Bizarre blog links

Every so often someone links to an article on this site - recently, it's usually the "stimulus for bloggers" article, but occasionally something else. I usually discover it through Technorati or by noticing a new referrer in the server stats.

Generally this is simply because somebody found the article interesting and linked to it. Often they copy a few lines of the article to give context to their readers.

Today, however, I discovered a very odd phenomenon at this blog. My article on behavioural economics and the knowledge firm has been linked, but it seems to have been put through a machine translator - twice! As far as I can tell it has been translated into another language (the blog is in South Africa, so I would guess Dutch or Afrikaans) and back to English. Google Translator doesn't produce these specific results though, and neither does Babelfish. Anyone seen this phenomenon before?

The original, from my article here, was:
This blog has two primary themes:
  • behavioural economics
  • the economics of knowledge
I believe they are closely linked, because behaviour is derived from the knowledge that people have about the world (or more strictly their mental model of the world, which may not actually be accurate knowledge).

Knowledge, in the economy, is influenced by many things. But at least one type of entity specialises in influencing it: the knowledge firm.

Knowledge firms include professional services firms,
The quote on the page is:
This blog has two core themes:behavioural economicsthe economics of knowledgeI believe they are strongly coupled, because behaviour is derived from the skill that people have about the world (or more sternly their mental typical of the world, which may not actually be accurate wisdom). Knowledge, in the wealth, is influenced by many gear. But at slightest one kind of entity specialises in influencing it: the expertise fixed. Knowledge firms embrace professional army firms,
How curious! I can't quite imagine why someone would do this. But every link's a good link...right?

Note in particular that "services" was translated into "army" and "gear" to "things". Is this some kind of Googlespamming linkfarm specifically focused on army products?

Comments

John Viega said…
Probably. There are lots of sites trying to make money on google adwords by registering fake clicks. What happens is that they set up sites where they regularly update the content, and then make their bot-net simulate legitimate traffic (meaning lots of visitors per ad clicked). But, they don't want to do the work of putting up legitimate content, so they just steal it from blogs.

One trick I've noticed a few times is stealing book reviews off Amazon, for books that match a particular search criteria. Running it through a translator and back can help keep Google from determining that you're pirating content from a particular site.
20 February 2009 at 14:51
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