the link using JS. Or just a span with onclick="window.location=..."

I'm not OK with the syntax because, first of all, it's not an HTML valid syntax: you don't have the 'an' element and your site may brake in older browsers or text-browsers.

But as I said earlier, google guidelines are there to be respected.

But why do you think " Google's current version of nofollow is NOT an option if you care about your PageRank" ?

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Exactly, nofollow increases the number of links on the page without forwarding link-juice. To cut a long story short it leads to PageRank/link-juice evaporation.

I've heard the <span onclick=""> variation before but a search engine could easily parse that one as a link.

It is important for the search engine to have not the slightest clue.

Also, I think that the less customising necessary and the more the new solution resembles a real link, the better.

If you care about your site PageRank you better not use nofollow because of the above effect. (I assume that it is still the state of the current algorithm)

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Sorry, I failed to address two more of your issues:

- not an HTML valid syntax: I could argue that "fb:like" is not a valid syntax either, but rather popular

- old browser: I must emphasise that this solution does not rely on JS to work.

The browser only needs to support a redirect in case of <noscript>, just like Facebook does, too.

Anybody else maybe positive on the idea, or got a better solution?

[code=html]<an href="www.facebook.com">Facebook</an>[/code]

@svidgenMar 30.2012 — #I have an idea.

Stop panicking about your link-juice and just use nofollow.

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Ok, if you can tell me what's in it for me...

Nofollow in its present form is a bad deal, as I've made clear before.

Let's be honest Google wasn't amused how popular the old "nofollow" was and "corrected" things rather strangely (for the issuer of "nofollow" - it ricochet's on them)

Why should anyone use "nofollow"?

It's a cheat (nowadays)!

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Apart from that you're at the mercy of other search-engines and what they make of "nofollow". They can have their completely individual interpretation at their discretion...

Nofollow was very popular, probably abused. But an alternative to it, that doesn't make too much hastle is attractive.

@svidgenMar 30.2012 — #Read the first, and most popular response, to the post you linked to:

No, it will not help. What you're doing is trying to serve up different content to Google then to your users. That's definitely against Google's terms of service and is a great way to get banned.

There's nothing wrong with outbound links. If you don't want a site to get credit for the link to their site if you are concerned it is spam or otherwise low quality nofollow is exactly what you want. If you're trying to hide these links because you think linking to other sites is bad then you're greatly misinformed. This is doubly so if you are doing it for the sake of PageRank. Outbound links can be a postive ranking factor. Plus linking to other sites is an important tool for search engines to determine what is quality content and what isn't. By breaking this sytem you're breaking web and making search worse for everybody.

Stop sweating the small stuff and start focusing on what matters : quality content. If you spent as much time creating good content as you did manipulating the search results or chasing PageRank you'd have a website that would rank well naturally.[/QUOTE]

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Ok, we're getting to the interesting bits now...

Personallly I don't feel like giving link-juice to PR 9 sites like Twitter or Facebook.

But when I come across a smaller site I like - I would like to give full credit in terms of PageRank, linking etc.

Is that better to understand? Pre-requisite is that I have full control of whether to give credit or not!

Quite clearly - in the case of Twitter or Facebook, I would prefer PageRank to stay on my site!

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #(nofollow is a "no-go" because it jeopardises the link-giving site)

@svidgenMar 30.2012 — #Get over it. You're not doing anyone any good, yourself included, by worrying about whether facebook or twitter get some pagerank.

Don't try to outsmart the search engines. It's a silly waste of time, and it's ultimately futile. They've each got a myriad of engineers working on algorithms to sift through and categorize the web in the most meaningful way possible. By deviating from the norm in an effort to outsmart them, you're not only preventing accurate cataloging of your site, but you're throwing off their numbers, putting anomalies in their data, impeding improvements to their algorithms, and ultimately putting your site at risk of being blacklisted.

And if that happens, you will have exactly 0 link juice.

Zero.

[B]ADDENDUM:[/B] It's also notable that these engineers are all smarter than you. If there isn't already a trend in hiding links, there will be. And these engineers will not only notice the trend, but they'll [I]promptly[/I] adapt to it -- if they haven't already.

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Well Svidgen, how can I put it? I think that aspects of the old nofollow were really good - in that you could determine, whether to give credit or not. That was popular!

I will remain that way, claiming that a link-giver should have the right to decide...

Technically, it is of course very important that the search engine doesn't have a hope in figuring out whether this is a link or not.

(As is in the case of my alternative as I think we can agree)

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #"They've each got a myriad of engineers working on algorithms to sift through and categorize the web in the most meaningful way possible."

I would like to back-up how difficult it is for a search engine to figure that out:

The tag <an... is replaced by PHP, not JavaScript to <a... i.e. server-side!

It's virtually impossible for a search engine to figure out...

@svidgenMar 30.2012 — #.. it is of course very important that the search engine doesn't have a hope in figuring out whether this is a link or not.[/QUOTE]

It's silly and absurd to think that Internet Explorer can figure out whether something on a page triggers navigation and that Google cannot.

@svidgenMar 30.2012 — #"They've each got a myriad of engineers working on algorithms to sift through and categorize the web in the most meaningful way possible."

I would like to back-up how difficult it is for a search engine to figure that out:

The tag <an... is replaced by PHP, not JavaScript to <a... i.e. server-side!

It's virtually impossible for a search engine to figure out...[/QUOTE]

Wait ... server-side replacement? How the devil do you expect a server-side replacement is going to trick a search engine? They'll see the replaced (proper) version of the link straight-up!

@hyperionXSMar 30.2012 — #Arvgta, at this point you should stop, as you don't know what are you talking about.

Ok, with this topic you got over 100 posts. Happy now?

It started interesting but you don't listen to others.

Nofollow does exactly what you need and must be used in that way. Stop working around because you will get on the black list.

Use the web as it is and focus on good content.

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Well that's excellent (technically)

It leads us to the discussion whether a spider is capable of viewing the situation after page load, like "FireBug" does.

I don't know at the end of the day, but they certainly would have to - if they wanted to get on top of these things!

If you go by what is in Google Cache, then certainly not, or by the "Spider View Tools" around...

Do you know? (Interesting)

@arvgtaauthorMar 30.2012 — #Hi hyperionXS,

our posts sort of clashed I think.

No worries - I'll stop posting soon :-)

But I do find it a very interesting topic whether a spider of Google's is capable of seeing the situation like in "FireBug".

(They should really and compare it to before)

Ok, I'll shut up for now - sorry ;-)

(glad you found it interesting in the beginning)

Kind regards

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #The tag <an... is replaced by PHP, not JavaScript to <a... i.e. server-side!

...and then fed to JavaScript via Ajax request, from which it is pulled, if JavaScript is enabled.

(I think that was irritating you - of course it's not a simple server-side replacement, which any search engine would notice straigt away)

Anybody else got any opinions on the approach?:

[CODE]<an href="http://www.facebook.com">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

It's a pity the thread died due to that small detail...

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #98% sure it didn't die on account of any particular detail. No serious developer is going to spend their time trying to control link juice to the extent you wish to control it. And most of us think it's actually a terrible idea even to try.

The thread is dead because it had nowhere to go from the get-go -- aside from some of us trying to convince you this is an utterly useless and silly endeavor.

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #To be clear, hiding links from search engines, should you wish to do so, is so absurdly easy that there doesn't NEED to be a thread in a forum to bounce ideas around. You haven't stumbled across a silver bullet; you've stumbled across weird, horrendous scheme that does no one any good, despite how marvelous you might think it is.

To be even more clear, there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of ways you can hide links from search engines, many of which are infinitely more clever than yours. No serious business is interested in this. No serious developer or designer is interested. The ONLY interest you'll find on the matter is from sketchy SEO groups -- most of which will already employ more clever and successful techniques.

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #Alright, no need to get that emotional ?

What's your favorite way of hiding a link then, if you could nominate only 1 then, that is simpler and more elegant to the user, if done on a large scale?

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #Just trying to stress the extent to which you should NOT be attempting this -- doesn't seem to be sinking in. BUT, if you're really that interested in getting yourself blacklisted ...

... I'd say the simplest (2nd simplest), most fool-proof mechanism would be to structure each link like so:

[I]<a href="#http://facebook.com/whatever">facebook</a>[/I]

Create a JavaScript method that performs a search-replace on all links onmousemove and onkeypress. This goes in a script tag at the bottom of your page:

[code=php]var fixLinks = function() {
 var links = document.getElementByTagName('a');
 for (var i in links) {
 if (links[i].href.substr(0, 8).toLowerCase() == '#http://') {
 links[i].href = links[i].href.substr(1);
 }
 }
 document.body.onmousemove = null;
 document.body.onkeypress = null;
 }
 
 document.body.onmousemove = fixLinks;
 document.body.onkeypress = fixLinks;
 [/code]

Search engines will see the links as though they're just standard, local page anchors with have no associated link juice, since it's not likely that a search engine will bother to trigger the mouse move or keypress events. But, for [I]most[/I] of your visitors, the first step to accessing a link is either a key press (tab) or a mouse move, which immediately triggers link-correction. And, to avoid processing all links repeatedly, our link-fix method removes the onmousemove and onkeypress methods from the document body.

Have fun getting yourself blacklisted ..

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #I don't think my approach gets anyone blacklisted.

It's been around for a while now in different forms and I've never seen a penalty.

On the contrary, it's good for the site's PR and hence the SERPs.

Thanks for your suggestion!

I would argue that that increases the number of links counted on the page.

The search engine will have no problem in recognising these as links, which I thought was the first pre-requisite of any "nofollow alternative"...

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #I don't think my approach gets anyone blacklisted.

It's been around for a while now in different forms and I've never seen a penalty.

On the contrary, it's good for the site's PR and hence the SERPs.

Thanks for your suggestion!

I would argue that that increases the number of links counted on the page.

The search engine will have no problem in recognising these as links, which I thought was the first pre-requisite of any "nofollow alternative"...[/QUOTE]

You can think all you want. Doesn't make you right. You'd do well, like the rest of us, not to pretend Google (and the other engines) are bluffing. Hell, a quick search for "google blacklist" yields a documented incident on the 1st page, wherein an entire domain was blacklisted, seemingly for something as trivial as having a domain alias: http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview/id/310942.html

On the 2nd matter: Sure, they could count to the number of page links, but if that's the case, they're all inward pointing anyway. My guess, however, is that google doesn't count page anchors -- no significant reason to do so.

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #Regarding this topic: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66355

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #Another documented case: http://www.informationweek.com/news/206503948

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #There's no reason to worry about "blacklisting".

If I were half as critical toward your approach as you are towards mine all the time , I could easily argue:

- It increases the number of links on the page (which mine doesn't)

- It is unpredictable, which way the PageRank will be forwarded, if at all

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #There's no reason to worry about "blacklisting".

If I were half as critical toward your approach as you are towards mine all the time , I could easily argue:

- It increases the number of links on the page (which mine doesn't)

- It is unpredictable, which way the PageRank will be forwarded, if at all

i.e. in the worst case the link is counted but the PageRank sickers into the sand because it cannot be forwarded.

Apart from that - what happens, when JavaScript is disabled?

What does the user experience?[/QUOTE]

No no ... see, MY approach is not to use any sketchy techniques at all. MY approach is to produce quality content. MY approach is commended by every major search engine -- all of which have Ph.D.'s working 8 hours a day in an effort to surface content produced through MY approach and HIDE content oriented around link juice management.

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #Besides -- you're contradicting yourself. What happens to YOUR technique when javascript is disabled. Either there's AJAX interaction, and the user sees a non-functional link of text -- precisely what happens in the "more clever" solution I posted, or there's NO AJAX interaction, and the search engines see the same thing the rest of us see -- thus, no link juice management benefits whatsoever!

Stop dragging this out. Stop promoting your sketchy practices. If you want to get blacklisted, that's perfectly fine. But, don't advertise your shady practices around here as if they're not utterly abhorrent.

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #This is your suggestion, right? (as a different alternative) :

[CODE]<a href="#http://facebook.com/whatever">facebook</a>[/CODE]

I'm glad you made a suggestion at all...

Now, care to defend your approach? :

- It increases the number of links on the page (which mine doesn't)

- It is unpredictable, which way the PageRank will be forwarded, if at all

- What happens, when JavaScript is disabled?

@svidgenApr 04.2012 — #You are ... completely ignoring the point. Completely ignoring all points.

... I am exiting the conversation. Good luck.

@arvgtaauthorApr 04.2012 — #Alright, has anyone else got a suggestion superior to:

[CODE]<an href="http://www.facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

@rnd_meApr 04.2012 — #Alright, has anyone else got a suggestion superior to:

[CODE]<an href="http://www.facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/CODE][/QUOTE]

anything would be better.

@rnd_meApr 04.2012 — #don't forget; other people linking to your site is more important for page rank than anything on/of/about your site.

@Gray1989Apr 05.2012 — #I'll put this simply. Google has no benefit in giving a higher pagerank to pages that don't deserve it. That's why they introduced a system like this in the first place. Trying to create false HTML and manipulate it with JavaScript is just wrong. You might as well make your entire page out of JavaScript and put your links in <noscript> tags. That actually seems like a better solution. Nobody here probably even cares about "pagerank"

@arvgtaauthorApr 05.2012 — #Thanks for both of your replies!

@rnd_me: Sure, quality content and backlinks are more important. So this is just about PageRank optimisation internally then - on page SEO, so to say.

Could you nevertheless nominate your favorite alternative, that provides similar value or say what's particularly ugly to you about my approach?

@Gray1989:

PageRank is the algorithm, that originally distinguished Google from other search engines. We seem to agree on that.

Search engines provide no PageRank-preserving way of NOT giving credit to content linked to, like high PR sites or untrusted links. Using such a technique like the "old nofollow" does indeed lead to higher site PR, in my opinion. That's one reason why the "old nofollow" was so popular...

"Trying to create false HTML and manipulate in with JavaScript is just wrong"

- what does Facebook do when introducing their own <fb:like> and then manipulating it with JavaScript a posteriori? How about Google Plus?

Thanks for making a suggestion for an alternative but I don't quite think you mean that seriously ;-)

I would like to emphasise that my alternative does not rely on JavaScript to be enabled, an advantage over all pure JavaScript alternatives.

@Gray1989Apr 05.2012 — #I would like to emphasise that my alternative does not rely on JavaScript to be enabled, an advantage over all pure JavaScript alternatives.[/QUOTE]

So, how does one click on one of the links that is not in an anchor tag, if onclick events are useless and the element type can't be changed? A non-javascript-enabled browser would simply read your "links" and nobody would be able to click them. That introduces the need for workarounds that could be tedious, maybe ending up with huge amounts of unnecessary code, all to fool an algorithm that is probably just trying to cope with all of the "workarounds" like the one you are introducing.

If you really really want a better alternative, then for all of the links that point to sites like facebook you could use onclick="location.href=''"... I doubt google is willing to decipher JS code in an onclick event in order to find where a link is going... Still poses the problem of being useless without JS enabled, but hey, it's worth it right? :rolleyes:

@arvgtaauthorApr 07.2012 — #One clicks on a real anchor tag, as it is substituted in PHP and then routed to the client over AJAX (and injected into the DOM) - if JS is enabled. If JS is disabled, a redirect to the PHP is issued and one clicks on a real link nevertheless.

The "onclick"-alternative seems to be the most popular one, but I would argue that Google is already able to parse that as a link, as they have announced to parse JS. If not already, they will in the near future, surely.

So I've still seen no suggestion superior to:

[CODE]<an href="http://facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

?

rnd_me maybe? - what's your favorite "nofollow alternative"?

Anyone else?

@Gray1989Apr 10.2012 — #If JS is disabled, a redirect to the PHP is issued and one clicks on a real link nevertheless[/QUOTE]

I'm sorry I just got back after a long break.

I don't mean to resurrect this thread, but I do have a suggestion now that it has been mentioned. JavaScript should never be used for workarounds whenever possible. It seems you have just pointed out that you are able to work with PHP, so if you want another suggestion, make PHP redirect the URL of all of your links before the HTML data is even sent to the client, to another PHP page on your server to handle the actual redirection. No JS needed. And if Google has already thought of that (it is likely that Google fully supports many redirection methods), I doubt there would be any method of value for you to use.

Come to think of it, I don't think it would be hard for them to do basic JavaScript DOM & Algorithm run-throughs either. Maybe something for the near future. lol

@rnd_meApr 11.2012 — #use tinyURL or an internal equivalent to avoid linking to other sites.

also consider a drop-down menu that uses js to redirect upon change.

i don't think the number of on-page <a> tags has anything to do with your page rank, and google invented rel="nofollow".

if you get busted by google for pageRank cheating, your site will appear a LOT lower in the list than it would because of "having too many links".

@arvgtaauthorApr 18.2012 — #Hi Gray1989,

you've suggested a server side redirection in PHP.

Must admit, I don't quite get it.

Maybe you can explain in different words what you mean, and wouldn't one have to detect, whether the link was pressed somehow?

Or what kind of PHP substitution can I perform server side, to disguise the link:

[CODE]<an href="http://www.facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

Hi rnd_me,

tinyURL is neat, no doubt about it, but I would argue, that it requires some manual work, whereas my "nofollow alternative" can be used programmatically. Also, it increases the number of <a> tags on the page making it useless in the light of this discussion.

The number of <a> tags on any given page plays an important role in the PageRank algorithm for assessing the link juice given to any individual link.

I'm sure, that nobody that uses this will get busted, because it's impossible for Google to detect/parse as it is implemented right now. Crucial bits of logic are on the server side and thus invisible to Google.

@rnd_meApr 18.2012 — #Hi rnd_me,

The number of <a> tags on any given page plays an important role in the PageRank algorithm for assessing the link juice given to any individual link.
[/QUOTE]

says who? what kind of <a> tags? <a> doesn't have to have @href, are you implying that anchors deduct page rank? that's silly. what about area tags? do those count?

i think you are over-analizing some concept that might have a small nugget of truth, but you're extending it out to some universal rule that i simply don't believe.

can you show any evidence that <a> tag count (regardless of links) matters?

@arvgtaauthorApr 19.2012 — #Hi rnd_me,

of course I mean <a> tags that are links at the same time, i.e. have href.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank#Simplified_algorithm

-> "divided by the number L(v) of links from page v"

The number of (outgoing) links is simply the denominator of the link juice value.

@rnd_meApr 19.2012 — #Hi rnd_me,

of course I mean <a> tags that are links at the same time, i.e. have href.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank#Simplified_algorithm

-> "divided by the number L(v) of links from page v"

The number of (outgoing) links is simply the denominator of the link juice value.[/QUOTE]

ok. where do i start? hmm.

This is a simplified version of an algo described in a 14-year old paper that google's engine is based upon. It's an academic over-simplification for the purposes of illustrating the concept to undergrad CS majors. It is by no means conclusive, current, or apropos to use in the real world.

i asked for documentation that Google does this. Truth is, nobody knows 100% exactly what google does.

aside from that fact it's not currently relevant, you are understanding/describing it wrong as well.

you imply that YOUR site/page will get a better ranking by using fewer links. That's not the case if you look at even the simple algo you linked to.

are you forgetting that nofollow links would be removed from the count of total links that you're so worried about?

if i have 1000 links and all but one have a nofollow, i have one outgoing link as far as the algo is concerned. again, it's probably because the article is so dumbed-down that it doesn't even address nofollow implications.

use nofollow if you don't want votes.

you've described a system that has no practical advantage to current standards yet manages to add lots of complexity.

the article you linked to says "Google advises webmasters to use the nofollow HTML attribute value on sponsored links".

please read what you post.

@arvgtaauthorApr 20.2012 — #

are you forgetting that nofollow links would be removed from the count of total links that you're so worried about?

if i have 1000 links and all but one have a nofollow, i have one outgoing link as far as the algo is concerned. again, it's probably because the article is so dumbed-down that it doesn't even address nofollow implications.

use nofollow if you don't want votes.

[/QUOTE]

I'm afraid that's not up-to-date:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/pagerank-sculpting/

The algorithm was changed in 2009 so that nofollow links are counted as links on the page in terms of PageRank.

@arvgtaauthorApr 21.2012 — #Anyone else?

rnd me suggested tinyURL, which is neat, but hardly a real alternative to nofollow...

What is your favorite alternative to nofollow, given the algo-change in 2009...

What is better than this:

<an href="http://facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/QUOTE]

?

@rnd_meApr 21.2012 — #Anyone else?

rnd me suggested tinyURL, which is neat, but hardly a real alternative to nofollow...

What is your favorite alternative to nofollow, given the algo-change in 2009...
[/QUOTE]

nobody has any better ideas. you arvgta, and you alone, have shown your infinite wisdom and superior mental acuity to all us other posters. I wouldn't be surprised if your site is not at the top of goolge's results for any and all keywords. You are so smart and likable, can i be your friend? no, mere mortals like me are too busy trying to find ways to do our silly common practices easier. We can't hope to ever reach arvgta's level; he is something else.

Congrats arvgta, you have found the secret golden calf of SEO hackery!

</sarcasm>

grow up arvgta, we've already told you what we think in dozen of wasted posts.

@arvgtaauthorApr 21.2012 — #That really is silly!

Anyone else?

@Gray1989Apr 25.2012 — #Or what kind of PHP substitution can I perform server side, to disguise the link:

[CODE]<an href="http://www.facebook.com/">Facebook</an>[/CODE][/QUOTE]

Sorry again for the long wait, I have been busy working on a driver backup program. Anyways, what I mean is use this:

[CODE]<a href="/redirect.php?http://www.facebook.com/"></a>[/CODE]

The redirect.php file is a file on the root of your server that handles all links. You could justify this by having the want or need of gathering your own statistics on links, or to use some sort of "You are now leaving this site" page. This is OK because there is no JS involved, and you are not changing the actual linking mechanism inside of the browser. That way all browsers should be able to navigate your site.

Think of it this way. Google's web crawler is basically a "smart"-browser with certain abilities when it comes to extracting information and traveling through links at high speeds. I'm sure any redirection techniques you may have in mind will hurt the browsers people use to actually navigate your page before it will actually have any affect on your pagerank. I'm also pretty sure the *number* of successfully detected and working links on your page would have a bigger effect on your pagerank.

The point is, don't try to fool the system. If you do anything that *may* happen to fool the system, justify it with another reason but TRY to keep compatibility in mind. Don't go out of your way risking the integrity of your website just because you think it would get a few more 'clicks'

@arvgtaauthorMay 02.2012 — #What you're proposing has different effects than I want on the PageRank flow, though it would most definitely work.

The point is, don't try to fool the system. If you do anything that *may* happen to fool the system, justify it with another reason but TRY to keep compatibility in mind. Don't go out of your way risking the integrity of your website just because you think it would get a few more 'clicks'[/QUOTE]

Gray1989 thanks very much for your detailled feedback.

I would argue it would be the job of the "system" to supply a decent alternative to the old nofollow, which was horrendously popular.

Because it's only two lines additionally in my PHP code I'll leave it that way for the moment. Using my approach also makes more sense if you use the tool anyway for the other techniques:

http://4nf.org/tool/

Any other comments on the approach:

http://4nf.org/nofollow-alternative/

@arvgtaauthorMay 08.2012 — #Ok, so nobody's too found of the approach:

[CODE]<an href="http://facebook.com">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

I've a different alternative:

[CODE]a! http://facebook.com/ Facebook[/CODE]
(to be placed at the very left of any text node)

If you had to choose between the two, which one would you prefer?

@criterion9May 08.2012 — #Ok, so nobody's too found of the approach:

[CODE]<an href="http://facebook.com">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

I've a different alternative:

[CODE]a! http://facebook.com/ Facebook[/CODE]
(to be placed at the very left of any text node)

If you had to choose between the two, which one would you prefer?[/QUOTE]

If you are going to go that far with it, why not use bbcode "[link]" style so you aren't recreating something that already exists.

@arvgtaauthorMay 08.2012 — #If you are going to go that far with it, why not use bbcode "[link]" style so you aren't recreating something that already exists.[/QUOTE]

Thanks! What is that? I'm not acquainted with it...

Very interesting...

@criterion9May 08.2012 — #PHP has some built-in support...

@arvgtaauthorMay 09.2012 — #Much appreciated, I had a look at it, but still don't get it.

What would be visible "on page"? (that's important from an SEO perspective)

@criterion9May 09.2012 — #It might look something like:

<i>
 </i>[link href=http://facebook.com]Facebook[/link]

@arvgtaauthorMay 11.2012 — #reminds me of the technique used in this forum in the editor for QUOTE, CODE, HTML, PHP etc. - is it similar?

@criterion9May 11.2012 — #reminds me of the technique used in this forum in the editor for QUOTE, CODE, HTML, PHP etc. - is it similar?[/QUOTE]

Yes. It is called BBcode.

@arvgtaauthorMay 11.2012 — #Very impressive - I like it. Is it PHP specific or platform-independent at a mid-tier level?

@criterion9May 11.2012 — #It is not PHP specific. PHP just has built in translators and such.

@arvgtaauthorMay 11.2012 — #So e.g. Java also has libraries for it.

Nevertheless, just had a look at the HTML of this page.

e.g. QUOTE is expanded to a whole block of HTML.

So it's different to what I'm serving, where HTML is the input and the tags can be seen on "Show Source".

It is normal to place these tags in the mid-tier, no matter what language.

One does not need a single library.

I would regard these tags as completely platform independent, and would thus argue, it's a different cup of tea?

@criterion9May 11.2012 — #So e.g. Java also has libraries for it.

Nevertheless, just had a look at the HTML of this page.

e.g. QUOTE is expanded to a whole block of HTML.

So it's different to what I'm serving, where HTML is the input and the tags can be seen on "Show Source".

It is normal to place these tags in the mid-tier, no matter what language.

One does not need a single library.

I would regard these tags as completely platform independent, and would thus argue, it's a different cup of tea?[/QUOTE]
Modern browsers can show the "adjusted" source when your javascript comes back through and re-translates the content to "prevent" Google from counting your links. This whole effort really isn't the best solution to the "problem" you have presented. If this was a collection of common blocks of code that could be substituted at the server side then this might have some benefit. Otherwise, you are mangling around with content where there is no clear benefit to outweigh the potential issues that could come from your approach. As an example, what will screen readers do with your swap in/out contents?

@arvgtaauthorMay 13.2012 — #Possibly the best "nofollow alternative" is to make the link entirely invisible, while functional to the user, which is demonstrated on my homepage.

So this thread just pertains to standalone links, where one would usually use "nofollow".

Who knows, how the various search engines treat "nofollow" links?

At the end of the day, these are trade secrets and their right to treat them, as they like. It is a known issue, that different search engines treat "nofollow" differently, which puts its user completely at their mercy.

In the case of Google, since 2009, it leads to PageRank evaporation.

I'm not aware of a rectification so far...

It seems, I'm overworried about "SEO hackery". Of course, just looking for more added value of my existing tool. (The primary aim of my tool is not SEO: see http://4nf.org/aim/)

Does this "SEO hackery" lead to penalties whatsoever?

A clear "no", as you can measure by the two sites:

- 4nf.org and

- www.oeko-fakt.de (client page)

On the contrary, the PageRank is admittedly higher than plausible, given the poor backlinks so far.

Let's stick to the core topic. I've shifted to agreeing that one alternative is enough, in the context of my tool.

At the moment, I'm supplying two:

[CODE]<an href="http://facebook.com">Facebook</an>[/CODE]

and the pure text alternative:

[CODE]<text node>a! http://facebook.com/ Facebook ...</text node>[/CODE]

I'm contemplating undoing the former because it's not convincing to introduce a new HTML tag as such a small guy.

So what do you think of the latter solution, that is fine for setting up from any mid-tier language programmatically and is completely platform independent, like "nofollow"?

Don't mean to be stubborn, am reading your feedback carefully and would just like to do a good and responsible job of what I'm supplying.

@arvgtaauthorJun 26.2012 — #I've trashed the former in favour of:

[CODE]<text node>a! http://facebook.com/ Facebook ...</text node>[/CODE]

Just informative, to close this thread.

(I agree, that it is not on to just introduce a whole new HTML tag)

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