Too Short??? Outbound Links???

1. 89

   DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years ago

   What the heck?  I just published a new poem, for which I had no pictures of my own.
   
   I did a search for public domain images, found one, placed it into a photo capsule, and, to protect myself, put in the source URL.
   
   I then saved the edits, and got this message:
   
   " This hub is too short to contain outbound links. It remains published, but is likely to be unpublished by a moderator if you do not fix the problem. If you plan to fix the problem later, please click the unpublish now button. To learn more about the problem, you can continue to the hub and review the warnings at the top."
   
   I do not regard a photo credit  within the photo capsule, in the space provided for listing the source,  as an "outbound link."  To my mind, those would be found within the body text, or in a 'links' capsule.
   
   What gives, here???  Can I safely ignore this nonsense?
   
   (Additionally, when I attempted to copy/paste thie above quote here, it copied not only what I had highlitted, but nearly the entire content of the page, including all headers and boxes!  That seems like some kind of glitch...related to the 'new improvements?')

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   1. 72

      relacheposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Obviously HubPages does, as is made crystal clear by the inclusion of the below sentence in the instructions you see in a photo capsule when editing it:
      
      (Source URLs in photos are counted as links for purposes of determining if a hub is overly promotional)

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      1. 89

         DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         Pfffftt...ONE lousy credit link for a SINGLE photo is "overly promotional" ???!! Give me a freaking break, HP!!
         
         They want the credit given for photos not your own, then want to count it against you?????!!!!!   That is very unfair!
         
         @#$(&*%$&($% 
         
         They can't have it both ways! 
         
         I even CHANGED my settings OFF of 'may be considered commercial,' and set the ads to "none' ...and re-published...got same message, went back to edit mode, & found my settings back at 'commercial' and 'high' ads.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
         
         
         (Not yelling at you, relache...but at HP)... I'm sure there's a workaround in there, somehwere.... ...  )
         
         AHA!!  GOT IT!  here's how it's done:
         
         I put:       "public domain clip art (at) blogspot (dot) com"
         
         in the  TOP field labeled "Name of Source"  ... instead of in the actual "Source" field

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         1. 72

            relacheposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            It"s the brevity of the content that's the actual issue.  And it still might be even if you found a link work-around.

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            1. 89

               DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

               Nope...used my work-around, and all the 'warnings' went away.

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2. 74

   To Start Againposted 12 years ago

   why don't you post the location of the photo without making it a link. Can't you put the url if it doesn't actually link anywhere? Or just name the site/person you got it from?

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   1. 89

      DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      See my original reply to relache.  That's exactly what I did.

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3. 70

   simeonvisserposted 12 years ago

   Well, that's what you get for publishing content that HubPages does not prefer. The 'short article' warning is intended to prevent people from publishing really short articles, it is not intended to catch poems. The outbound link in the source of a photo is not the problem, the problem is that your hub is just really short.

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   1. 89

      DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      "That's what I get??!!"
      
      I'm not sure I care for your tone.
      
      The fact of adding a photo usually gets around the 'too short' censor.  I've used that before, at another hubber's suggestion.  Normally, it works.  This particular poem, while short, is a few lines longer than others I've published, in which  having a picture took away the 'too short' warning.
      
      Poems, by nature, are often very short, and since HP DOES have poetry in its category listings, they should not discriminate against it in that way.  As I said, they can't have it both ways!
      
      It would be a simple matter amounting to perhaps a single line or two of code, for the webmaster to exlude anything published under the "poetry" category from getting caught in that particular snare.

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      1. 70

         simeonvisserposted 12 years agoin reply to this

         I don't intend my tone to be wrong or anything. But you have to understand that it does not make sense, from HubPages' perspective, to treat poems differently. They are, after all, a business that intends to earn money from online content, and that means articles and not poems.
         
         It would indeed be a simple matter to implement the change that you propose but you are overly surprised that they have not done so. The above reason shows why poems won't receive special treatment I'm afraid.

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         1. 89

            DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

            All I'm saying, is that they have somewhat of a double-standard going on.  They allow poems--there is a WIDE selection of poetry types under the heading of poetry--when selecting the proper category for your work.
            
            Ergo, if they ALLOW poems, it is not right to turn right around and discourage them by any means.  If they don't like that poems are short, and they, "don't earn money," for them, then they should eliminate the category entirely.
            
            So, if they intend to keep the category, it needs the 'protection' as it  were, of a separate set of rules.

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4. 74

   To Start Againposted 12 years ago

   Lizzy, I'm sorry you've had a bad experience tonight but I don't think this is something that happens all that often. If it is then I haven't heard of it. I have poems up as do many others. I've read some far shorter than yours (yes I went and looked) And plenty of them have pictures. I don't know why yours got marked and others don't. Maybe it is something as simple as placement of the picture--I always have mine at the very top when I post poetry. Or maybe even the site you linked to. I get most of my pics that I don't own from Photobucket so maybe there is a difference with the sites? I'm just specualting here. I just don't want you to think that HP discourages poetry or creative writing because they don't really. There is a lot of poetry on the site hence the category option.  And what may seem like a  "simple matter amounting to perhaps a single line or two of code" to you may not be so to the Hubteam. Glad you got your problem fixed though

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   1. 89

      DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Thank you, To Start Again...
      
        I have had this problem before with poems on here--quite a bit, in fact-- and at first I "fixed" it with a separate capsule of unrelated 'fluff fill" ...
      
      When I first arrived here, all I published was my poetry...and I did not even have Google Ad Sense set up.  That came a year later, after I began writing 'regular' articles.
      
        As far as my new "Eons Ago" poem, the placement of the picture was necessarily at the end, so as not to give away the ending right at the start.  In fact, I even changed the title for that same reason, as the working title was, "The Last Apatosaur."
      
      
      And, yes, the 'single line or two of code' is a smiple fix--my husband worked for years in the computer industry.  For a programmer, that is not a difficult thing to do.  It's a simple matter of an "if/then" command line.

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5. 69

   lrohnerposted 12 years ago

   Lizzy -- I'm glad you solved your problem too.
   
   I think Simon is right. Articles that will attract the search engines usually have some length to them, and articles that attract the search engines are the ones that make money. I think it's great that HP allows poetry, short recipes, etc. (Although I really could live without the Indian auntie photo galleries! )
   
   Most (not all) folks who publish short recipe hubs usually get around the length problem by putting in a text capsule with sort of an intro -- sometimes a story of their memories of Mom and Grandma preparing the dish when they were younger, or perhaps some tips about the preparation.
   
   This isn't directed at you specifically, but I wonder if the poets on here could get around the length problem by putting in a short description of their inspiration behind the poem or what it means to them.
   
   Maybe I'm way off base, because I don't have a poet's bone in my body, but I think it would be really interesting to read about that inspiration, it might skirt the length requirement AND maybe it would give the search engines something to grab onto so that the poems on here have a better chance of making the poets some cash.
   
   Just a thought from someone who knows next to nothing about poetry.
   
   Edited to add: Just read your last response. I wouldn't call that extra capsule "fluff fill." I truly think it would be interesting to understand where the poet is coming from.

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   1. 89

      DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      LOL---no--it was not any kind of 'back story,' but a verbiage-inflated explanation that it was extra text added for the sole purpose of adding length... Pure "fluff."    ;-)   The same thing copied onto each and every short bit, with a notice to that effect..that it would appear on all short poetry hubs, and could be ignored as irrelevant to the subject.

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6. 69

   ThomasEposted 12 years ago

   The problem is that, frankly, if you exclude the poetry category from the length requirements then you make that section of the site a haven for spammers.
   
   I might even give it a go myself:
   
   get, OH me friend, you a Lello
   ICE machine,
   Groan,
   Oh yes, you a lello ice machine,
   which makes ICE for
   smoothies and home brew making
   at LELLO ICE MACHINE.COM/buyitnow.
   
   
   Free-verse, don't you love it?

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   1. 70

      simeonvisserposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Love it

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   2. 74

      To Start Againposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      

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   3. 89

      DzyMsLizzyposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      Thomas, I think that sort of think would get the boot on the basis of the 'no self-promotion' rules...because that's what spammers are doing.

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