When Google announced it would support the “nofollow” HTML attribute back in 2005 I was pleased. Blog spam was (and still is) a major problem. The invention of “nofollow” took a lot of bite out of the usefulness of comments for spammers. It really seemed like the right move at the time and looking at it now it still makes a lot of sense. I can’t image how bad things would be without it.

For the uninformed, “nofollow” is an attribute that can be assigned to links on websites. This is recognized by Google and then subsequently ignored in Google’s index, thus not allowing sites to raise their “PageRank” on Google. Therefore, in theory, leading to more relevant search results.

Here is my gripe, when Google announced this feature they did so under the stated guise of “Preventing Comment Spam” but it’s turned out to be abused. There are those who would argue that “nofollow” has become a tool that creates an unfair balance where higher trafficked sites don’t share traffic with lower ranked ones. Now I’m not saying that “nofollow” should go away but that it should be used less. Why am I complaining? Because three of the sites I use most often implement “nofollow” in places that, while well intentioned, work out as unfair. These sites?

Twitter, Flickr and Facebook.

For starters, Facebook’s usage makes no sense. Facebook has several checks to prevent spammers from joining the service and multiple ways to report it when it happens. I am not saying they are perfect but they very much maintain a strong and effective walled garden. When you factor in that the site has pushed its users to make more of their content public and had major issues with privacy. It’s downright unfair that if they are going to push me to make my content public that they aren’t going to allow me to get a PageRank incentive for this.

At first glance however, the inclusion of “no follow” does seem logical for Flickr and Twitter. The ease of access to these sites makes them obvious targets for spammers. In the case of Twitter, it’s no secret that they have a large spam problem, so in the short term “nofollow” seems like a practical solution to de-incentivise spamming.

Despite this reasoning I still believe it to be the wrong solution.

Flickr is a publishing system and there are those who use their Flickr accounts as blogs with very long written posts to accompany their photography. Yet Flickr automatically attaches “nofollow” to any link posted anywhere on their site, even on the user’s own written content.

With every photograph I post on my Flickr account I include a link to a related blog entry whenever possible. These things directly relate and semantically should be linked. My analytics also clearly show this is an effective tool for increasing my readership and traffic as a significant portion of my traffic comes from these Flickr links. Yet, Google ignores them because of the “nofollow” attribute. The same with Twitter.

Doesn’t this go against the whole spirit of “nofollow”? If you ask me it’s lazy and unfair. Especially in Flickr’s case when you consider that many users are “Pro” users like myself who pay for a Flickr account. I’m paying for a service that is going out of its way to prevent me from getting PageRank from it. That’s a bunch of crap.

There is another way to look at this though. One could argue that PageRank is actually doing the opposite of it’s intention and hurting Google’s relevance. The three biggest traffic sources to this site are Twitter, Facebook and Flickr, in fact these account for almost 50% of my traffic, however Google’s mysterious PageRank algorithm ignores these sources, thus making it harder for my site to gain relevance in search results. Isn’t this leading to an inaccuracy in what’s “relevant?”

“nofollow” is used almost ubiquitously by any service that has an easy sign up system, therefore it is creating a tiered system on the web that takes away power from user generated content and gives more strength to those who have a greater technical knowhow. There are many out there who will never understand how to setup a blogging platform such as WordPress or MovableType but can easily get a Twitter, Flickr or Facebook account. Why should their voice matter less to PageRank? And on the flip-side, why should a major media outlet matter more? Isn’t this working against the democracy of the web?

How do we decide what is signal and what is noise? Surely just because something is easier to do doesn’t make it less relevant, does it? Can’t we come up with a better technological solution that empowers users not punishes them for their lack of tech savvy?

Last Tuesday a coworker and I grabbed dinner after work at “Goddess and Grocer” downtown. It was a nice night out so after eating our meal outdoors she suggested that we walk back to her place in Lincoln Park where she would then drive me back to my apartment in Wrigleyville.

My legs were still mighty sore from ‘Journey to the End of the Night‘ a few days earlier but I figured the exercise would do me well and give me a good chance to shoot some photos.

In preparation for ‘Journey’ I purchased a new camera: the Panasonic Lumix GF1. I am normally a devout Canon shooter but when James started talking about the GF1 and ultimately let me try his; I was swayed.

My normal body is a Canon 5D Mk II and it is hands down my favorite camera I’ve ever owned, however it’s a bit bulky and expensive to be carrying around day to day. What caught my eye about the Lumix was it’s small size, excellent low light performance and it’s compatibility with a variety of micro 4/3 lenses. It’s the perfect camera to throw in my bag and have on me at all times which made it the perfect camera for ‘Journey.’

The opportunity to go for a walk on this particular night was an opportunity to further test out my new toy. What follows are the shots from that night.

After leaving Bangkok I landed in Kuala Lumpur for a 4 hour layover. Just long enough to get bored to tears in an airport but not long enough to leave said airport.

I wandered around they duty free shops for a bit and decided to get a bite to eat at the Malaysian noodle place called Nööödles. I got the “beef balls and herbs soup” and a coke for what equated to around $7, not half bad. After that I stumbled onto the airport Starbucks which had a free open WiFi connection… Sweet! Only problem though? No way to charge my devices.. Kuala Lumpur is the only stop on my trip that doesn’t use the standard US two prong wall socket and I didn’t bring my adaptor kit with me. Luckily enough there was an electronics store right below where I was able to pick up one of those little adaptor switch boxes for around $10.

I did have a momentary nerd out moment in there however. They had TONS of Japanese video games for sale and all sorts of bizarre bootleg devices. This was the kind of stuff that 10 year old me dreamed of. I got really really excited at the idea of buying something to bring home and play… Then I remembered that this isn’t the days of old where you could get a cartridge adaptor for your NES and just play Japanese games, the whole industry has switched to optical media which simply won’t play without modding your systems, which thanks to the DMCA is illegal in the USA and with companies like Microsoft blocks you from getting online. Damn. Stupid regions. Stupid DMCA. Stupid Microsoft.

After I got over my heartbreak on this I went back to Starbucks, plugged in and I was off and running! (Note: the iPad’s battery would have no doubt made it fine through my flight to Tokyo, but I knew I was going to use it heavily in the next day so I wanted to start off with a fresh full charge.

I arrived at the Narita airport and wandered around a bit, taking a moment to use the bathroom, clean myself up and change into jeans. It’s 84 degrees here, a huge break compared to the sweltering heat and humidity of Thailand, I’m excited to be wearing jeans again.

I took a bus to the downtown Tokyo Train station which took about an hour but I figured would be a good starting point. From there I began to wander some more, I immediately was able to figure out which direction I was walking from the placement of the sun and when I noticed that I laughed out loud. The boy scouts would be proud. I’m extremely grateful for my iPhone right now as none of the streets are obviously labeled, that said I think I’d be doing okay as there are a lot of maps placed throughout the city which denote where you are. Navigation is all based on neighborhoods and landmarks, and it’s surprisingly clear for someone who doesn’t read a word of Japanese.

First thing on my agenda: find the Apple store. I accomplished this very quickly. Now I know you probably laughed at that and might have even muttered “nerd” but there is a method to my madness. Apple is very selective in the placement of their stores, they are usually in upscale, popular/trendy areas so they can immediately give you an idea of a good place to check out, on top of that they offer free wifi, accessible power outlets, clean bathrooms and friendly multi-lingual staff.

That choice paid off big time immediately I was able to find a guy who had moved here from Estonia who was able to give me a brief run-through of Tokyo basics. First thing he told me, enjoy the free WiFi because I won’t find much of it elsewhere. Not even Starbucks offers it apparently and McDonald’s does but only to Nintendo DS users… great. I also found out the post office here doesn’t sell stamps… weird. I’ve yet to mail out my postcards so that is priority #2.

Christine’s father was able to get me a great hotel rate for tonight so I’ll be staying at the Sheraton, this goes against my usual traveling rules, but I could use a clean bed and shower. Unfortunately I can’t check in until 2 so it I’ve got some time to kill.

I’ve heard a few suggestions / requests of things to do for tonight which I’m excited to start tackling as soon as I’ve put my bags down. I’m still open for more though so hit me up in the comments or on Twitter. More later!

So I’m typing this on my brand new iPad while sitting on a Cathay Pacific flight to Vancouver, from there I’m off to Hong Kong, then straight on to Bangkok. In Bangkok I’ll be meeting up with a good friend Christine and the agenda is pretty much unwritten. I just need to be back in Bangkok on the 12th so I can fly to Tokyo for a grand total of 26 hours.

So you’re probably wondering, what is the reason for the trip? My answer of course is the trip is the reason for the trip. I’m planning on continuing the photography and social media adventures that I’ve grown to love so much.

I was hoping to be able to post my photos nightly throughout the trip but unfortunately the iPad camera adaptor wasn’t available in time and since we’ll be backpacking most of the time I decided to leave at home the 7 lbs of computing power that is my MacBook Pro. I did however pay for the international data plan on my iPhone so I’ll probably snap a few photos on there and post them to Flickr as I go as a preview of the final images to come when I arrive home.

For this trip I’ve packed extremely light, since my days on the government watch list (explanation to come…) I’ve learned how to pack lighter and lighter and only bring what I can carry.

On this trip for example I have one bag, my camera bag/backpack. Which contains:

- Canon 5D mk II with 24-105mm f4.0 kit lens
- 4 Canon 5D mk II batteries
- 4 Compact Flash cards. (1 32gb and 3 16gb)
- Canon 50mm f1.4
- Canon 28mm f2.8
- Apple iPad 64gb WiFi
- 6 pairs of socks
- 6 pairs of underwear
- 5 shirts
- 1 pair of jeans
- 1 bathing suit
- 2 field notes, 2 pens
- 1 deck of cards
- assorted wires and chargers

Aside from a few sparse things I’m bringing one way to Christine, the clothes on my back and my iPhone in my pocket, that’s it. As I mentioned before I’ve paid for 50mb of international data but I’ve also paid for 50 outgoing text messages (Incoming are apparently free) and I plan to buy a prepaid phone over there to be able to stay in touch with Christine.

I’ll be active on Twitter, FourSquare, Flickr and Facebook throughout the week as well as hopefully blogging every night assuming I can find WiFi to post from so please follow me.

Actually, I plan to take it one step further than that… As it stands right now, I have no agenda for Tokyo, only a few suggestions. Like my day in Paris before this I know no one in Japan and I don’t speak a word of Japanese. My plan is to crowdsource my day… I’ve got 26 hours there… Where should I go, what should I do? Reply to me on Twitter and let me know how you think. I should spend my day, I’ll go do it, photograph it and write about it right here!

Stay tuned dear readers!

There have been a bunch of really intelligent comments on this today but I’d like to beg one question:

If Cory Doctorow is so against closed systems owned by big corporations with enormous budgets, why does Boing Boing use Flash for it’s ads and video?

He’ll criticize others for their use of proprietary tech meanwhile profiting from another?