05-14-2003, 10:00 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Brighthand Popular with Alexa Toolbar Users
Brighthand has published an interesting article on their traffic ranking with Alexa and direct comparisons with Pocket PC Thoughts and other PDA Web sites. My only comment on this is that this traffic ranking only pulls in results from people using the Alexa toolbar, so the results only apply to a specific group of users, and are meaningless in the overall picture. :wink: In fact, Alexa has largely been declared a spyware tool by most people (I know I'd never install it). Want to see why? Check out their privacy statement. Here are a few choice quotes (uppercase theirs):
"ALEXA'S TOOLBAR SERVICE COLLECTS AND STORES INFORMATION ABOUT THE WEB PAGES YOU VIEW, THE DATA YOU ENTER IN ONLINE FORMS AND SEARCH FIELDS, AND, WITH VERSIONS 5.0 AND HIGHER, THE PRODUCTS YOU PURCHASE ONLINE WHILE USING THE TOOLBAR SERVICE. ALTHOUGH ALEXA DOES NOT ATTEMPT TO ANALYZE WEB USAGE DATA TO DETERMINE THE IDENTITY OF ANY ALEXA USER, SOME INFORMATION COLLECTED BY THE TOOLBAR SERVICE IS PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE. ALEXA AGGREGATES AND ANALYZES THE INFORMATION IT COLLECTS TO IMPROVE ITS SERVICE AND TO PREPARE REPORTS ABOUT AGGREGATE WEB USAGE AND SHOPPING HABITS...YOUR SEARCH RESULTS WILL BE TRANSMITTED TO AND LOGGED BY AMAZON.COM AND MAY BE CORRELATED BY AMAZON.COM WITH ANY PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION YOU MAY HAVE PREVIOUSLY PROVIDED TO AMAZON.COM."
I'd urge everyone to steer clear of Alexa, and that includes Brighthand users. :wink: I'm very pleased with the traffic level Pocket PC Thoughts has achieved in the past two and a half years, going from a personal Blog to a multi-user news & views site, and I have each one of you to thank for that. :way to go:
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05-14-2003, 10:08 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Oct 2002
Posts: 116
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I wonder how many people here are Brighthand regulars as well...
I like Brighthand's forums, but PPCThoughts blows them away on the news and info side.
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05-14-2003, 10:08 PM
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Moderator Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,998
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I've never ran Alexa and doubt I ever will. I really don't like these "services" that collect information, especially when they're marketed as a great add-in or some other darn thing.
It makes companies stop working. They let the number's run their business instead of doing the legwork and getting dirty. That's why PPCT is tops (at least to me). The mods here are knee-deep day in and day out. They have their fingers on the pulse of their communities. That's why people come and (perhaps more importantly) why people stay.
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05-14-2003, 10:10 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 90
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I never heard of it before reading this article.
Maybe I'll just crawl back into my cave.
-- Robert :robot:
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05-14-2003, 10:14 PM
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Moderator Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,998
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by SofaTater
I wonder how many people here are Brighthand regulars as well...
I like Brighthand's forums, but PPCThoughts blows them away on the news and info side.
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I pop by Brighthand a couple times a week. I click "New Posts" here about 50 times a day. 8)
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05-14-2003, 10:18 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 79
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Thanks for the reminder to run SpyBot!
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05-14-2003, 10:19 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 1,185
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Alexa=Evil :devilboy: I installed it on a throw away machine once to help drive some stats on a site I was running. It's very easy to fool Alexa as we would have Alexa "Refresh Parties" here and just do the old F5 trick on all the machines that had it installed. It's not very smart about filtering multiple requests from the same IP so you can increase your rating pretty easily.
I don't doubt Brighthand gets decent traffic, but I'd seriously contest the statistical validity of any Alexa results.
I must be late to the game here on this topic, but what's with the Brighthand versus PPCT stuff?
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05-14-2003, 10:21 PM
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Sage
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 784
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I don't use Alexa but I do visit PPC Thoughts and Brighthand regularly. I like PPC Thoughts for news and Brighthand for the discussion boards and both are excellent!
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05-14-2003, 10:25 PM
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Mystic
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,819
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Am I reading the graph wrong? It looks like brighthand has much less than the others except for that spike... Can someone explain to me why a lower number is better than a higher one?
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05-14-2003, 10:33 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 144
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Jason, you're missing the "Hell, no!" option in your poll. :mrgreen:
IMHO, Google is a much better page ranking tool. I would give results from Alexa about as much weight as results from Gator or Bonzi Buddy.
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