It’s been quite a while since Twitter put nofollows on all user-embedded outbound links, and bloggers all over the world are still furious. Part of this fury comes from each fresh blogger that discovers that the move happened. Part of it is a disappointment that big socially grounded sites are behaving in a way that badly affects their users.

Placing nofollows on outbound links has been a disturbing trend in big internet sites in the last few years. Search engine optimisation experts once thronged to the social media networks for off-page SEO because the links from such popular sites were so valuable. SEO experts still throng to the social media networks, but they have less certainty of boosting a page’s ranking with a social media campaign. In placing nofollows on outbound links, sites like Wikipedia, Facebook and Twitter have taken the candy away.

Another thing that may have caused the upset is that bloggers were the ones who triggered the change. It all began when SEO hobbyist David Naylor posted his findings on links within the bio section of his Twitter profile. Naylor discovered that although Twitter had nofollowed the ‘web’ section of user profiles, Twitter’s webmasters hadn’t thought to nofollow any links in the bio section. This meant that posting a link within the ‘bio’ field would get your site some link juice.

This discovery was essentially the discovery of a free link, which SEO experts were all very excited about. However, Google guru and hobby blogger Matt Cutts spotted the fact that this loophole could easily be used by spammers and, doing the right thing, notified Twitter’s CEO Evan Williams. A short while later, this new source of links was shut down with a nofollow.

Perhaps the furore would have been slightly less if the line from Naylor to Cutts to Willliams had been less clear. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on your point of view, Cutts sent the heads-up to Williams over Twitter, where thousands of other bloggers were able to see it. Links were made and blame was thrown around.

The cutting off of a rich source of high-quality links is upsetting to everyone interested in SEO. Most sites struggle to find enough inbound links, and social media sites can seem like a good way to generate links that are of a decent quality. You can talk to us at SEO Consult about your inbound link strategy. Bloggers got even more upset because it was seen as a betrayal by one of their own.

What does this sad little tale tell the average site owner? Well, the trend that Twitter’s action reveals is one of mistrust. Big sites are aware of their vulnerability to spammers and will do everything they have to protect themselves. This is slowly but surely creating an atmosphere of mistrust around the net, one which is making it increasingly difficult for the little guy when it comes to search engine optimisation. Sadly, when big sites start locking down, a lot of little sites get harmed.

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