Seperate Poetry and Short Stories From Informational Hubpages

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   angela_michelleposted 12 years ago

   I feel concerned that the reason google may prefer ehow as opposed to hubpages,  is because there is an abundance of poetry and short stories.
   
   I am not by any means saying that those who publish the short stories and poetry are not good, but they are not usually searchable or high market. I feel like by having short stories and poetry be a part of our site, pulls down the credibility of the nonfiction of the remainder of the site.
   
   I would like to see hubpages make a different domain name for those that are short stories or poetry. For instance poempages.com or something more clever. That way hubpages can become viewed as a true resource site, rather than an entertaining site.
   
   I hope that made sense, but I have tried figuring out how to place my feelings in words for quite a while, and decided to make a comment.

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   1. 0

      writeronlineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      "I feel like by having short stories and poetry be a part of our site, pulls down the credibility of the nonfiction of the remainder of the site."
      
      Really? I feel like anyone unable to construct a sentence any better than that, ought to take look in the mirror before casting aspersions on the work of other writers. Seriously.
      
      There is an alternative point of view, based on the idea that it's everyone's right to express themself in writing - in whatever form. Hub Pages provides a platform for a wide variety of writers, at diferent levels of skill, across a wide range of genres. That's the site's raison d'etre. If that interferes with your (perceived) ability to make more money, unless work you don't personally rate is isolated elsewhere, maybe you'd be better to instead isolate your (perceived) superior revenue-driven work on a site of its own. Your own. Puff Pages perhaps...
      
      A quick and random review of revenue-driven Hubs should help you to see that much too much of that work fails any kind of writing-quality check. It's not topic selection or genre that drags HP down. In Google's eyes or anyone else's. It's simply that there is too much rubbish littering the entire site, that our administrators can't be bothered cleaning out. Either that, or they can't tell the difference. (Check some of the Hubs published by the owners and managers here onsite, and you'll see that's not a sarcastic comment.)
      
      If you're open-minded enough to look at this question from a different perspective, this Hub expresses it, and is rounded out by a number of comments from other Hubbers.
      
      <snipped - no promotional links in the forums>
      
      Cheers.

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      1. 71

         Hauntyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         This is just plain rude. Examine your own sentences and spelling, please. Then, while making a comment, you had better watch your manners as well, as not everyone takes kindly to the kind of accusations you make about low-quality content.
         
         Personally, I think the OP has a point, which, by the way, goes well with the idea of multiply sub-domains for authors that some Hubbers proposed here.
         
         @Shadesbreath: Nice way to express your point of view, even if the abusive analogy about the pitchforks is a meanie. Nobody suggested that sort of thing, so it's not fair to make it look like the OP had.
         
         Also, the thing about the inordinate amounts of spam and replicated articles is a reality that likely hurts HubPages way more deeply than poetry and short stories.

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            Shadesbreathposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Nah, not abusive or meanie, just a bit of fun. Anything to procrastinate before digging in and doing something actually productive.
            
            

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         2. 0

            writeronlineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Haunty, get over yourself. Speaking plainly is not rude. Not much to be gained by waffling around. As to quality content being drowned by garbage onsite, facts are facts. Suggest you get off the Glee Club high horse and read Paul E's response /acknowledgement of same.

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            1. 71

               Hauntyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               I just don't see the point in addressing a suggestion in the manner some people did here, that is, in the way of harsh criticism or mockery.

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            Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            I thought WO's comment was pretty much spot on.  It's not as offensive as the two drafts I typed yesterday.  I deleted them and made do with a picture instead  - otherwise it would have been ban time.

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            1. 71

               Hauntyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               I only got ticked off by WO's scolding of the OP's sentence structure - my pet peeve, - while, in fact, his was not much better either. Thought if he could start his post that way, I would too.
               
               Your picture is spot-on, as always.

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   2. 0

      calculus-geometryposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      When I hub hop, I see far more spam and spun content than creative writing. I don't know if hub hopping provides a representative sample of the types of articles on this site, but if it does then I think the spam pages are a bigger factor in this site's search engine rankings than the presence of short stories and poetry.

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   3. 60

      Eric Graudinsposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Angela wrote: "I feel like by having short stories and poetry be a part of our site, pulls down the credibility of the nonfiction of the remainder of the site. "
      
      Thanks for the belly laugh.
      The product flogging "non fiction" articles on Hubpages have about as much credibility as a merchant banker saying that he doesn't care about his bonuses.
      In my opinion, the vast majority of articles at Hubpages and other similar sites are written by authors that know nothing about the things they are writing about, or have never used the things they review and try to sell.
      
      They "research" the work of others, and copy, spin, mangle, and mash the words and ideas that they copy from elsewhere.
      And then the stuff they spew up is used by other writers who are doing the same thing.
      Unless you have some genuine knowledge or experience about a topic, I'd suggest that you don't waste your time to join the other hordes of others who  still think that they can make their fortune on the internet writing articles about all sorts of stuff that some guruwanker tells you
      is hot this week.
      
      At least the poets and short story writers tend to be much more genuine in what they write.
      
      I recently looked at some photography articles on hubpages when I was looking at getting a new camera. The reviews was appalling.
      If they are an indication of the quality of the non fiction here, then it may be better if the non fiction writers were moved to a new site called slushpages.

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   4. 69

      Patty Kenyonposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Hello Everyone!! 
      
      I am new to HubPages and  I will say so far that this has been a WONDERFUL community!! Everyone is so very supportive!!
      
      In Regards to the Question:
      
      Personally, many of the Hubbers I follow as well as myself write in many different genres.  Those genres include Poetry, Creative Writing, Non Fiction, Humor, and some write reviews. 
      
      HubPages, to me, is a way for writers to show their abilities in all different forms of writing.
      
      I believe that it allows each reader to easily read through HubPages for the different content it provides. 
      
      When Hopping HubPages, which I do frequently, allows me to view Hubs in all different genres and often times I learn something new...a new type of Poetry...to History, to Science, to Humor etc. 
      
      To separate the content into different domains, in my opinion, many would miss a ton of great content regardless of genre.
      
      Thank-you for taking the time to read this comment from a new Hubber!!

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   5. 91

      Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      In response to the original post.
      
      Poems do get a lot of Google traffic if you know how to tag and title them. I also had 8 chapters of a story that got very good views but I removed it for editing.
      
      The point I am trying to make is that I don't agree that fiction writers and poets should be removed from the main site.
      
      What I am suggesting is that if you write articles as well as stories and or poems separate them. Open two accounts, one for your informative articles and the other for your works of art.
      
      As I already said, poems are well searched on the internet, you just need the right titles and hash tags.

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      1. 85

         Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Sounds like you should write a Hub about that, Cardisa, because I know many other poets on HubPages have had poor success.   I know tagging and titling is basic, but I think poets would find it helpful to have it spelled out in a Hub aimed specifically at them - especially as they are often not very web-savvy.
         
         My only concern with poetry is that Panda can punish a whole sub-domain for having a few short Hubs.  That's why HubPages sets a minimum word count.  The decision to allow an exemption for poetry was made long before Panda, and I'm a bit surprised they haven't changed it to reflect Google's new attitude.  Of course, images and videos count as content too, so it's not that hard to "beef up" a poetry Hub for someone like you, who knows what they're doing.  What worries me is that new Hubbers could be merrily publishing unadorned single poems as Hubs, blissfully unaware they could be doing their sub-domain damage. 
         
         As for the OP - I don't see any need to remove poetry and short stories.  We each have our own separate sub-domains and what others choose to write is none of my business, provided it's not putting the site's advertising programs at risk.

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         1. 91

            Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Hi Marisa,
            
            I will check with my Apprenticeship mentors if I am allowed to write a hub of that nature.
            
            The basic things to keep in mind with writing anything online is content including poetry.
            
            For poets reading this here are some tips:
            
            1. Add an intro to the poem, what mood you wrote it in, what inspired it etc.
            2. write down all the possible titles and the subject of the poem.
            3. go to your keywords tool and look up the subject to see if it is search friendly.
            4. your poem should title A Poem About Cars .....for example
            5. If your title has been used try another spin on it and used your name at the end like A Poem About Cars By Cardisa
            6. Any further questions, my fee is US$1000 per hour

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            1. 91

               Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               I just did a keyword research and found that I have a keyword friendly title to work with so I can write the instructional hub on how to format the poetry hub to get traffic.

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            2. 85

               Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               See, those are great tips, it should make a really useful Hub I think.

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   6. 0

      Matthew Kirkposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Why don't they just ban poetry, its terrible, or the stuff on here is, cringeworthy - every single one.

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         paradigmsearchposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         You mean, of course, except paradigmsearch's, right?

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            Matthew Kirkposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Of course

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      2. 0

         SirDentposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         I take offense at this statement.
         
         
         
         Choose your weapon!!!

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            Matthew Kirkposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            Better be careful, poets are famous for "going before their time" (none of you better use that for your next poem).

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2. 82

   WriteAngledposted 12 years ago

   Where would this stop?
   
   Where would you place humour, for example, which is neither poetry/short stories nor informational?
   
   Some people might also argue that purely sales-oriented material should be separated from very information-focused material.
   
   Others might wish to separate hubs dealing with low-brow topics from those dealing with high-brow topics.
   
   I would also argue that a well crafted poem/short story holds more value that a supposedly informational hub written by someone with no concept of grammar or style, who is trying to capitalise on high-paying keywords.

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3. 74

   frogdroppingposted 12 years ago

   Google's algorithm is pretty impressive. However the day it can differentiate between poetry, consumer reviews and short stories, I'll start to worry.
   
   Google cannot read.
   
   What can it do? Detect new content, spam, duplicated text, content length, that kind of thing.
   
   Seen as though you feel no way about poking poetry and fiction writers with a stick, do you understand what happens when a site is filled with same/similar content? There are over 1000 hubs with the words 'clean/brush a dogs teeth' in them.
   
   Almost 350 hubs about strawberry/banana smoothies. A 1000 about concentration camps. And it's 'atrocious' by the way.
   
   +1 to the hubber above me.

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4. 76

   Shadesbreathposted 12 years ago

   One hubber thinks that poetry sucks
   And wants short stories off HP
   “Search content only,” is what she demands,
   “For I think I’m better than thee.”
   
   She bade the community bring pitchforks out
   And torches burning bright
   They could chase those damn creative types
   Out into the night.
   
   “Burn the poets at the stake!
   Douse the story tellers with pitch.”
   But nobody came to the riot she called
   And most thought she was just a
   person with a skewed understanding of how hubpages and search engines work.

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      Motown2Chitownposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      You know, Shades, I still think you're awesome.

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      lyndreposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Perfect answer

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      Mark Ewbieposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Yep... +1 to Shades.

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      writeronlineposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      +1 indeed to Shadesbreath.

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      SirDentposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I am impressed.

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   6. 0

      Matthew Kirkposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I would of come to the riot and burned and pillaged away very happily

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5. 73

   Reality Bytesposted 12 years ago

   It would be nice to have the opportunity to create different sub domains under the same account.  Allowing the hubber to separate their content in to different niches.  I have no idea how hard something like that is too implement.

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      SimeyCposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I suggested this the other day - with the ability to move hubs between sub-domains (it'll take a week for them to appear on the new hub so they get de-indexed). Probably a nightmare to code though!

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         Reality Bytesposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         It is a great idea.  It seems Google likes related content under the same domain.  It may benefit both the hubber and HP.  I saw your suggestion and did some research yesterday.  I find more and more opinions saying Google likes similar content throughout a domain. 
         
         It would be nice to be able to move hubs keeping the URL, but if not it could still be beneficial from this point forward.

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6. 60

   Mark Ewbieposted 12 years ago

   

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7. STAFF

   Paul Edmondsonposted 12 years ago

   We have thought about how we can help organize fiction on HubPage better, but the feedback we've been given from Google (this week) is sites are treated separately, so it's unlikely the fiction categories are positively/negatively impacting the DYI or instructional type Hubs based on site organization or domain name.
   
   We have little tolerance for spam.  We know it's a problem, and we remove it as fast as we can identify it.  Over the next few months, we expect to improve this detection significantly.
   
   We'll keep you updated on the spam efforts.  You can count on more of it getting removed.

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8. STAFF

   Paul Edmondsonposted 12 years ago

   @Marisa Wright
   
   I'm not sure how google views a mix of poems and content on the same subdomain.  There are accounts that have both and the content can get significant traffic, so I don't think that's the only element at play to get pandalized.
   
   I just checked an account that has the vast majority of poems and has pages that get a significant amount of traffic.  http://drax.hubpages.com/hub/deviation  That page is one of the top daily hubs. 
   
   I've heard people say that they have removed a piece of content and their traffic came back.  Not sure if that's correlation or causation.   Although, google has recommended removing low quality content...
   
   We've always known that content is at the heart of Panda and I can see how poems may be treated poorly in google's algorithm.  I probably wouldn't mix poetry and how tos on the same domain, but it's clearly working for at least a few people.

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      Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I'm not saying there's anything wrong with poems per se.  However, Google robots can't read, so they can't tell the difference between a haiku and 100 words of plain text.   And since we all know a 100-word Hub would be regarded as "low quality", why would the haiku be treated any differently?
      
      I'd be interested to know whether those successful poets are doing what Cardisa is doing, and enriching their poems with introductions/images/videos so their poetry Hubs aren't low on content.
      
      You are so right about causation.  Most internet gurus are saying the Panda score for a domain (or in our case, sub-domain) is based on the  "poorest" posts, so it's important to make sure you have NO sub-standard posts - and in Panda's definition, lack of content means sub-standard.  That has led many people to remove or consolidate short posts in an attempt to recover from Panda. 
      
      In my case it seemed to work - I had a ballet site which got Panda'd last year, and after consolidating my short (video-only) posts, my traffic came back at the next update.  But as you say, I will never really know whether that was because of my changes, or whether it just so happened that the next Panda update changed the assessment of my site.

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         Hauntyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         What do you think about Q&A pages? Now that we have Answers on our sub-domains, aren't they doing the same as really short Hubs? I'd be interested to know whether Google knows the difference between Hubs and Q&A pages.

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      2. 91

         Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         I have poems that I don't want to delete from my account because they get constant traffic from Google. There are seasonal poetry like valentine and love poems that do well during February too. The poem I wrote for my partner for Valentine's Day got over 100 views per day during the month of February. I have been removing my poem because I have a poetry blog and wanted my account to remain strictly for articles but I think I will leave the ones that are doing well.

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            Marisa Wrightposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            This comes back to what I was saying about poetry and length/content.  Too many poets simply post a short poem as a complete Hub, and I suspect that an account with lots of Hubs like that would suffer.  I "recovered" my ballet blog by using ideas similar to the ones you advocate  for poetry - basically adding more meaningful content around the original, too-short posts.
            
            I know etiquette prohibits you posting a link to your Hub about "best practice" for poetry, so I'll do it:
            
            http://cardisa.hubpages.com/hub/How-To- … or-traffic

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9. 69

   brakel2posted 12 years ago

   Thank you Angela for your idea. Every idea is important. It has generated discussion. I do not know how I feel about separating  different genres. I know many sites use this method. Poetry and short stories do have creativity and value on this site Congrats on your 100 score.

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10. 88

    RedElfposted 12 years ago

    +1 to Shadesbreath and Mark Ewbie - my heroes!

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11. 84

    rebekahELLEposted 12 years ago

      Poetry hubs with added content, video, etc. are as much content as any other kind of hub.  I only have a couple of poetry hubs, but I have hubs about writing poetry, other creative inspired hubs along with my topical, information hubs.  I don't see that it has affected my sub-domain.  I wrote the poetry hubs in the first year I was here because I wanted a sample of different kinds of writing. 
    
    I have a few tips in a couple of my hubs, one about Poems and Poetry, and the other is my experience of being one of the poetry judges during the contest last year.  I know one of the requirements for submitting poetry for the contest included adding additional text and a photo.  There were some very fine submissions.
    
    Poems do get searched, mostly by topic.  The more specific the title and keywords are, the better.  People search for poems for special occasions, events, people,  etc.
    
    As far as some of the comments about the poetry here - I don't recall any of the poets claiming to be Keats or the Bard..  But that doesn't mean we can't write and express in a poetic sense.  HP has a vibrant community of poets and writers who enjoy writing creatively.  I wouldn't like to see a separation.
    We've all seen our share of dry, boring information hubs.  That doesn't mean they shouldn't be here.

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    1. 94

       angela_michelleposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       I actually thought with this idea, it would benefit poets and fiction writers. It would be much easier to find fellow poets. Also, it seems it would help more people find the poetry, because if the creative writing was grouped together, when someone searches "poetry about..." then google would be more apt to pull that up as well knowing that the domain is a poetry site.
       
       I honestly did not mean to offend anyone.

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       1. 69

          brakel2posted 12 years agoin reply to this

          It is like texting. Posting takes the place of face to face contact. it leaves open the possibility of gross misinterpretations.. It had a great result in that Cardisa wrote a wonderful hub. Great job Cardisa.

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          1. 91

             Cardisaposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             Thanks Brakel2.

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12. 94

    angela_michelleposted 12 years ago

    I was surprised by how people took what I was saying. I am a huge fan of poetry and write it a lot myself. I just don't publish it on hubpages, but rather on a poetry site. I also write fiction as well, but I don't self-publish that online. I wasn't trying to say we should delete it off our site, just put it under a different domain.
    
    From my understanding is that hubpages is trying to make it so that way their writers write more searchable articles. Very few poems and fiction are searchable. I think the fiction and poetry should be kept, but used under a different domain name. If the domain name had something to do with poetry or creative writing, then that would cause the poetry to become more searchable. For instance writing "poem about..."
    
    This would make hubpages as a whole more searchable for poetry, fiction and DIY.
    
    Cardisa, I believe, mentioned that she has made poetry and fiction to be searchable. Most of the poetry I have seen on here do not have searchable titles, because they are writing to express themselves, not to draw traffic.  I think her tips on how to make it more than just a poem, by adding more to it, would bring the quality of the poems up.

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