Keyword spamming

[tarsierspectral]

Are we allowed to notify Alamy of keyword spamming?  If so, is it taken seriously and is anything done about it?

[fotoDogue]

I would think you should contact Alamy about anything that seriously concerns you. Whether they'll act on it is anyone's guess.

 

Some time back I tried to use the term "food desert" for an area that lacks access to food. So many photographers had used it as an alternate spelling for "dessert" that the term was useless.

 

 

fD

[NYCat]

I guess I will have to contact Alamy because I put my name in quotation marks in my keywords to make it easy for me to quickly find all my images. I just checked to see what is coming up when I search my name and a couple of images on the first page are of elephants and are not mine. They do indeed have my name in the keywords. So a case of copying and not checking the results. 

 

Paulette

[wiskerke]

I guess I will have to contact Alamy because I put my name in quotation marks in my keywords to make it easy for me to quickly find all my images. I just checked to see what is coming up when I search my name and a couple of images on the first page are of elephants and are not mine. They do indeed have my name in the keywords. So a case of copying and not checking the results. 

 

Paulette

 

Yes I found some of mine too. Very funny. However now we only have alphabetical keywords, that is hurting us more than it would under the old search engine.

 

Is that keyword spamming?

What does tarsierspectral think keyword spamming is?

 

If it's adding irrelevant keywords to an image in the hope that lots of views meant lots of sales, under the old system that would mean bad CTR and a quick sink to the bottom.

With the new keyword tools there will be not a lot of space for keywords anyhow in those infamous 50 tags.

Will the new search engine still punish bad CTR? I bet it will and that it will give competent and careful keyworders a lot worse CTR than they ever would have thought possible. In fact just as bad as the stupid keyworders or the keyword stealers.

 

wim

[tarsierspectral]

What I think keyword spamming is when you have a picture of something that has to do with Africa for example and you put a name of every country and every African country capital in your keywords.  That's to me obvious spamming.  Whether that hurt the ranking under the old system I don't know, I just know that these irrelevant images are now showing up before my relevant images.  Perhaps that goes back to the other discussion on this forum but under any system this shouldn't be allowed.  Not sure how that could be policed but from past experience I know Alamy never did anything about reported cases as such. So I'm just frustrated.

[wiskerke]

What I think keyword spamming is when you have a picture of something that has to do with Africa for example and you put a name of every country and every African country capital in your keywords.  That's to me obvious spamming.  Whether that hurt the ranking under the old system I don't know, I just know that these irrelevant images are now showing up before my relevant images.  Perhaps that goes back to the other discussion on this forum but under any system this shouldn't be allowed.  Not sure how that could be policed but from past experience I know Alamy never did anything about reported cases as such. So I'm just frustrated.

 

Do you have an example of a search where this is happening? No need to identify images or contributors.

 

wim

[tarsierspectral]

 

What I think keyword spamming is when you have a picture of something that has to do with Africa for example and you put a name of every country and every African country capital in your keywords.  That's to me obvious spamming.  Whether that hurt the ranking under the old system I don't know, I just know that these irrelevant images are now showing up before my relevant images.  Perhaps that goes back to the other discussion on this forum but under any system this shouldn't be allowed.  Not sure how that could be policed but from past experience I know Alamy never did anything about reported cases as such. So I'm just frustrated.

 

Do you have an example of a search where this is happening? No need to identify images or contributors.

 

wim

 

 

Yes, search for "Brazzaville", just on first page you will find images of people from Ethiopia for example, or places in Ethiopia.

[wiskerke]

This is hilarious! That image of what looks like the Blue Ridge with the sign Brazzaville, and if you search with Google Images will show up with the word Retirement; or Koblenz or Washington or Eindhoven. In total Google finds 25,270,000,000 results. Even at 10 cents an image that must pay for someones rent.

That endless African road seems somewhat innocent in comparison. ;-)

 

wim

 

edit: it's not the Blue Ridge, because no yellow lines. No idea where this is. Northern? Eastern? Europe probably.

[tarsierspectral]

This is hilarious! That image of what looks like the Blue Ridge with the sign Brazzaville, and if you search with Google Images will show up with the word Retirement; or Koblenz or Washington or Eindhoven. In total Google finds 25,270,000,000 results. Even at 10 cents an image that must pay for someones rent.

That endless African road seems somewhat innocent in comparison. ;-)

 

wim

 

edit: it's not the Blue Ridge, because no yellow lines. No idea where this is. Northern? Eastern? Europe probably.

 

yes, it is hilarious but at least it's checked off as digitally altered.  Not sure what this image could be used for but maybe this contributor knows the market better than I do!  I'm more concerned about the other guy with all the possible words that have nothing to do with the image.

[CM photo]

Here's a good one for you: search for "red-eyed frog Madagascar" and you get 66 hits.  Of these, 38 (i.e. over half) are from a single contributor and they are of a red-eyed frog from Costa Rica.  The thing is that this is not a case of mistaken identity because "Costa Rica" is also in the keywords.  One of the spurious images is in first place in the search.

 

I wrote to member services three times about this spamming and the images are still there.

 

This is just one example of hundreds of mis-identified subjects on Alamy - some accidental, and due to the incompetence of the photographer when it comes to identifying animals and some due to blatant spamming.  And by the way, I did have some images of genuine red-eyed frogs from Madagascar on Alamy but I have removed them now and sent them elsewhere - I can't be bothered to complete with cheaters.

 

 

[Foreign Export]

I do report it to Alamy where someone has literally adding numerous entirely irrelevant keywords- and in particular if they appear ahead of me in a particular search

 

Never had a reply though

[tarsierspectral]

Here's a good one for you: search for "red-eyed frog Madagascar" and you get 66 hits.  Of these, 38 (i.e. over half) are from a single contributor and they are of a red-eyed frog from Costa Rica.  The thing is that this is not a case of mistaken identity because "Costa Rica" is also in the keywords.  One of the spurious images is in first place in the search.

 

I wrote to member services three times about this spamming and the images are still there.

 

This is just one example of hundreds of mis-identified subjects on Alamy - some accidental, and due to the incompetence of the photographer when it comes to identifying animals and some due to blatant spamming.  And by the way, I did have some images of genuine red-eyed frogs from Madagascar on Alamy but I have removed them now and sent them elsewhere - I can't be bothered to complete with cheaters.

 

Exactly, I have notified Alamy of similar issues (deliberate spamming not just a mistake) and they have not done anything about it.  This sucks for us and Alamy and for the buyers. Not sure why it is not treated seriously!

[DJ Myford]

This is one of the reasons I have so few images with Alamy: they just don’t care. If they had behaved like a serious business rather than constantly trying new gimmicks and ignoring the serious problems, I would have thousands of images on file by now.

[NYCat]

I contacted Alamy about the photographer who had copied my keywords and included my name in the keywords for the images. They answered within minutes and this is what they said...

 

"We feel sharing and utilising others tags is now commonplace. However, we will remind the contributor to refrain from using tags irrelevant to the subject and ask him to remove your name from the images."

 

So they don't seem to be concerned about the copying. I guess it is inevitable and I admit I do sometimes check out other people's keywords and might even copy some before editing them for my images. Mostly I copy myself from previous keywording.

 

Paulette

[tarsierspectral]

I feel that copying others' keywords and keyword spamming are two different issues.

[IDP]

I contacted Alamy about the photographer who had copied my keywords and included my name in the keywords for the images. They answered within minutes and this is what they said...

 

"We feel sharing and utilising others tags is now commonplace. However, we will remind the contributor to refrain from using tags irrelevant to the subject and ask him to remove your name from the images."

 

So they don't seem to be concerned about the copying. I guess it is inevitable and I admit I do sometimes check out other people's keywords and might even copy some before editing them for my images. Mostly I copy myself from previous keywording.

 

Paulette

I think they're right - that it is inevitable and probably impossible to police. However the old search system made this pretty counterproductive.

 

The visible keywords are in alphabetical order, with no indication of which keyword field they're in. There's also no indication of the (previously) all important word order and proximity, which created relevancy. Therefore, it was almost self-policing. Simply copying someone else's keywords would have inevitably resulted in a low rank and low visibility.

 

Sadly, this is no longer the case and it's become a plagiarist's charter. Word order doesn't seem to matter and irrelevancies are rewarded.

 

I did a search for Yellowstone National Park and the search results aren't much different to Park National Yellowstone - which would not have happened under the old system, giving prominence to word order and relevancy.

 

Sadly, another example of the bewildering mess we're now having to live with!

 

Ian D

[wiskerke]

Incredible

 

You land 28 days in the sin bin for a few pixels hardly showing CA and THAT kind of keywording passes with flying colours  Came across this image while looking for wolf den nest    

 

Cheers,

Philippe

 

Come on Philippe, how is your Russian?

Right: one beer please; thank you and prosit. That's about mine too.

So if I were Russian I would turn to one of the keyword apps too.

Besides, as you probably have noticed, he has never put more images on Alamy than his first 4.

 

wim

[Bill Brooks]

As far as good keywords go, would you use this software that grabs keywords from images by others?

 

http://microstockgroup.com/tools/keyword.php

 

Search by keyword. Select a couple of thumbnails, that look like the image you are trying to keyword. Submit. Highlight keywords that apply from the list.

[wiskerke]

As far as good keywords go, would you use this software that grabs keywords from images by others?

 

http://microstockgroup.com/tools/keyword.php

 

Search by keyword. Select a couple of thumbnails, that look like the image you are trying to keyword. Submit. Highlight keywords that apply from the list.

 

Of course, what could go wrong.

Let's test it:

 

Amsterdam windmill

 

10 images of windmills appear. All in the Netherlands, none in Amsterdam, but how would a Russian know?

 

dutch, holland, amsterdam, landscape, netherlands, windmill, nature, mill, old, travel, traditional, tourism, river, europe, wind, scenic, schans, background, zaanse, zaandam, sky, rural, landmark, village, spring, culture, farm, water, countryside, lake, field, cloud, canal, historic, country, blue, evening, agriculture, red, wooden, sunset, tourist, architecture, building, museum, famous, panorama, beautiful, energy, tradition, colorful, keukenhof, yellow, european, wonderland, heritage, garden, outside, touristic, green, windy, bulb, zaandijk, working, flowers, people, outdoor, scene, meadow, tulip, ecology, history, power, north, season, scenery, blossom, tulips, flower, grass, park, vintage, summer, wings, boat, autumn, destination, dusk, house, facade, authentic, environment, sunrise, pond, trip, suburb, journey, zaan, indigenous, coast, reflection, reed, rotate, real, sea, land, equipment, roofs, path, watermill, turbine, springtime, peaceful, lisse, natural, peace, seasonal, wood, wheel, kinderdijk, site, rotterdam, classic, world, splendid, unesco, twilight, illumination, floral, idyllic, no, wheat, outdoors, picturesque, polder, lamp, hague, wanderlust, hat, girl, folk, historical, kid, pink, national, ethnic, dress, blooming, baby, amazing, child, clothes, delft, costume, sightseeing, toddler, sunny, tranquil, orange, vibrant, view, bloom, place, wonderful, clouds, welcome, typical, amsterdam windmill, sun, fresh, road, flora

 

or since last monday:

 

agriculture, amazing, amsterdam amsterdam, architecture, authentic, autumn, baby, background, beautiful, bloom, blooming, blossom, blue, boat, building, bulb, canal, child, classic, clothes, cloud, clouds, coast, colorful, costume, country, countryside, culture, delft, destination, dress, dusk, dutch, ecology, energy, environment, equipment, ethnic, europe, european, evening, facade, famous, farm, field, flora floral, flower, flowers, folk, fresh, garden, girl, grass, green, hague, hat, heritage, historic, historical, history, holland, house, idyllic, illumination, indigenous, journey, keukenhof, kid, kinderdijk, lake, lamp, land, landmark, landscape, lisse, meadow, mill, museum, national, natural, nature, netherlands, no, north, old, orange, outdoor, outdoors, outside, panorama, park, path, peace, peaceful, people, picturesque, pink, place, polder, pond, power, real, red, reed, reflection, river, road, roofs, rotate, rotterdam, rural, scene, scenery, scenic, schans, sea, season, seasonal, sightseeing, site, sky, splendid, spring, springtime, suburb, summer, sun, sunny, sunrise, sunset, toddler, tourism, tourist, touristic, tradition, traditional, tranquil, travel, trip, tulip, tulips, turbine, twilight, typical, unesco, vibrant, view, village, vintage, wanderlust, water, watermill, welcome, wheat, wheel, wind, windmill, windy, wings, wonderful, wonderland, wood, wooden, working, world, yellow, zaan, zaandam, zaandijk, zaanse,

 

Now what has gone wrong? ;-)

 

No problem to use one of these as long as you know what you're doing. It may find a word or two you had forgotten to put in.

See, we are clever people standing on the shoulders of other dwarfs.

 

wim

 

edit: last monday not ast monday

[wiskerke]

 

You land 28 days in the sin bin for a few pixels hardly showing CA and THAT kind of keywording passes with flying colours  Came across this image while looking for wolf den nest    

 

Cheers,

Philippe

 

Talking of CA's, have you seen today's front page image? Not the first time the first image customers see is covered in CA's (green fringing covered the keyboard). Hardly a good advert for the quality of Alamy's content.

 

Off topic, I know, but I had to mention in somewhere! 

 

Geoff.

 

 

Glitch aesthetic to prove you're a real person using a phone in stead of a phony photographer using a so-called real camera.

Great pseudo: Guerilla.

 

wim

[Bill Brooks]

Wim: I do as you suggest. I keyword my image first, then use the software to look for the odd good keyword I may have missed.

 

Not so sure about the dwarf analogy however.

 

First of all it is embarrassing, because I quite often discover that I have missed a couple of good keywords.

 

Secondly it it is depressing, because often the microstock reference image is better than mine.

[DJ Myford]

Just did a search for Mallard duck female uk, and three of the images on the first page are of a Canada goose. Wonderful.

[Allan Bell]

 

Wim: I do as you suggest. I keyword my image first, then use the software to look for the odd good keyword I may have missed.

 

Not so sure about the dwarf analogy however.

 

First of all it is embarrassing, because I quite often discover that I have missed a couple of good keywords.

 

Secondly it it is depressing, because often the microstock reference image is better than mine.

 

 

 

I tend to use online dictionary/thesaurus/wikipedia etc. Then specialist sites for animals/birds/fish/plants/flowers/trees/butterflies/fungi etc etc. Look up places/buildings/vehicles etc etc etc.

 

Never crib from others keywords, just my own.

 

Allan

[Allan Bell]

 

Just did a search for Mallard duck female uk, and three of the images on the first page are of a Canada goose. Wonderful.

 

..... and of his only 7 keywords, 2 are misspelled: balck, duck, grey, oxford, swan, swiming, uk  and 2 are irrelevant because the Canada goose is neither a duck nor a swan. And, of course, the real name "Canada goose" is missing    In fact, there's nothing correct about it except perhaps "Oxford" but then again ....... 

 

How on earth can you mistake a female mallard duck for a Canada goose? 

 

  

 

Still think it wouldn't be a bad idea to take a quick peek at the keywords when newbies submit their first 4 images for review 

 

Cheers,

Philippe

 

 

 

I do that and try to offer advice if necessary. But can only do that if they introduce themselves on the introduction forum.

 

Allan

[Allan Bell]

 

 

 

Just did a search for Mallard duck female uk, and three of the images on the first page are of a Canada goose. Wonderful.

 

..... and of his only 7 keywords, 2 are misspelled: balck, duck, grey, oxford, swan, swiming, uk  and 2 are irrelevant because the Canada goose is neither a duck nor a swan. And, of course, the real name "Canada goose" is missing    In fact, there's nothing correct about it except perhaps "Oxford" but then again ....... 

 

How on earth can you mistake a female mallard duck for a Canada goose? 

 

  

 

Still think it wouldn't be a bad idea to take a quick peek at the keywords when newbies submit their first 4 images for review 

 

Cheers,

Philippe

 

 

 

I do that and try to offer advice if necessary. But can only do that if they introduce themselves on the introduction forum.

 

Allan

 

 

But isn't it Alamy's task to check? 

Anayway, seems like a tiny little bit of CA is more important than correct captions 

 

Cheers,

Philippe

 

 

 

See where you are coming from on this subject Philippe.

 

Allan