Mahalo going the social media route ?

[Danny]

It's been a while since i've last heared about Mahalo, until i just found this email in my inbox :

Subject : Suparna thinks you should join Mahalo

Hi,

You can view Suparna's Mahalo profile here:
http://www.mahalo.com/member/Suparna

To join Mahalo, go to:
http://www.mahalo.com/signup

After you join and add Suparna as a friend, you can easily keep track
of all the great links Suparna recommends to Mahalo.

---
Mahalo is a human-powered search engine that creates organized,
comprehensive, and spam free search results for the most popular
search terms. Anyone can recommend links for inclusion in Mahalo.

---
If you do not want to receive any more email from Suparna again, click:
(url removed)
---
If you received this email in error or don't want to receive any more email from Mahalo again, click:
(url removed)

It appears that Mahalo has launched something they call 'Mahalo Social'.
I think that's a bad move. I fear that in the end, getting found on Mahalo will be no more than trying to have as many friends as possible.
Emails like the one above are the consequence. A platform created by Mahalo to send spam.
And i wonder, why would someone that i've never heared about invite me to Mahalo ? Are they getting paid for this, or what ?

[WebSavvy]

Danny, you're not the only one that's getting Mahalo spam. So am I, and from people I don't know nor have never even heard of.

Apparently, Mahalo also has this FF plugin now for file sharing. :rolleyes:

I think they have some sort of affiliate program going where these people get paid based on the amount of referrals they send to join Mahalo. It's just pathetic.

[ihelpyou]

This is the crux of the problem I have with this social media. It makes email spam simply OK now in most every way.

I'm NOT your damn friend. Please stop spamming me. Don't ever invite me to these social sites as I will not become your fake friend.

[Connie]

I'm courious as to why Jason would add Social Media to Mahalo?

[SEFL]

It's a trend, and he's following it. I suspect it's because he also knows that the biggest shills are people in the SEO community.

[stacy131]

Isn't there a federal no spam list we can join or will we receive spam regardless? I suspect the latter. :(

[SEFL]

Wouldn't matter anyway, Stacy. Federal laws are null and void internationally.

[Webmaster T]

Social Media and SMO is the latest service the industry has created because they see the link development and directory submission biz loosing it' effectiveness/saleability. The bottom line is most of this industry couldn't market free $10 bills to residents of the local Sally Anne! So they dream up one useless service after another to hide the fact they are lousy marketers and good link developers which with a little work I'm sure you could teach a monkey to do! Digg promotion being a favorite one of mine to point out as a useless endeavor that just eats up bandwidth and disk space.

[SEFL]

Pfft. Digg promotion is nothing as far as lameness is concerned. It's all about getting Stumbled and getting all those random visitors that don't do anything and leave the site after about 8 seconds because it wasn't something they could possibly be interested in.

Digg promotion lameness < Stumble promotion lameness . Although both will soon be passed by MySpaceBook...er...Facebook.

[ihelpyou]

I suspect it's because he also knows that the biggest shills are people in the SEO community.
:uplaugh:

Too damn funny, but very sad and very true.

[sitetutor]

It's a trend, and he's following it. I suspect it's because he also knows that the biggest shills are people in the SEO community.

It's more than a trend. Kids these days are hooked on those. You want to compete with the big SEs? Make sure you provide a playground as well.
It worked for McDonalds. It might work for Mahalo as well.

[ihelpyou]

I'm not sure Mac's is a good comparison however. I think they were one of the very first hamburger fast food joints in history, if not the first. There were plenty of se's before mahalo came along. I really don't believe it matters what mahalo does or does not do. They could be a big player one day with social stuff, but like I've stated before, I highly doubt a social site is what average joe and sally web surfer is going to turn to when they are looking for information on a product or service. If anyone thinks that the organic se's can be gamed, etc, and they can be, just imagine what it's like on social sites where all you have to do is have 3 thousand so-called fake "friends" voting up your stuff. Do you honestly think the average human being is going to find out what they are looking for on social type sites, knowing full well how things work in the future? Nope.

I give lots more credit to the average smarts of the average human being, being to see through the bogus and crappy games being played on social sites.

[Blue]

I totally agree with Doug.

Folks can easily see through popularity contests, which are basically what these spinn-type sites are.

People want relevance through truth, not popularity through politics.

Sheep will be sheep, but then sheep don't rule the world, now do they?

[ihelpyou]

I wonder what mahalo is up to these days?