

Maybe Jason Calacanis isn't being totally honest about Mahalo? - dazz
http://smackdown.blogsblogsblogs.com/2010/06/21/zomg-jason-calacanis-lied-again-shocker/

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josefresco
Why this crusade against Mahalo/Calacanis? Why isn't this sort of critique
aimed at Google, who is after all indexing and profiting off of sites like
(and much worse than) Mahalo.

I find all these posts interesting, but it seems Jason is being portrayed as
the most at fault. Isn't he just playing the Google 'game' better than most?

When I see SPAM in Google's index that is ranking high I don't get mad at the
spammers but rather at Google for allowing and often times making huge money
off of SPAM they index.

~~~
mvandemar
This is very much a critique against Google, but more towards the pass that
they keep giving Jason. Jason is most definitely _not_ playing the game better
than most, and in fact his violations of Google's quality guidelines are in
many cases way more blatant than other spam sites, and are definitely more
high profile... yet for some odd reason Google refuses to penalize them. Other
sites belonging to honest webmasters get penalized on a daily basis, yet Jason
appears to be immune.

~~~
olefoo
I think this is an object lesson in the value of social skills and conference
going. I doubt that Calacanis would be able to keep this circus going if he
hadn't cultivated some excellent relationships inside Google. I can't really
blame the Googlers involved; it's hard to knowingly wreck the business of
someone who's been a good friend, even if you know they deserve it.

------
rit
This obsession with Calacanis/Mahalo is becoming a Hacker News tic along the
lines of the reddit obsession with Bacon/Narwhals/Keanu Reeves.

Most of the content is regurgitated as well. If you have such an issue with
Mahalo and/or Mr. Calacanis: STOP PAYING ATTENTION TO THEM.

Nothing dooms a site to the shadows of history like being completely and
utterly forgotten.

~~~
jcalacanis
Thank you.... and I agree.

We are 100% SEO compliment to best practices and we delete/deindex/build out
any community pages that are short every month. Google Knol, Wikipedia,
About.com, eHow and Associated Content don't do this!

We are uber agressive about removing short pages, and investing thousands of
dollars in top pages. like these two: <http://www.mahalo.com/how-to-make-
strawberry-shortcake> <http://www.mahalo.com/how-to-play-guitar-chords>

These claims by hater SEOs are basically B.S. They take the last 10,000 pages
the community are working on and say "gotcha!!! these pages suck!" Well, they
are being worked on! Come back in 60-90 days and they will be built out or
they will be deindexed. that simple.

... absurd.

~~~
axod
I see <http://www.mahalo.com/how-to-make-strawberry-shortcake> has 4 adsense
units on it. Adsense says you're allowed a maximum of 3.

Something I'm missing? Or is there some special Google deal by which you can
add more than 3 and get away with it?

In terms of user experience, I think the ratio of content to adverts on that
page (Which you seem to cite as a good page) is way out. Tons of adverts /
cross promotion etc, and a little bit of content in the middle.

~~~
jcalacanis
Google gives permission to some sites to do more. we are one of those sites.

~~~
axod
Do you think those types of pages are providing real value to users? Come
on... get real.

There's obviously a reverse incentive at play here which stinks (IMHO). If you
make the page useful to users, they wouldn't click on any of the ads. So it's
in your best interest to create bare minimum pages, or pages that give the
users a token amount of value - the bare minimum.

I'm surprised at Google for allowing this sort of thing and specifically
allowing you to put even more ads up than is usually allowed.

------
euroclydon
I wonder how much money Google is making off the Mahalo domain?

------
jamesshamenski
Google is probably making a lot of money off of Mahalo. Anyone want to take a
stab at what that number could be?

~~~
travem
Probably more than they make of Knol :-)

------
bobbyi
I don't understand how the author can say that there aren't coupons on those
coupon pages. Apparently since the coupons are from an affiliate program with
Savings.com they don't count.

When I go to the "1800Pools Coupons" page that he linked, the main content box
has an offer for "$25 off Orders Over $500" . When I click on this, it tells
me that the coupon code is "AFF25" and can be added during checkout on the
1800Pools website.

<http://www.mahalo.com/1800pools-coupons>

Where's the problem? Isn't that exactly what someone who searched on google
for "1800pools coupons" is looking for?

~~~
mvandemar
Savings.com != Mahalo.com. There is no reason to rank Mahalo... if that is the
site being looked for then rank Savings.com instead.

It is what is known as a "thin affiliate" site, and it adds a layer of
navigation to the user and middleman payouts to the advertiser, lowering user
experience and driving up advertiser costs.

~~~
epoxy
FYI: Calacanis sits on the board of Savings.com.

[http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/05/savingscom-makes-coupons-
mo...](http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/05/savingscom-makes-coupons-more-social-
jason-calacanis-joins-board/)

------
jister
I thought this issue was long gone? Can we just move on please?

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ddemchuk
The simple matter here is that people should not be attacking Mahalo because
of their "spam" or whatever else you think they're doing. If you want to
attack them, you should also be ripping apart all the results for the front
page results for viagra, weight loss, acne, etc.

All they're doing is taking advantage of Google's weaknesses. If you use
Google on a daily basis, which the majority of us do, but their results are
not the high quality you're expecting them to be, why the hell would you be
getting mad at the results showing up instead of the site serving up the
results?

Everyone needs to lay off and start criticizing Google if anything.

------
jasonmcalacanis
Let's talk about something more interesting:

1\. Open Angel Forum has gotten a dozen startups funded. 2\. Open Angel Forum
is now in eight cities, and will be in San Francisco this Thursday. 3\. The
Launch Conference next winter will be a platform for 30-50 startups to launch
AND raise their seed/A-rounds.

These SEO attacks are absurd at this point... I may be outspoken, but this is
a slam job done by a group of SEOs who have it out for me. It's sad that they
can take over HackerNews so easily.

~~~
ashu
As a completely independent observer having no stakes in this game, I think
that the facts absolutely don't point this way. None of your "arguments" has
explicitly refuted the attacks. All refutations have been shown (with proof)
to be invalid.

Finally, it just does not seem like all that plastered _excessive_ AdSense is
doing the Internet any good at all. What value are you providing there,
exactly? If those are just pages which don't get much traffic, you could just
remove the AdSense from there and the world will thank you for it.

~~~
cmatthias
I'd like to echo ashu's comments; I have no skin in the SEO game and Mahalo
doesn't pass the smell test for me. There might be a bias on HN against you or
your site, but if you want to change that, it's your job to argue with solid
facts that can't be refuted with a 5 minute Google search.

The fact that you're trying to completely change the subject with your post
about the Open Angel Forum doesn't really help your cause, either.

