tea.mathoverflow.net - Discussion Feed (Commercial links)

Spinorbundle comments on "Commercial links" (262)

Spinorbundle — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:02:10 -0800

@ Andrew: You're absolutely right, I will add further explanations in the future.

Ilya Nikokoshev comments on "Commercial links" (261)

Ilya Nikokoshev — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:57:37 -0800

@bbukh and others: I noticed I was mentioned (rather positively) as the author of non-referral link to amazon

I want to share that before posting a link I (usually) try to check that the store I link to is the best by some objective criterion --- in this case, it's indeed the first Google result. Perhaps this could also be a good thing to put in the FAQ.

Andrew Stacey comments on "Commercial links" (259)

Andrew Stacey — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:50:15 -0800

@Spinorbundle: Thanks for clearing that up. I see no need to apologise, but your wording could have made it clearer that you had no particular relationship with the site you were linking to. Maybe something like "A quick google search came up with this list" or "I've found this list useful in the past.".

Spinorbundle comments on "Commercial links" (248)

Spinorbundle — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:12:25 -0800

As I wrote in a comment to the edit of Ilya:

Thanks for editing my post. I'm sorry for the confusion, I didn't recognize that this site contains links to Amazon with the referral code of the site owner. Obviously I'm not the site owner, I just thought the comments on the book will be useful for the person who asked the question. So sorry again.

Andrew Stacey comments on "Commercial links" (245)

Andrew Stacey — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:46:34 -0800

I wouldn't call it abuse providing it was made clear. In this case it wasn't. It may be, as you suggest, that the person who posted that comment was unaware of the issue, but that doesn't change the fact that I would want it made clear once it was brought to the attention of someone with enough rep to do something about it. So thanks, Ilya, I think your change is just fine.

Ilya Nikokoshev comments on "Commercial links" (244)

Ilya Nikokoshev — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:41:01 -0800

There are good reasons US Federal Courts don't issue advisory opinions -- it's much easier to talk about the specific example. Now: I edited the post we're talking about. I believe this is a big improvement over the way it was written before.

Of course, as part of "checks and balances" system, you should check out if you're fine with what I wrote there.

rwbarton comments on "Commercial links" (237)

rwbarton — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:24:15 -0800

Anyways I don't see what's so bad about even intentionally posting Amazon links with referral codes, provided of course that the link is relevant--otherwise it should be treated as spam. Am I allowed to link to my (hypothetical) ad-supported blog?

Anton Geraschenko comments on "Commercial links" (236)

Anton Geraschenko — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:05:51 -0800

I agree with rwbarton that it I wouldn't call it abusive in that case.

rwbarton comments on "Commercial links" (233)

rwbarton — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:34:03 -0800

In the case of the fractals list, that page is the top Google result (for me) for 'fractal books', so it seems quite likely that the person posting the link here is unrelated to the person hosting the page of Amazon links, in which case I wouldn't call this abuse.

Andrew Stacey comments on "Commercial links" (232)

Andrew Stacey — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:58:40 -0800

But in the fractals list, this did happen! It wasn't a direct link with a referral code, but the links off the page linked to have referral codes (at least, all those I tested did). And this was not stated either on the page itself nor in the answer.

Personally, I'd rather a link to Kepler's bookstore.

Anton Geraschenko comments on "Commercial links" (231)

Anton Geraschenko — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:43:02 -0800

I think it's certainly worth discussing, but it seems premature to make policies to counteract abuses that we're not sure will happen. Certainly if somebody starts linking to Amazon with referral codes, he'll be told to stop it and then (if he persists) we'll suspend his account.

My feeling is that linking to Amazon is pretty standard, though my preference is to link to Google books whenever possible.

Andrew Stacey comments on "Commercial links" (229)

Andrew Stacey — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:38:11 -0800

There's one point that bbukh raised that you didn't answer: the policy of not linking directly to amazon but via a referral site. Then if the book is bought (in that session), the owner of the referral site gets some credit on amazon. The first site mentioned by bbukh doesn't make this clear, which is behaviour that I'm not happy with. I don't, as a rule, object to the referral system but I do think it ought to be explicit rather than hidden away in the links - particularly for those (like myself) who don't really know how it works.

David Speyer comments on "Commercial links" (228)

David Speyer — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 06:35:43 -0800

I don't think we need a policy about this. Links to amazon (and other retailers) are useful. Yes, it might be unfair to other book merchants who sell the same book, but having a link to one retailer is more useful to our users than links to none. I think MO should focus on being useful to our users, not on being fair to third parties.

Now, there is a point at which I'd object. If anyone was deliberately using MO to advertise (for example) amazon, by finding excuses to link to amazon pages when it isn't really relevant, I would object very strongly. I delete that sort of comment from SBSeminar whenever I spot it. If this becomes a major problem,I could imagine killing referrer links to discourage it. At that point, we might also want to make our links rel=nofollow in order to discourage people from mining us for the google juice. But these changes can wait until the problem arrives.

bbukh comments on "Commercial links" (224)

bbukh — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:34:30 -0800

Should there not be a policy regarding commercial links? An example of what I mean is http://mathoverflow.net/questions/3567/what-is-the-best-book-to-learn-fractals/3578#3578

The answer there gives a link to a website with references, which have links to Amazon with the referral code of the site owner. Another instance is http://mathoverflow.net/questions/4669/can-we-disallow-finite-choice/4671#4671
where a reference is given and a link is given to Amazon again (without referal code).

I think that giving a reference is great, but linking to just of one of the many merchants who sells the book is not. If we now do it inadvertently, tomorrow someone else will do it systematically.