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Nicholas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 9:59 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
I got a Google web alert today that a piece I wrote appeared on somebody's weblog. When I looked at the blog, my name was there, and a title that had some of the same words of my original piece, but in a different order and with some odd new words. The article itself was about the same length as the original, but most of the words seemed random, nonsensical, and strange. It was riddled with random non-sequitors like "superannuated eggs," and most of the sentences were meaningless. I recognized words from my piece here and there, but this could not have been written by a person: the whole thing had the feel of being randomly generated.
 
Does anybody have any idea what's going on? There were other posts on this blog, and they were also all just as random and strange. Is there a program out there that fishes work off the Web and runs it through some kind of randomization program to create a meaningless piece of text? And why?

http://ozment.livejournal.com
 
 

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tchernabyelo
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 10:11 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Link?

Sounds like stuff used for/by spambotting, but I'm not sure why it would end up on a blog...

Brian Dolton
 
Land Of Wind And Ghosts stories:
"The Box Of Beautiful Things" - IGMS#3
"The Man Who Was Never Afraid" - Abyss and Apex #20
"At Blue Crane Falls" - Abyss and Apex #25
"Where No Wind Blows" - Staffs & Starships #2
"What The Sea Refuses" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"What The Heart Bears" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"Above The Clouds" - Paper Blossoms, Sharpened Steel (forthcoming)
"The Dragon Path" - Fictitious Force (forthcoming)
"Three Out Of Four" - Sorcerous Signals Feb-Apr 08 
"The Last Arrow Of Liang Xi" - Darwin's Evolutions (forthcoming)
 
Stories in other settings:
"The Unicorn Hunter" - OG's Speculative Fiction #8
"Call Centre" - Necrotic Tissue #1
"When Winter Came" - ASIM #32
"Cold Fire" - Flashing Swords #9
"St. Saviour And The Devil's Dandy" - Flashing Swords (forthcoming)

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Rob Santa
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 11:37 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
I'll second Brian.


Rob Santa
Hopelessly Addicted Writer of Speculative Fiction
and CEO of Ricasso Press

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Ramon Rozas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 11:47 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
I think its a "scraper site," http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scraper_site.
 
Also known as a "splog."  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spam_blog
 
I have trouble believing people can make money this way, but apparently it works.
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Nicholas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 2:21 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.

Ramon, thanks for the info. I checked out the Wikipedia links you provided, and I suspect you may be right. Although, the fake weblog in question was set up on Wordpress; I don't recall any banner ads. It sounds like the banner ads are the reason for "scraper sites" existing. Also, I wonder why the content wasn't just picked up or "scraped;" why the additional step of running it through some randomizer to turn it into weird gibberish?

curioser and curioser

 
 

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BethS
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 2:27 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Nicholas said...
I got a Google web alert today that a piece I wrote appeared on somebody's weblog.
 
How does this work? Google informs you when your work appears somewhere?
 
~Beth
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MysticWino
anarchist fringe monkey boddhisatva



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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 3:15 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
I've had that happen two or three times in the last week. I'm hoping Wordpress takes care of it. But they've been making some strange updates over the past couple weeks. So . . . give it a few days?

Read me soon in The Return of the Sword!
Blog: http://bitterhermit.wordpress.com
Buy wine: http://fringemonkey.org
Poetry Blog: http://fringemonkey.wordpress.com

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Nicholas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 3:46 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Beth said...
How does this work? Google informs you when your work appears somewhere?
 Google Web Alerts notifies you when a specific search term appears. In this case, it alerts me to my name so that I don't miss any online reviews of my work. (It helps that I have a unique name. I suppose it would be pretty useless for a John Smith.)
MysticWino said...
I've had that happen two or three times in the last week. I'm hoping Wordpress takes care of it. But they've been making some strange updates over the past couple weeks.
 That's interesting to hear, because I've been having another unrelated problem from Wordpress the past four or five days. I've been getting about half-a-dozen notifications a day from them that there is a new comment for me to moderate on Manning's Manly Movies, specifically to The Garbage Pail Kids Movie review. Every single one of the thirty or so "comments" has been spam. Out of nowhere they're just pouring in--and only to that one review, so far, not to any of the other reviews at MMM. Where the heck did the filter go?

http://ozment.livejournal.com
 
 

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MysticWino
anarchist fringe monkey boddhisatva



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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 4:04 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
The full moon was Sunday?
About as good an explanation as I can come up with.
Seriously, though, it's because they're busy doing things with their whole platform, etc. I prefer the older layout.
Oh, and I had a huge problem trying to upload images all last week. But that seems to have been corrected.
David

Read me soon in The Return of the Sword!
Blog: http://bitterhermit.wordpress.com
Buy wine: http://fringemonkey.org
Poetry Blog: http://fringemonkey.wordpress.com

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Ramon Rozas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 4:15 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
As to WordPress, is there a captcha to post comments? I heard a comment on Digg that some spambots had just beaten new captcha technology. Maybe we're witness to the beginning of the next level of the arms race!

BTW - how do you sign up to Google Web Alerts!? Sounds cool (not that I'm so vain that I'm googling my name twice a day...)
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Nicholas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 4:42 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ramon, it's one of the features with Gmail.
 
 

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Ramon Rozas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 4:59 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ah. Oh well, I don't use gmail. Maybe they'll open it up when it comes out of "beta"
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BethS
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 5:18 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ramon Rozas said...
Ah. Oh well, I don't use gmail. Maybe they'll open it up when it comes out of "beta"
I've been using gmail for years. Is it actually still in beta?
 
It used to be by invitation only, but now I think you can simply go to mail.google.com and sign up.
 
It is a terrific e-mail service.
 
~Beth
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BethS
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 5:23 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Nicholas said...
Ramon, it's one of the features with Gmail.

I use gmail but I can't figure out where to find this feature. Help?

~Beth

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Ramon Rozas
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  		   Posted 4/22/2008 6:02 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Cant find the link now, but gmail is still technically a "beta" product.
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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 12:21 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ramon Rozas said...
Cant find the link now, but gmail is still technically a "beta" product.


Gmail and google itself will always BE a beta product. As is every other piece of software in existance.

go to google, search on

"google alerts"

and you'll get the link just fine.

Gmail happens to be the best mail client out there, btw.
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Anthony G Williams
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 1:55 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ah, that may explain something that's been happening to me: a couple of times recently, Google Alerts has drawn my attention to what looks like a blog which has simply copied entries from my own blog (properly attributed to me). I wondered what was going on.
 
 

Tony Williams
Scales (2007), The Foresight War (2004)
Homepage: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk

SFF Blog: http://sciencefictionfantasy.blogspot.com/


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MysticWino
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 10:43 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Ramon Rozas said...
As to WordPress, is there a captcha to post comments? I heard a comment on Digg that some spambots had just beaten new captcha technology. Maybe we're witness to the beginning of the next level of the arms race!

BTW - how do you sign up to Google Web Alerts!? Sounds cool (not that I'm so vain that I'm googling my name twice a day...)  Ramon: not so much a matter of vanity, really. It's about knowing who's saying what about you. It's about protecting your identity. It's about protecting your copyrighted works. And for the semi- to pro-level writer, it's a matter of good marketing savvy. You catch people saying good things about you and then link them in your blog - or reply professionally if they have something else to say . . . But, really, it's only as vain as is good business and professionalism. smilewinkgrin And then there's the fun of seeing others with the same name doing . . . other . . . things on the net and out in the world. Fairly few of us have a name that won't bring in info on others.

Read me soon in The Return of the Sword!
Blog: http://bitterhermit.wordpress.com
Buy wine: http://fringemonkey.org
Poetry Blog: http://fringemonkey.wordpress.com

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Ramon Rozas
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 12:28 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Beth & Crystal Wizard: thanks - I didn't know that gmail was open even without an invite. I'll give it a try.

Mystic Wino - Oh, I google myself twice a day, but I hate admitting it! That's how I found out that I got a positive review at the Fix Online. (http://thefix-online.com/reviews/atomjack-9/).

I really need to get myself a web presence, but I've always been worried that I won't be disciplined enough to keep a blog updated.
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MysticWino
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 1:33 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.

Not getting one started is certainly one way to remain consistent. Kept me from writing a novel for about . . . twenty years. freaked   Blogs are great if you use them right - right for your own needs/desires. It's just another tool. No more. And definitely no less.

Congrats on the review.

Ramon Rozas said...
 (http://thefix-online.com/reviews/atomjack-9/).

I really need to get myself a web presence, but I've always been worried that I won't be disciplined enough to keep a blog updated.

Read me soon in The Return of the Sword!
Blog: http://bitterhermit.wordpress.com
Buy wine: http://fringemonkey.org
Poetry Blog: http://fringemonkey.wordpress.com

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crystalwizard
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  		   Posted 4/23/2008 3:18 PM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.
Google alerts are very useful. That's what let me know that book 4 of my series had been picked up by Fictionwise. I never would have known otherwise.

You just have to set the alerts up correctly so you get notified about what you really need to be notified about.

Never meddle in the affairs of a wizard unless you are soggy and hard to light!



Managing Editor of Flashing Swords

Visit my art gallery on art wanted
All my books in print

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Nicholas
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  		   Posted 4/26/2008 1:13 AM (GMT -4)    Quote This PostAlert An Admin About This Post.

I have four email accounts, and Gmail is by far the best. It has the best spam filter, the most storage, and a "mini-Google" searcher for your own account. That way, if you don't want to scroll back through three hundred emails looking for a specific one, you can just type in a search term and the relevant email is pulled up.

The only funny thing about it is that Google runs an unobtrusive little advertising banner above the Inbox that is obviously keyed in to terms you use in your emails (targeted advertising). The matches, of course, are sometimes ludicrously hilarious. If I write an email that mentions spam, I'll get a banner link to the website for Spam Lunchmeat. An odd one popped up the other day for an article on "Toenail Fungis." I've never written "toenail" in an email, and though I've probably written "fungus," I've spelled it correctly. The link description went on: "Article on toenail fungis by a famous auther." I didn't click on the link, as I have no desire to read an article on toenail fungus, written by a famous author or not (although I suppose a story by Stephen King about toenail fungus could be quite scary). I also had to wonder about how famous the "auther" was with two typos in the banner. rolleyes

http://ozment.livejournal.com
 
 

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