WTF!! Xomba account blocked.....

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   ryankettposted 14 years ago

   I only started using this site a week ago, and only had 11 bookmarks, yet they have emailed me to inform me that my account has been blocked - and with no other explanation! I am now awaiting a reply to my email asking why. I have read, and reread, their terms of service and I can see no breach whatsoever. Perhaps more worrying for me is this line:-
   
   
   "Xomba.com reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to reject, refuse to post or remove any posting (including email) by you, or to restrict, suspend, or terminate your access to all or any part of the Services at any time, for any or no reason, with or without prior notice, and without liability."
   
   
   So they now claim ownership of the text used for my bookmarks then? And the keywords in my titles? And now intend to take 100% of the associated adsense impressions? All of the content is still there, I have not given this up voluntarily. I cant see anything in their TOS which states they can keep my content, I am even considering legal action if they do not respond....
   
   I am shocked and appaled. It seems a google search shows me that I am not the only one. If I dont get a response then I will be making it my primary objective to inform as many people as possible of my plight through blogs and hubpages.

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      cosetteposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      what?
      
      oh noes.
      
      no explanation? i don't like that keeping content and 100% of adsense either. i was just going to start building over there; now i'm glad i didn't. i'm going to go close my account.
      
      thanks for letting us know Ryan. where would we be without you. ((hugs))
      
      p.s. that is what i love about HubPages - they communicate and let us know exactly why things happen and never leave anyone in the dark. Xomba's attitude is very uncool.

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         ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         I wish I could tell you that closing your account was a bad idea. But perhaps keeping it is in fact wiser, with your existing backlinks, as they remain dofollow...... but as for building.... I dont think that I will be bookmarking anymore. It is their lose, they are making 100% of impressions on 11 posts.... which is far less than 50% of impressions on 191 bookmarks and counting....

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            cosetteposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            yes, i won't be putting any effort into that site. there are plenty of others out there. the lack of communication alone would have put me off, but coupled with all the rest, i would have bolted too. if they delete your account, will all of your stuff go away? then they can't use it. but to lock you out for no reason? with your adsense info still there? that's scary. i would be ticked-off too!

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      alexandriaruthkposted 14 years agoin reply to this

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      Lady_Eposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Hope it gets sorted, Ryan.
      Good luck.

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      David Venturaposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      I have to say that reading this threat made me to revaluate continuing publishing things in Xomba.
      
      If you read point number 6 of their terms of use. It seems that anyone posting there is giving them the rights for continuing to use the posts.
      
      Because the terms of use say that you grant the rights to use, modify, translate, etc, to Xomba of all the material published.
      
      After that it adds that the license will terminate when you move the content from the site.
      
      However, the terms say that they keep the rights of the copies that they have in their servers, even if you terminate the license by removing the content of the site.
      
      As far as I understand their terms of use they have the right of keeping our content even If we remove the content of the site, and I don’t like it a bit
      
      Please, correct me if I am wrong.
      
      ttp://www.xomba.com/terms_of_use

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      vimierposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I was absolutely ripped off by Xomba too. I found their money making strategy online, and me stupidly enough followed it. I had created I think 25+ bookmarks and a few articles and my account was blocked. This was within a day or two of joining!
      
      They then kept the content for themselves. This was absolutely unacceptable, and I hope anyone writing there leaves immediately.

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   rebekahELLEposted 14 years ago

     does not sound good. good luck.

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   HubPoliceposted 14 years ago

   They blocked mine within 24 hours for accidentally including a wrong link (or misleading link as they put it) in one of my blurbs.
   
   I had my account re-instated within the next 24 hours after I'd promised to behave myself in future.
   
   But yes I wasn't impressed either, no initial explanation, and I couldn't access my account to remove my content.
   
   There are lots of horror stories on the net about Xomba acting in this way.

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      ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Well they have 24 hours to respond to my email and unblock my account before I set to work on descrediting them on the first google page for numerous search terms. I have had this crap before, it is nothing but a cheap attempt for them to make more money.

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         HubPoliceposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         I suspect you'll hear from them within that time period, and have your account re-instated, but the real problem is gonna come after you've invested a lot of time there, and then they block/ban you again.
         
         I rarely use it.
         
         But either ways, best of luck with it.

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            ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            Exactly what I thought, do I want to keep my account? I was very excited about Xomba, particularly following Sunforge' comments the other day about taking $40 in a week. It does of course also provide a dofollow backlink, but if its only purpose is a dofollow backlink... and if they are going to make cash from that.... then I think I will be staying well clear.
            
            Looks to have been happening for a while now.... http://hubpages.com/hub/xomba-scam
            
            Plenty of stuff on Google about Xomba being a scam. I really should have checked it out, I hate being ripped off.

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               charanjeet kaurposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               This weekend my agenda was to tap the potential of Xomba for my pages, thanks for the heads up. I feel so sad and sorry that it had to happen to you. Felt the same way when i was kicked out of Helium.

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               HubPoliceposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               Always worth a quick check for everything.
               
               The other day I was checking out the 'FREE 250 business cards for all eBay members' advert that's always at the top of ebay.  I went all the way through it and was just about to enter card details to cover the postage and at the last minute thought I'd do a quick check on Google.
               
               Lets just say it was very very lucky that I did.
               
               Anyways that story was unrelated to Xomba, but still kind of relevant.

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               Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               Links on Xomba were do follow when they started out, then they switched to no follow (which is when I stopped using them). Have they switched back now?
               
               I know they were very strict on prohibiting affiliate links and self-promotional links.

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      anglfire693posted 14 years agoin reply to this

      I had the same thing happen to me the day after I joined!  I posted in a forum about it as well...I copied and pasted my post here to reply to yours.
      
      I recently joined Xomba and used it successfully the first evening to add some of my hub links.  The next day my account was blocked and when contacting the site for help, I was told that my account was blocked because I had copied it from 'here' and here was a link that I clicked on and took me to my article...but the problem was, it was on some site called tripledub.com and submitted by some adams.  Well I got it all straightened out, this guy who stole my article stole the absolute wrong one as it was an article in my "Great gifts for..." series so I could prove the writing matched mine, but not only that, out of all of the 22 articles he could have stolen, this guy actually takes the only one that has my name in the text of the article!  If he stole others I don't know, I couldn't manipulate the site well enough to get help and the site service people were no help after I told them I would not submit my content to their site because they were still allowing this guy to submit on there after it was proven that he stole my article.  Yes, they took my article down from his posts, but told me, "let us know if he has any other articles of yours posted and we will take care of those also."
      
      Anyway...my question is this...is there anyway to prevent people from stealing your work????

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         anglfire693posted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Was just reading more posts on here about Xomba...yes, there customer service stinks!  The article they said I copied had my NAME in the body of it, last word of the first paragraph!  Plus I sent them links to the other hubs I had done in that "series" so they could compare them and I also listed out for them every site I submitted to and proved to them that I always used the same screen name, and showed them where I had posted that exact article to all of those sites.  When they reinstated my account, I didn't get so much as a "sorry for the inconvenience"...nothing.  Just a generic, "your xomba account has been activated" the same as when I first created it!  I would drop them, but I seem to be getting decent traffic from there.

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            cosetteposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            wow. that's not right. there are other places i can get traffic from, so in light of all that i have read, i won't be using them. i asked them to delete my account the other day, and they did, so that's that. good luck though

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      starme77posted 14 years agoin reply to this

      sounds to me like they steal articals , i would stay away from them

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   habeeposted 14 years ago

   Ryan, I'm sorry that happened to you. It sux royally! Please let us know how it turns out.

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   cosetteposted 14 years ago

   i asked them to close my account, since they don't have a way to do that on their site.
   
   what about infobarrel? has anyone heard anything about them?

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   Mark Knowlesposted 14 years ago

   Well - I tried xomba also - but they have some pretty noxious pop up ads, plus kontera and snap link ads - neither of which they share with you, so I am  ditching them.

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   Jane@CMposted 14 years ago

   Well Ryan, if they are scamming you and anyone else here that uses them, I'll be the first to say I'd be glad to have you on my side.  I'm sure your diligence and intellect will inform people what kind of site it is or is not!  Thanks for the heads up

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   jenblacksheepposted 14 years ago

   I created a Xomba account after reading Sunforged's comments too. I did it on Saturday and on Sunday my traffic had doubled. Dno if that's a coincedence or not. It was playing up yesterday when I tried to add more of my hubs, so I gave it up for the day.
   
   I don't really understand about bookmarks, but it all seems a bit worrying. I heard something about Xomba a while ago, about some problems it had been having, but then I thought someone said it had all been resolved, which is why I went for it.
   
   Nothing is ever easy!!

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      ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      Well put it this way. If hubpages ban you, they unpublish your writing and you are free to republish it wherever you want. As things stand, Xomba have banned me and kept my content on the site - I have no ability to edit or remove that content. That is the crucial difference.

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         cosetteposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         why ban you "for content" yet keep your content on their site?
         
         that would make me feel so helpless.

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         jenblacksheepposted 14 years agoin reply to this

         Ye, Oh I understand that. If it's doubling my traffic then I'll stick with it for now I think.
         
         Is Shetoldme worth it? I've heard bad things about that too.

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            ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

            Actually, Shetoldme.com are fantastic and those issues were fully resolved. I cant find the thread now but Sunforged was the creator of that topic and was left fully satisfied. I cannot recommend Shetoldme.com enough, although the results take a lot longer. I am now making about $2 per day with shetoldme.com, and $7 yesterday alone! But it seemed to take a while.... The owner, James, is a decent guy.
            
            I would defo say leave your Xomba stuff, you may as well you have posted it now. I would just be wary about posting anything else.... and stick with bookmarks rather than the full articles. At least then you have dofollow bookmarks if they do ever ban you for no reason!
            
            Do you have Google analytics? That will tell you exactly how much of your traffic comes from Xomba.

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               jenblacksheepposted 14 years agoin reply to this

               Ye, I have analytics, looks like a fair bit is coming from Xomba. I only have bookmarks on there ... just 50 word summaries. Put all my highest earning/traffic hubs on Xomba and a few of my worst ones to boost them. The backlink will still be there even if I'm banned, so I'll stick them all up eventually I think, but maybe I'll concentrate on Shetoldme for now.
               
               Thanx Ryan. Sorry to hear they're being rubbish to you!

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   ryankettposted 14 years ago

   I am gutted for anybody else who now doubts the integrity of the site, particularly those that have posted more than 10/11 bookmarks. But I felt that this was necessary out in the open, we are lucky to have such a great team at hubpages.
   
   I have just sent a link to this thread in an email to Xomba. James at Shetoldme.com dealt with concerns brilliantly on here, so I can see no reason why Xomba cannot come and try to win over people on here. It will be my last email unless they reply.

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    NaomiRposted 14 years ago

    Thanks for the warning, Ryan. I've used Xomba a few times as a backlink because they seem to rank quickly and highly on Google, but I haven't written anything lengthy for them and I removed my Adsense from them. I'll stay away from them from now on.

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    EmpressFelicityposted 14 years ago

    Yikes Ryan, I can only echo what the other posters here have said and thank you for the warning.  I've posted links to five of my hubs on Xomba but I won't post any more till I've heard the outcome of your story.

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    tantrumposted 14 years ago

    SORRY RYAN !!!!

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    sunforgedposted 14 years ago

    sorry to hear that happened ryan, I have seen many similar stories about their service, but usually the people complaining were writing in poor english and were involved in nefarious activities!, lol.. I know this wouldnt be the case for you
    
    I also read the anti-xomba hub, it comes up pretty high in a google search, so its hard to miss
    
    http://www.mylot.com/w/discussions/1335260.aspx (xomba is a scam)
    http://listofscams.blogspot.com/2007/11 … -scam.html
    http://www.mylot.com/w/discussions/1305980.aspx
    
    Most of the complaints i found were from several years ago and supposedly the site had new management and a new look
    
    
    
    Xomba has quickly become a very good earner for me but the real intention for the site and my recommendation is simply for the quick backlink...it takes maybe 45 seconds to make a blurb, I have over 100 up already.
    
    I cant think of any legitimate reason to ban an account that is making xomblurbs! there is no clause that says it has to go to your own site - as long as the blurb copy is original, they have no reason to ban anybody!
    
    Last week someone from hubpages was banned, they requested info, xomba wrote back that they were blocked for copied content..the hubpager showed it was their own copy and xomba reinstated, hopefully something similar will happen for you!
    
    http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/29470
    
    other xomba thread w/ similar issues as Ryan
    
    http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/28714
    
    This is something to keep in mind before investing time into any site..even if they do correct the problem for ryan, lets see HOW they fix it..you owuld expect a decent explanation for a ban
    
    so sorry my recommendation led you to this, they serve the purpose of a backlink whether you earn or not...i get better xomba traffic than any of the social bookmark sites...but their are literally hundreds of adsense rev sharing sites that allow you to create bookmarks, any of these can be used in place of xomba
    
    
    when this thread comes to conclusion, ill link to it in my hub that recommended them

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       ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Thanks for your response Sunforged, I have looked at my bookmarks (I did my oldest hubs first, working up to newer, so could find them via google) and I can confirm that a couple of my bookmarks used the first few lines of my hubs as the description. I hope therefore that I have triggered a copyscape-esque system on their site, and that I can clarify ownership with them. I will of course keep everybody updated, and can keep an open mind with regards to their response.
       
       Even if they reinstate my account, I would still want clarification with regards to who owns my posts. If I create 50 words of unique content every time I bookmark, which they will never remove from their site, then that would still be an issue with me. Particularly with that nasty clause in their TOS, so it would take email confirmation from them that I own all content if banned again. Else, they could ban every user at some stage in the future and reap the rewards for years to come. Helium have long worked a similar system, keeping - and earning from - content of banned users.
       
       I have 191 hubs to bookmark, 50 words minimum for each, thats 9550 words. I am not leaving myself open to having 9550 words 'stolen'.....

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    sunforgedposted 14 years ago

    i just swung by the site...all the stats are down today for page views ..as in they arent showing up at all..not "0";s just missing completely
    
    Maybe some kind of technical errors going on today?

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       waynetposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Yes they are updating the read views to more of a google analytics type visits and views type of thing according to their recent update on reads.
       
       I for one really like xomba and it's approach and the way it has grown over the last few years, it's slowly losing that default Drupal theme and evolving into a more branded site.
       
       I'm sure Ryan that this is a small oversight on their part and it hopefully will be cleared up shortly.

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    sunforgedposted 14 years ago

    I only reccomend the blurbs...why share real writing with them for a 50/50 split when you get 60 here at hubs

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       jenblacksheepposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Definitely! I can't think enough to write on here, I'm not going to waste time and money (i guess) writing that seems to have so many on-going problems.
       
       
       I've just signed up to Shetoldme, and had an e-mail back from James. Sounds like he's working really hard there; says he's the only one doing the job he's doing and has a massive workload. Says it could take up to a week to get approval! It felt like a really personal e-mail, even though I know it's not. Automatically liking him!
       
       Guess I'll finish getting myself set up on Xomba and take my chances.

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    ryankettposted 14 years ago

    Xomba just emailed me one line saying:-
    
    "Your account was blocked because your content was copied from Wikipedia. All content must be in your words and your words alone."
    
    
    I replied with:-
    
    "None of my content has been copied from Wikipedia, some of it has been copied from the opening text of my own articles on hubpages. If any of that content is now on Wikipedia it has been copied from me. I have the benefit of Copyscape on hubpages, none of my articles trip that.
    
    Your communication is appalling, I cannot access my account to even review my content, so why not tell me which of my bookmarks have been taken from Wikipedia? Here is what I know about plagiarism http://hubpages.com/hub/How-To-Deal-With-Plagiarism
    
    Now, show me where I have plagiarised. You have, as far as I am concerned, now stolen my content and I demand its removal. Show me an example of my copied content, or take back your libelous remarks."
    
    I know that I havent held back with this one, but I sent them three emails to get that response. I have googled the passages of text from my bookmarks, none of them bring up any wikipedia articles.

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       EmpressFelicityposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       It sounds as though this is might be the template response they send out to anyone they sniff out as having duplicate content (even if, as in your case, the duplication was from your own material rather than Wikipedia!)

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       ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       UPDATE: There is no update, Xomba have absolutely nothing to say in reply it seems. Neither do they feel the need to respond to this thread, which they have been sent a link to.

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    Jeffrey Nealposted 14 years ago

    That's BS, Ryan!  Hopefully they respond thoughtfully.  I too joined xomba on SF rec., and I have 11 or 12 blurbs there now.  Some of them I wrote the blurb original, but probably at least half I just copied the summary from my hubs. 
    
    Now, I usually write a separate summary for hubs rather than generate it automatically, but does anyone know for sure if xomba takes issue with copying the first few lines of a hub?
    
    I'm not going to close up with them, though, since as you said it's still a do-follow link either way.

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       deartfuldodgerposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       From recent events on the forum it seems as if there automated system does not like copied content..but they do reinstate the user when they show the content is theirs to be copied
       
       I just tried to get to the TOS on xomba
       
       and got this:
       
       Site off-line
       
       The site is currently not available due to technical problems. Please try again later. Thank you for your understanding.
       
       
       so it seems as i fthey do have some tech issues going on...maybe this caused Ryans BS Flag also?

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    jenblacksheepposted 14 years ago

    What a joke! I don't think you should have held back. If it were me, an e-mail like that would be holding back! I've read a lot of your hubs and your writing is more intelligent than most of the crap you read on Wikipedia. It doesn't even make sense that you would have copied a 50 word blurb from Wikipedia! ... Presumably they're not commenting on the content of the link you put on there, only what you actually write as a summary!
    
    Perhaps you could email Google Adsense and get them to cancel your account with Xomba, then you'll still get the benefits of the dofollow link without having to have anything to do with them.

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    NaomiRposted 14 years ago

    Good luck, Ryan. Keep us posted on what happens. Good for you for taking a stand.

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    fishtiger58posted 14 years ago

    Thanks for the warning going to close my account right now.

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    sabrebIadeposted 14 years ago

    Hey Ryan!
    Remember when I asked if Xomba was rude or was it just me a few days ago?
    ::clears throat::
    You said "It must just be you"?
    LOL
    
    Same thing happened here.
    But after some back and forth e-mails, they re-opened my account.
    Good luck!

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       ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       I wasnt even a member then, was just playing. Oh the irony!

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    sabrebIadeposted 14 years ago

    Xomba needs to change their customer service style.
    If it wasn't for "us"(Bloggers, Hubbers etc) posting links, there would be no Xomba
    I have had sites e-mail me and say " Hey, we noticed this..." or " Hey, you shouldn't do this..." but to just slap your account down, and be snotty about it afterwards is inexcusable.
    They can't act like Google until they are as big as Google.
    
    When I e-mailed them I mentioned that I hadn't had a problem with She Told Me, RedGage, or any other book marking site like that, and that there were plenty of others to use.
    
    And I don't think that my responses were templates, they had a tech's name on them.
    And no I'm not telling you the tech's name.
    LOL

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    aguasilverposted 14 years ago

    Thanks for the heads up, I also went there after sunforgeds' hub and started to register, but that's as far as I've got, won't go further until you post that they have resolved your complaint.

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    shinujohn2008posted 14 years ago

    They are doing like that for years. They also block accounts of users with lot of content , but , will not delete the content. They make money from that.

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    DennisBarkerposted 14 years ago

    Xomba was on my list of sites to develop content on, thats now on hold until their issues are resolved.
    
    Thanks for the info ryan, saved me some aggro with this thread.
    Regards
    Dennis

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    Patti Annposted 14 years ago

    Wow - I have about seventy five link already on - hope it all works out.  It seemed like a good site - but you never know.  Thanks for letting us all know.

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    Dao Hoaposted 14 years ago

    Oh no!
    
    I opened an account with Xomba after I read your other post.
    
    I put some blurbs, but now I will wait.
    
    Thanks for let us know.

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    sunforgedposted 14 years ago

    ask them on their facebook account?
    
    http://www.facebook.com/pages/Xomba/19341387013
    
    KidGas of Hubpages is currently front page on Xomba's Facebook!
    
    Nick Verenis is the CEO , he claims that he will answer all xomba related questions..try emailing him directly via Xomba/Facebook or linkedIn ..LOL
    
    We could all become fans and start posting links to this thread on their facebook account? I dislike poor customer service especially when I know the customer receiving the disservice is deserving of better

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    Lily Roseposted 14 years ago

    I joined Xomba a few weeks ago after a recommendation from Kidgas and I've posted almost all my hubs so far as xomblurbs.
    
    I have made sure that my 50 word description is not just copied from my hubs - I change them up a bit.
    
    My traffic is rising and I'm actually making decent money from Xomba.  I'm staying put and I'll cross my fingers nothing goes bad!
    
    Sorry you're having such trouble, Ryan.

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    Rik Ravadoposted 14 years ago

    I too recently joined Xomba and have had good results from Xomblurbs - I'll keep an eye on your progress and if necessary stop using Xomba if you don't get a satisfactory outcome.  Glad you are harnessing the power of the Hubpage community - good luck!

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    Jeffrey Nealposted 14 years ago

    Hey, Ryan, did I read correctly on one of sunforged's hubs that your account was unblocked? If so, congrats on getting it sorted out, and did they give you any further explanation?

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    PJ_Deneenposted 14 years ago

    Bummer, I just started with Xomba, but will hold back for now.  I'm sorry they are treating hubbers this way.  I hope this gets sorted out for you.

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    Green Lotusposted 14 years ago

    Well, the same thing happened to me.
    
    I posted all my hubs right after reading Sunforged great hub...so I e-mailed Xomba CS. They said I was blocked because I signed up for Xomba using my REAL NAME and I was sending everyone to sites created by Green Lotus. That's not allowed in Xombaland. Anyway after about a week trying to prove to them I was one and the same, I was able to access the account.

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    ryankettposted 14 years ago

    UPDATE:- I have my account back, with them basically saying that it was never a permanent ban (yeah right), they have obviously been reading this thread (I sent them the link) and dont like what it is doing for their business. I doubt I will use them again, I have 4 other adsense sharing bookmarking sites to use - people only get 1 chance with me and they well and truly blew the chance in its entirety. They are still a good dofollow backlink, I will give them that, but they are also only one of many similar sites!

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    sunforgedposted 14 years ago

    It seems they are rather stringent about fighting stolen content/copyright violation but dont have a good system of informing those they have issues with.
    
    I know the site has been growing very fast as of late and they are hitting some great ranks in google, being strict about dupe content/cp violations is a necessary part of that authority.
    
    Hopefully, there CS will catch up with the new demands on their system
    
    Ryan WAS reinstated, as was everyone else who mentioned this on the thread...perhaps its a rite of passage for the site! ..I get great returns from Xomba and think its worth the annoyance
    
    If i got suddenly banned I would be furious also...but at least I now know that eventually I would probably be reinstated

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       ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       I will probably give it another go sunforged, in fact my latest hub even recommends that people sign up, but it has been knocked back a few places with me for a while. I agree with what you say, but I have just had email communications with the owner of Snipsly which really makes me want him to succeed - so my next 195 backlinks will be with them....

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          ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

          ps. I would change the OP to state that the issues have been resolved, but no editing ability

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    Jane@CMposted 14 years ago

    I'm seeing results from snipsy already.  I was a little leary as the site is built on a wordpress blog.

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       Jeffrey Nealposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       That's actually my favorite thing about it.

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       cosetteposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       that's good to know because that's my pick. speaking of which, i should get crackin'
       
       

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    Ivorwenposted 14 years ago

    I'm glad to hear this was resolved, Ryan.

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    sabrebIadeposted 14 years ago

    I'm glad you got it resolved Ryan, even though it took them long enough.
    I've been watching this thread (like I bet others have) to see if they did well by you.

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    ryankettposted 14 years ago

    I have actually done a little bookmarking on Xomba tonight, I have no idea whether that is a wise thing to do!

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    kerrygposted 14 years ago

    Thanks for the heads-up about your problems and the updates, Ryan. I've also been using them on sunforged's recommendation and will be a lot more cautious from now on about rewriting blurbs, and maybe starting to move over to SheToldMe and Snipsly.

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       ryankettposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       My advice would be to use all three! Snipsly wont pay good money for a while, but its good to get your bookmarks established early on. SheToldMe.com is becoming a good payer for me. I am uneasy about Xomba, but I think I will give it the benefit of the doubt for now!

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    thisisoliposted 14 years ago

    I am kind of unsure whether or not to use Xomba right now.  While tehy do apparently get good traffic, I do not want to have to beg to give them content which will make them money, which will have a contractual right of use given to them.
    
    Xomba is in real trouble if they continue as tehy are doing.  It is important to remember that the writers are what make the site a success.  If you start treating the writers like garbage, they WILL all leave.
    
    Sure the site can survive on the content they basically stole, but without fresh quality content, they wont last very long.

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    1974posted 14 years ago

    I wouldn't even bother with Xomba for a back link, I just checked all mine today and they are all "nofollow".  For some reason, my stats have all been reset to zero as well.  Not sure when that happened, but I haven't logged in to Xomba for awhile.

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       sunforgedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Than you checked wrong
       
       They are dofollow
       
       what did you use to "check"?

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    1974posted 14 years ago

    I have the SEO plugin for FireFox and I also viewed the page source.
    
    EDIT:  and just to be clear, they were "dofollow" at one point.  I'm just wondering if they penalize people for anything.  All I have posted there is a handful of Xombytes linking back to my HubPages but it is all original and not copied from anywhere.

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       sunforgedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       as do I .
       
       post a link to a page that has a nofollow link! im very interested

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    1974posted 14 years ago

    Here ya go, this isn't one of mine but it is also from October of this year which is when most of mine were posted.  I wonder if the "dofollow" goodness has a shelf life of a couple months.
    
    http://www.xomba.com/disneychannelhanna … ey_channel

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       sunforgedposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       That one certainly is nofollow, Ive looked around and found some older liks that were also nofollow
       
       None of mine are. But they are from the last 40 days. I cant find out a why...Im going to send out a help question to admin

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    1974posted 14 years ago

    cool, let me know what they say.  I haven't violated any TOS, yet they don't have too much info on their site.  I wouldn't mind as long as they were up front with their nofollow policies.  If there is a certain amount of participation I need to adhere to I would surely do it. But not knowing what it is makes it kind of difficult.

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    thisisoliposted 14 years ago

    yeah I would like to know more about the Stealth no-following of links.
    
    It is the little things like that which would put me off using them as a service.  I prefer to use companies such as Hubpages, who seem to respect their users, rather than ones which try to sneakily steal more and more from those who make the service.
    
    I think you could compare this to Costa Rican Government vs British Government.

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    janiek13posted 14 years ago

    I also just recently put some bookmarks on xomba, hmm.. better check it. I have run into a few shady deals on some of the sites I have tried. Live and learn.

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    1974posted 14 years ago

    I just added a new Xomblurb to see what would happen.  The link on the new one is "dofollow", yet all my old ones are still "nofollow".  It will be interesting to see how long it lasts...

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    Lily Roseposted 14 years ago

    I just checked my adsense for today and I had one xomba click worth nearly $3 (not sure if I can put exact amounts) this morning.  Xomba has been working out well for me and I thank you Sunforged for the recommendation.
    
    Can someone enlighten me on the "dofollow" and "nofollow" thing - I've learned so much since being here at HP and I've heard these terms many times, but I really don't know what they mean.  Also, how can I check to make sure my xomba links are "dofollow?"

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       1974posted 14 years agoin reply to this

       "nofollow" is an attribute for the  tag in HTML.  It was implemented in an effort to combat blog comment spamming in order to gain a backlink to your site.  To put it simply, a  tag that has the "nofollow" attribute assigned to it does not pass any "juice" so to speak to the target site.  The back link still works when you click on it, but as far as helping your site or page climb up the rankings, it is near worthless.
       
       To find out if your link has "nofollow" added to it, you can download the SEO Plug In for FireFox.  Or, you can simply go to the view menu in your browser and choose to "view source" or "view page source".  You want to look for this in the HTML:
       
       a href="http://example.com" rel="nofollow"
       EDIT: it stripped out the whole code when I posted, the above is normally surrounded by "<" and ">".
       
       Instead of example.com, you will have to scroll through the code to find exactly where your link is.  It is much easier to just use the FireFox plug in.

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          Ultimate Hubberposted 14 years agoin reply to this

          I got a few seconds late in replying.

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          Lily Roseposted 14 years agoin reply to this

          Thanks for the explanation - and to Ultimate Hubber.  Now I completely understand what it means.
          
          
          I just went to Xomba and checked several of my blurbs, from 5 days ago to 6 weeks ago, and they are all "nofollow"!  I'm really not happy about this because I put a lot of time into oposting those blurbs!  On the other hand, I am earning pretty good adsense (on occassion) from xomba clicks ($2.71 for one click this morning.)
          
          I emailed xomba asking about the "nofollow" - let's see if they respond...

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       Ultimate Hubberposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Dofollow and nofollow are tags placed in the hyperlinks.
       
       Search engine crawlers are allowed to crawl the dofollow links and they are counted as an incoming link towards your post/hub. Thus they help you rank high in search engines.
       
       Crawlers are not supposed to index nofollow links and most search engines won't show nofollow in their index of links BUT many successful bloggers think that nofollow link do carry some SEO juice and getting thousands of nofollow can also help you rank higher.
       
       To make it simple, try to get dofollow links as they have more power to rank you higher in SERPs, if you can't get many dofollow, get some nofollows.
       
       Read this to find some ways of getting easy and free backlinks: http://hubpages.com/hub/Get-Easy-Free-Backlinks

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    Trsmdposted 14 years ago

    Thank God.. I did'nt joined in Xomba...

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       Ultimate Hubberposted 14 years agoin reply to this

       Didn't you read the whole thread?

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