Forum:Remove "nofollow" tags from a particular wiki?

Is it possible to remove all "nofollow" tags from a particular wiki?

I am the only admin at the wiki I work on. I noticed the "nofollow" tags today while looking at the HTML for a page. So I guess Wikia's MediaWiki software is following the Wikipedia model.

Offtopic spam links on my wiki get deleted in a day or 2, and so the "nofollow" links are unneeded. Unlike on Wikipedia where there are so many pages that people can frequently slip in offtopic, or only slightly ontopic, spam links.

I can understand the need for "nofollow" tags on Wikipedia, but they serve no purpose on my wiki. They actually hinder the purpose of my wiki.

There are hundreds of city pages whose purpose is to put out as much info, and as many useful links as possible concerning the topic of this wiki. "Nofollow" links discourage this. They also discourage mutual interlinking help in getting all our network of pages higher up in Google searches. --Timeshifter 15:59, 25 August 2009 (UTC)


 * You could use a bot. Mark (Tedjuh10) - Talk 17:03, 25 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Can a bot edit the HTML? Also, wouldn't the tags be returned anytime the page is edited and saved again? --Timeshifter 20:29, 25 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Oh, do you mean that the nofollow is actually ín the HTML, because then you should contact Wikia and ask them to remove it. Mark (Tedjuh10) - Talk 21:44, 25 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Removing the nofollow could be really bad for the Google ranking of the wiki. — TulipVorlax 04:58, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) I don't see how. See Nofollow. I found out that nofollow can be turned on or off. See
 * http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:$wgNoFollowLinks --Timeshifter 18:18, 27 August 2009 (UTC)


 * The "How" part has been discussed on Forum:Primer in search engine optimization.
 * Google consider that a page with more than 100 links might be spam. — TulipVorlax 03:13, 28 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Tulip, you wrote: "Removing the nofollow could be really bad for the Google ranking of the wiki." From my reading removing the nofollow would not hurt the ranking of the wiki at all.


 * Nofollow tags causes Google not to let external links here effect how Google ranks the linked pages. Nofollow tags do not effect how Google ranks the wiki.


 * My understanding is that the number of external links on a page effects how Google divides up the Googlejuice for those links. A few links get more Googlejuice per link than more links on a page. One link on a page gets 100% of the Googlejuice. 10 links on a page get 10% Googlejuice per link. There is no exact formula, and Google constantly changes its formulas for ranking, etc.. Nofollow tags eliminate 100% of the Googlejuice. That is not good.


 * The reason why that is not good is that one of the main purposes of the Cannabis Wiki is to support the yearly Global Marijuana March (GMM) and the hundreds of cities involved. Putting nofollow tags on relevant external links hurts the ranking of the many sites involved in promoting the Global Marijuana March. It also isn't fair. Nearly all of those GMM sites that link to the Cannabis Wiki do not use nofollow tags for those links.


 * We want people doing Google searches for info on GMM cities and their GMM events to find those GMM city sites, and to find the Cannabis Wiki. I don't want those sites to use nofollow tags either. --Timeshifter 23:38, 29 August 2009 (UTC)


 * On the link i've given, Dany said clearly that we dont have to worry about link in the sidebar, footer, and all because they have the nofollow.
 * So, to me, that mean that if thoses would not have the nofollow, we would have to worry.
 * Counting all UI links on some pages get us well over 300.
 * Google consider pages with more than around 100 links to be spamming.
 * And that is what making the ranking drop.
 * — TulipVorlax 02:03, 30 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Note that ranking is "not so important" anyway.
 * I have some personnal websites that all possesses a rank of zero and they still receive 10 to 35 visits per day in wich about 90% come from Google. — TulipVorlax 02:09, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

(unindent). When I talk about rank I am talking about how high up one is in Google search results. I have had a website since around 1998. Around 70% of the hits come from Google.

It is not necessary to do anything special to get hits. Good content is what counts. People link to good content. The more good content, the more people who link to it. From regular websites.

There is a lot of mythology about meta info, keywords, number of links on pages, and so on. All that matters is more and more pages of good content.

Blocking good, honest external links with nofollow tags helps no one.

I don't mind nofollow links on the sidebar, header, footer, and ad links. --Timeshifter 20:46, 30 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Ok, only in articles. I understand now.
 * So you were not talking about Google PageRank™ ?
 * — TulipVorlax 01:09, 31 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I was using "rank" in the more popular sense of how high up a page comes up in search results in various search engines.


 * See also:
 * PageRank


 * Google page rank is similar, but not exactly the same. "The SERP rank of a web page is not only a function of its PageRank, but depends on a relatively large and continuously adjusted set of factors, commonly referred to by internet marketers as "Google Love"


 * One's website as a whole may not have a high rank. Individual pages may get a lot of hits though. But if there are no links to a web page then there may be little or no support for that page in search results. But even that is not always true. Some pages get one link from Digg, etc., and become very popular in search results for awhile. Good content is what counts.


 * I just want to remove the nofollow tags within the articles on my wiki. This gives more Google Love to the external links. They need all the Google juice they can get. --Timeshifter 01:48, 31 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I understand. My sites might be a bit more well known to Google because i use Google Sitemap for all of them (i even created my own Sitemap Generator using SharpDevelop for this).
 * Now all is left is for Wikia staff to say if this is feasible and if they will permit it.
 * Good luck.. ;-) — TulipVorlax 03:14, 31 August 2009 (UTC)