Skimlinks on Talk

Could you at least make sure that the links go to relevant pages?

When someone on education is writing about the schools recording system it shouldn't really link to a game.

We're going to give this a bit of time to bed in now but we'll continue to monitor the situation and in the meantime thanks for all your input.

Just a polite way to say 'well carry on doing what the fuck we want'

Which is fair enough because yes it is the TC.

However, I still don't understand the point of having a link that will link car parts to an eBay page. I mean who on earth will even click on that (bar me as I was too curious to know what sort of link will come up with. And yes it's bonkers. It has no relevance to the post nor does it have any relevance to anyone)

And I will continue to say that it's all very good to try and monetise in everything BUT it also push people away. Maybe the very people that have made the site great. It will also change dynamics again and it might not be for the better (again see the fact that as the site has grown, it is used to generate newspaper articles etc).
Look at what AIBU has become. It never used to be as aggressive as that.
Look at what the relationship threads have become. It used to be that you could rely on it for help. Now people are wondering first if it could end up in the DM.

I think it s a crap strategy.

But I supposed that if it still makes money atm that's all what counts?

Read the T's and C's . As soon as you post, MN own whatever you posted, and can do with it what they wish
yeah, I get that but I feel it takes the piss

Peaceout, that makes no sense, a blog can be a business like mumsne and can be profitable. Wheres the line?
my point is that with a blog the profit goes to the person who does the work ie writes the text that generates the links
on MN we do the work MN get the profit.
Where's my cut, why should they monetize my time and effort?

Mumnet, really, allowing years old posts to be subject to skimlinks is a step too far.

But I dont expect you give a shit. S'all about the ££.

there's no way to stop mumsnet selling our word

so MN are monetising content written before users had the chance to consent to the skimlinks

Read the T's and C's . As soon as you post, MN own whatever you posted, and can do with it what they wish.

so MN are monetising content written before users had the chance to consent to the skimlinks, because the content pre-dates the skimlinks.

Yes, peaceout, Skimlinks can set cookies.

"Pages on Mumsnet may set cookies from Skimlinks. This is an affiliate programme that allows us to earn a commission when you click links to products from Mumsnet."
From the MN privacy/cooking policy

Peaceout, that makes no sense, a blog can be a business like mumsne and can be profitable. Wheres the line?

The links are generated on page load not when they were posted. I just checked some posts from months ago and they have them.

So yes really old threads appear to have them.

The benefits of doing it on page load is, the database of posts stays the same, no adding links when they wanted to start using them and no going through to remove them when the see sense and want to get rid of the links. ALSO, it means the links can be tailored to the users if it thinks you're more interested in iPhones than sheds it's will personal which words are links.

(No links are mine)

I wonder if it interacts with your browser via cookies?

And now local newspaper hasn't skimmed for me, just to disprove my point. Looks like direct links like Asda linking to the Asda homepage, don't get the hover, but more generic phrases like car parts which link to an ebay search do get the hovery thing.

None of the links in this post, if there are any, were not added by me!

I wouldnt mind so much about skimlinks that I saw on say a blog because then the advertising revenue would be going to the person who wrote the blog.
But on here we are doing the writing and mumsnet is selling our writing to make a profit for itself

I would assume that the links are being generated when the post is posted. I'm basing this solely on working in a sort of techie field - to retro-add links would mean regenerating the code behind every previous post, and would take a hefty chunk of processing power on a site this big. Am prepared to be wrong though, so would be good to have it confirmed.

Also - some of the skimlinks come up with a Skimlinks message when hovered over, but others don't - that I don't like. Scrolling back, local newspaper doesn't have the hover message, but car parts does.

it's just another form of click bait really isnt it :(

And it really is every word.

all I can do is never click on any links!

good point, there's no way to stop mumsnet selling our word to generate advertising revenue really is there:(

It's ridiculous now. Linking 'mobile phone' to Vod a phone etc.
I know we're the Product, but seriously?

But what about in posts you've written in the past, peaceout? This is why I'm trying to find out from MNHQ whether the links are being applied to posts written years ago, and/or whether links can change over time, so that just because MadeUpSupermarketName doesn't generate a link in the post when I actually submit it, if I look at the post next year, when W4itrose have rebranded to MadeUpSupermarketName, will a skimlink be added to my post? NB the skimlinks are (based on my reading of the skimlinks website) customised, so we may not all be seeing the same words linked, nor will the links all necessarily be going to the same location.

I'll be monitoring the situation and making sure I dont use words that generate links

On the PC today and all these bloody Skimlinks are showing up in burgundy, which is usually used as the colour any clicked links show up as, so not only are they more intrusive, it looks like I've gone and clicked on them all in the past. This is the opposite of making them look different to user-added links.

We're going to give this a bit of time to bed in now but we'll continue to monitor the situation and in the meantime thanks for all your input.

That's pretty much what was said about the emoji.

@AmyMumsnet Could you, or someone else, please respond to my questions from Fri 17-Feb-17 21:01:39

And the other thread in site stuff that I've been waiting for a response to.

AmyMumsnet could you confirm the skimlinks are added as the browser is displaying (rendering) the thread, i.e. a word which is skimlinked to Vodafone today could be skimlinked to something else if someone opens the thread in two years' time?