Thanks for stopping by! Hey, why don't you do what all the cool kids are doing and subscribe to my RSS feed? You know you want to, so go ahead, be bad, be very very bad... :) Thanks.
A question I have been going back and forth in my mind about is whether blogs that do nothing other than aggregate other people’s content is a good thing? It seems that as the blogosphere grows larger every day, there are more and more content aggregator sites that offer no original content of their own and just pull content from other sites.
On the one hand, picking a specific niche and pulling in content on that niche sounds like a valuable tool for readers interested in a specific industry. I think a perfect example is a site like Techmeme. A very popular technology site that just pulls content from any and all tech related posts.
Though I know there are bloggers out there who feel that a site that offers absolutely no original content of their own and is just copying and pasting from another site is not offering anything of value.
So what do you think? Are these aggregator sites helpful because you can find all the information in one place or as a fellow blogger do you feel they are not offering anything of value except the hard work and skill someone else has put into their blog? Comment and let me know your thoughts.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Technorati Tags: content aggregator, Techmeme
Related Articles:
I think aggregators have their place.
1.) Pulling data into a focused aggregator can help the blogs they are aggregating with visibility. A lot of bloggers are good at blogging and very weak at SEO which means we the readers do not see some of the best written material unless we just “stumble” on it or follow a link from somewhere else.
2.) As long as the data is clearly credited to the source.
For a blogger I would think you would want your writings to show up as much as possible, as long as it is not copied in a manner that makes it appear to belong to someone else.
I’ve actually gone through most of my feeds and pulled out a lot of the ones that do this. I figure I can subscribe a choice few for content and the others kill off the others that regurgitate it.
I already subscribe to Problogger. I don’t need other sites telling me about what Darren Rowse has posted.
Here’s a perfect example:
http://tinyurl.com/35b7l5
Cyber - I think your opinion is shared by many. I think the one issue that some people take issue with are the agrregator sites that are making advertising revenue from content that is not their own. They are just pulling content from other sources and keeping all the ad dollars. It seems to be the exact fight that Viacom is having with YouTube. What do you think?
Dave - I think you and Cyber have hit on the two major sides of thinking. I tend to lean more towards your side than Cyber’s that I can find the sites that I want to read and not give money to the aggregators that offer nothing of original content. I guess I would rather give the author the traffic than an aggregator. Does that make sense?
I can see value in aggregator sites, I have built a few.
Whether they are useful depends on whether the content is niched to make it more useful, or displayed in some way different to how it appeared on the original blog.
1.) If an aggregator gets revenue, but, my site is listed and attributed properly then why should I have a problem.
2.) Andy hit another good point, there is a difference between niche and spam.
Just look at what Google is doing. They are giving us the tools to build our own search engines and put them on our sites. When those search engines help the site, and list other content accordingly it adds value and authority to the site and helps drive traffic to the other content.
It depends what you mean by aggregate. I’m guilty of devoting a large percentage of my posts to what is happening in the industry based on what I read through other blogs. These are carefully thought out, and my goal is to bring a different take on something I agree or disagree with.
If you’re referring to what I would call a “weekly reading list” of links to other blogs, well that’s just lazy in my opinion.
Maybe a different perspective? As a blogger that’s starting out, I find content aggregators extremely valuable for creating awareness around my blog. For me, it also depends on how the content is delivered by the aggregator. For instance, if they’re boosting up a post in some way, perhaps by adding their perspective to a post, then it’s much more valuable then just simply saying ‘this person posted about x’. I admit though, I may change my opinion on this as I get more experienced with blogging and (hopefully) acquire a consistent reader base.
Andy - I agree with you… My issue with some of these aggregator sites is that they do not call enough attention to who the author is and where it was originally written.
Cyber - I think you make a great point. I am in favor anytime you give the individual control of how he or she likes to do something. And Andy is right, the way these aggregators really work is when they pick a niche and stick with it. As I said, I get annoyed at times when they have the authors name and log in tiny letters and not giving the original author the attention they deserved for writing it.
Jeremy - That is exactly what I mean. I see no problem linking to other stories and news while adding your own thoughts and opinions, but when it is just a copy and paste job, it raises a few gray issues.
Clay - I think you hit the bottom line. If an agrregator is giving good attention to a blogger and most importantly - DRIVING TRAFFIC to that person’s blog, than everyone wins.
Gentleman, as always, thanks for your insightful comments!