Have you installed Google's new Sidewiki yet? If you haven't heard of it, Sidewiki turns all websites into open forums. Any one with half a monkeys brain can leave bad comments to be seen by all who view them. And website owners can not opt out! I can just imagine how many disgruntled vendors and affiliates are going to be blowing the horn of disapproval on this new service..
My God. Not to mention, competitors will be leaving negative comments on each others wikis. Let's just hope that this is one of those things that never catches on. It's making me sick to my stomach just thinking about it.
Only the savviest of the savviest will install something like this on their browser. I see it having no effect on vendors or affiliate sales. FTC already has enough people scared from as many post I've seen on this forum mentioning them, people just need to quit hyping this stuff up.
Good Point. I had visions of it being installed on future browser updates, popping up uncontrollably on wide-eyed buyers . . .
I've seen a couple of google sidewiki remover scripts. They are already being used on blogs. Just do a search on google.
Hopefully you are right.. But it just popped up for me to install today. I checked it out and it's pretty bad. The question is: What percentage of the internet uses Google Tool bar? I have had Google Toolar for years, but last night it popped up an install message. I think Sidewiki was available for a few months now, but perhaps Google is really pushing it now. What if someone posted a link to a Clickbank product download page on the sales page? it might take google 48 hours to take it down. The vendor could lose 2 days of sales, and the affiliates will blow all their PPC money. How long do you think it will be till Google mixes Paid Ad's in every sidewiki bar? Considering they put paid ad's in your gmail account, I would take it as no surprise when I see google ad's in sidewiki. Sales sites are going to be hit with spammy links trying to direct surfers to a competitive product. This means affiliates are paying for PPC traffic and Sidewiki lets scammers throw their own link in to swipe the traffic you paid for! Even if only 5% of people have Sidewiki, it can cause devastation. Now, every vendor and every affiliate will have Sidewiki installed because they should be checking sidewiki comments before spending their money on PPC, and they will also have to keep an eye out on their own sites. If you don't check, you may be sending your traffic to a website that has a SCAM REPORT as the first sidewiki post. Do you want to pay to send traffic to a site that has bad sidewiki posts? I certainly don't! I agree that if it was only used for good purposes (as intended), it would be fine. but you know as well as I do that this isn't the case. This is like the ultimate spam tool..
If it gets spammed, it will be called a 'failure'. Google won't let it transform into a failure. See youtube, every comment has a "report" function. So spam will be reported here too. They took years to start monetizing youtube & even don't do it fully now. So they won't be monetizing this tool anytime soon. And I don't think they will slap ads here. I think it is just an incentive for users to use the Google Toolbar. Regarding your concerns about the future existence of a forum type environment (hosted by google) around every site, I don't think its going to happen. In short, no need to panic.
Thus far I know: <script type=â€text/javascript†src=â€http://www.sidewikispam.com/sidewikispam.jsâ€></script> http://www.blocksidewiki.com/
It really doesn't do that at all. Comments made on Sidewiki are not made on the web site to which they refer. Inaccurate posting like this is the main reason the misunderstandings about Sidewiki are so widespread. Maybe not, but (a) there are many ways they can block/prevent it, if they wish to, and (b) given that the comments are not on their property, why should they be able to opt out any more than they can "opt out" of people making any comments about their sites elsewhere on the internet? I would think the overall long-term effect of this on anyone's sales will be somewhere between negligible and zero.
The comments are made in the sidewiki box which is unique to every page you have. Essentially, they made an "Instant Comment Box" with No Moderation Privileges and slapped it on every page on the net.. The comments aren't put on your webpage directly, but anyone with Sidewiki installed can easily thrash any website they want, and these comments can be seen by every possible customer who has sidewiki installed.
Yes, I wasn't clear enough. But I actually meant what the above ostrich genius said: I mean't that people can make statements about a website & start a whole conversation just like its done on youtube videos. I would like to mention that there was a similar initiative Blogeverywhere.com by Sabeer Bhatia, the man who sold Hotmail to Microsoft. It provided a functionality by which people could comment on every website and those comments could be seen by anyone. And this website is just a parked domain now.
See the opportunity in the change bro I wouldn't really bother doing anything yet, but if it does catch on or you do get a couple of negative comments then perhaps ask your list / buyers to leave some positive comments on the side wiki rather than just emailing you- run it like a competition - "everyone who leaves a comment gets a free album, the top 3 will receive _____" ? I wouldn't bother doing this yet as probably 99% of people have never even heard of side wiki and probably never will unless it becomes part of the search engine itself..
How about instead of finding a way to block it or disable it, find a way that it will benefit you and your site...
I installed a few weeks ago, checked it out and am now just ignoring it. To me it is just a waste of time.
This how i think it will happen. Owners of websites will spam their own "sidewiki" with good reviews (while slandering competitors sidewiki's). If the webiste owner will not be able to provide spam faster then the negatives then he will likely hire companies who will specify in spamming sidewiki with good reviews (im sure these kind of companies will popup like mushrooms after the rain if sidewiki ever lifts its ugly head). These companies will spam the sidewiki easier using indian staff that sit all day long and write reviews such as "me buy prodict me like". or create bots that automatically spam with random ready made messages "i loved this product, is the best one i ever bought in its field" etc.. i bet many "smart" affiliates will also spam website X sidewiki with comments like "don't buy here the product is no good, try website Y" and jam in a cloaked link. turning sidewiki into the world biggest fake affiliate review site. On top of it, there may be legal implications if people start slandering commercial websites or use personal harmful comments against website owners. The owners of sidewiki may be held liable or at the very least have a very very big staff of people who monitor complaints. The market always know how to repair itself. trust me.
People that buy ClickBank products are generally not too bright. They get sugar-coated guides on what can easily be found on the web for free. So no, this will have 0 effect.