If you add <meta name="ROBOTS" content="INDEX, NOFOLLOW" /> to the head of a page is that the same as adding rel="nofollow" to all the links on the page? Or does this in some way affect the page itself. I remember reading something about how this has some effect on how google indexes the page but I can't see how that would be the case.
Your links to inner pages will be effected by rhe NOF. if you want to strict external links, just put the NOF tag on it
<meta name="robots" content="nofollow"> and <meta name="robots" content="index, nofollow"> are logically equivalent. BOTH are page level nofollows which nofollow every outbound link on the page (both to internal and external pages), yet allows the page to still be indexed. It is equivalent to adding a rel="nofollow" attribute to every outbound link on the page.