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Re: How do I read referral logs?

On Sat, 31 Dec 2005 06:06:17 +0000, Roy Schestowitz
<newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>__/ [John Bokma] on Friday 30 December 2005 20:06 \__
>
>> "Stacey" <Remove-the-Y-stacey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> 
>>> "John Bokma" <john@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>>> news:Xns973C7C9093754castleamber@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>> "Stacey" <Remove-the-Y-stacey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> [ Referer spam ]
>>>>
>>>>> I am not seeing 80% either. I have viewed my raw logs against both
>>>>> the webalizer and modlogan. It seems pretty good. I get referrer
>>>>> spam every now and then but not bad like 80% maybe around 10 - 15%.
>>>>
>>>> Still sounds quite high to me, I guess I get around 1-2% but to be
>>>> honest that's a wild guess. If you add up bots that pretend to be
>>>> direct hits, it might be higher, maybe 5-7% (another wild guess), but
>>>> that's not really spamming the referer.
>>> 
>>> Well, I was guessing also.:-) I wouldn't know unless I set and figure
>>> it all out.. To tell you the truth it isn't worth figuring to me. I
>>> skim through the raw logs on occasion to make sure it is all ok with
>>> the other stat programs. It looks about right from the eyeing. I see
>>> it(spam) every now and then sometimes it is higher than other times.
>> 
>> Yeah, actually I found just two spammers today :-D.
>> 
>>> But I can say for sure it isn't 80%.
>> 
>> Maybe Roy considers Google a spammer too ;-)
>
>
>No, Google are kind to me. *smile*
>
>
>>> I think with all of the referrers
>>> and this is for those who take my images I could say it would bring it
>>> up to 15%. It isn't spam, but it isn't good referring hits either.
>> 
>> Yeah, leechers. I check those now and then with a small script, and if
>> they are annoying, I block them, or the entire domain that hosts them
>> (like myspace, blogspot, etc).
>
>
>That's never an ideal solution. However, leeches can really raise the hosting
>bills, so when thresholds are approached, it's worth cutting down where it
>hurts the least -- HotLinking. Some of them would grab a 200KB JPEG and use
>it as their background picture. Pure HotLinking. If it's just one site,
>updating the blacklists is easy. It becomes impractical when this happens
>too often.
>
>I get around 10,000 referrals per month from Google Images, which to many is
>just "Google Images", not an actual Web site. Yes, they think Google owns
>the images! So HotLinking seems like the easier way. It is most problematic
>when large (and supposedly trustworthy) sites do it. They get high traffic
>that actually gives inertia stolen graphics. Dvorak Uncensored is a perfect
>example of that.

Dealing with leeches is easy & effortless once you've dealt with it
initially. Just redirect any image with a referrer that's not approved
to a small (byte-wise) ad image for your site. Just be sure to count
empty referrers, "file:...", "xxxx:..." etc. as approved referrers so
you don't block direct browsing, local files, and "anonymous" browsers
respectively. And don't forget all the variations on your server's
hostname & domain. Also remember to include your URL in the ad image
since it won't be linking to you.

Usually the leeches will catch on after their cache updates and either
grab their own copy of the image or switch to leeching off someone
else. There are a handful of blogs & personal sites out there, though,
that have been giving us free advertising for some time now. >:)

I was tempted to serve up something really embarrassingly disgusting
like those goatse or tubgirl pics I hear tell of, or something, but
sometimes potential customers will email each other links to pics of
our wares so that wouldn't have been wise.

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