Hot Summer and Duplicate Content

Temperatures are high today  32 degrees Celcius around lunch time, with a humidex of 40 - which means it felt like 40 degrees. Sure did.


I had planned out today like clockwork, but from the time I opened my email this morning, NOTHING has gone right.

My son had complained yesterday of red & pink and swollen and itchy eyes. My first thought was pinkeye which is contagious. He still had symptoms when he woke up this morning. I had an appointment I had to attend and my son was supposed to be going to camp. Now I would have to cancel my appointment and take my son to the doctor.

When I opened my email - I found an email from Squidoo accusing me of writing  Duplicate content on a lens I had made yesterday. I spent hours yesterday writing all the content for that lens myself. This was done  for a challenge and now the lens is under threat and may be deleted due to duplicate content.

When I checked the lens myself, it turns out that every line I wrote was duplicated elsewhere - but each line was duplicated on a different  webpage - as if Squidoo now says that I spent hours surfing the net looking for common phrases to copy. Why would I do that?

 It's not my fault that my style of writing is similar to other people's. And when filters are set to just 5 words - yes FIVE WORDS - that is not even a full phrase, let alone a complete sentence!!!

This is the second lens that I have been warned for Duplicate content. The first one was locked and eventually deleted because NOONE at Squidoo would tell me exactly what the problem was. These filters  are automatic (computer algorithms), not done manually.

It all has to do with Google. If Google sees duplicate content then Google punishes the copies and indexes only the original. At least that is what is supposed to happen.

And if the filters claim that 5 words in a row means you copied someone else, well then, every single english language page on the web must have duplicate content at some point, because there are only so many words in the english language and only so many ways to put them together. There is BOUND to be some repetition

If more than one person happens to use the same exact common English phrase, then only the first usage gets indexed on Google, everyone else gets slapped with Duplicate Content.

If this is what happened on the first lens that was deleted because I used common english phrases that were seen elsewhere, then Squidoo is going way overboard in its filtering - and NOT responding either is very UNPROFESSIONAL.

If this new lens gets locked and deleted because NOONE responds to my emails, then I will be closing my account with Squidoo. It's been fun, but this duplicate content nonsense is just going too far.


I wont bother to move my content to anywhere else either - apparently this same duplicate content nonsense is happening all over the web. So I will just stop writing online. There's no point any more.

Google has taken all the fun out of writing.

Happy Birthday dear Bibliohistoria

This is just so you know what happening, or not happening as the case may be. Tomorrow (March 17th)  is of course St Paddy's day (and I am not Irish) and tomorrow is also the 4th birthday of this blog.

And obviously my interest in reading and reviewing books seems to have died down quite considerably. That is surprising to me but that's the nature of the scanner personality!!!

I am spending a lot of my time on Squidoo now - creating lenses (webpages) on all sorts of subjects. So far I have made 60 lenses. You can read them from my profile page.

I cant promise to keep my promise of reading and reviewing 2 books per month. Well actually I am still interested in reading the books. I just  seem to have lost all interest in writing reviews. So dont expect any regular updates to this blog. I will continue to post any interesting bookish news I read about.

Check out my Squidoo profile page (linked above) to keep up with what's happening to me. Since we have to keep our lenses Unique, Useful and Updated, I find that I make lenses about things that happen around me. Personal lenses do better for content and visitors than essay type lenses
Ciao for now.

Silence is golden....or not....

OK OK OK I know I havent posted anything for a month. I'm sorry.

The reason is that my scanner personality has taken over and I am spending a lot of my time on Squidoo, making lenses (mini webpages) and making friends there as well. I am also still reading fan fiction online and looking for a job.

So I will make a deal with you. I will read and review at least a minimum of 2 books per month this year, or until my passion for Squidoo dies down.

I find that reading books is getting a little boring. I think in part because I dont have the extra money to go out and buy books. I have to borrow them from the library. I frequently have to reserve and get them out on inter library loan - and then I am forced to read them to a deadline - usually 3 or 6 weeks. For some reason that removes the enjoyment out of reading them. I have no idea why or how.

And she's off.....

I hope you all had a Happy New Years.

In keeping with my Scanner Personality, I have found a new interest.

"Oh no, not again...." I can hear you whispering.

Now I love creating web pages and blogs, but blogs are time consuming and webpages means writing a lot of HTML code. If you have checked out my dashboard page here for all my blogs, you can see that I currently have 19 blogs. Some of my blogs are for book reading challenges and others are for various areas of interest.

And last week I found a new way to create web pages for all my varied areas of interest. It satisfies my drive to educate and teach others, and to create, and it satisfies my need for the method to be relatively easy and painless. It is called SQUIDOO.

For Squidoo, one can create a singe page for a specific area of interest and creating the page is as easy as clicking a few buttons. Each page is called a LENS and their creators are called LENSMASTERS. A lensmaster can have as many pages as they choose. It is not unusual for some lensmasters to have 500 pages or more.

Squidoo supports itself with ads. Most of the ads run at the top and bottom of each page and down the sidebar on the right. There is still plenty of space to write up about your interests. Lensmasters can also use various affiliate programs to sell products - the most common one used is Amazon.

Some lensmasters have worked hard and are now creating a decent income with their lenses - anywhere from a few hundred dollers every month to several thousands every year. For others like me, the money is secondary (not important) and the stronger desire is to teach and educate. If our pages do generate any money, it gets sent to charities of our choice.

My plan is to gradually move most of my blogs over to Squidoo and delete the blogs. But don't worry!!! I will be keeping this blog. I am not throwing away almost 4 years of hard work. No way!!

As of today I have already created 7 Squidoo lenses and am in the middle of creating 2 more. I did say they were easy to make. The community at Squidoo is wonderful. There is a very supportive forum where one can ask questions and get help.

My main Squidoo page or main lens is called a LENSOGRAPHY. It has information about me and links to all my other lenses. On Squidoo I call myself SERENIA. That is an old Egyptian name found on papyrus in Egypt.

Serenia Lensography

I hope you will visit my various lens pages and either leave a comment or click the Liked It button at the bottom of each page.