Odd Amazon ref link?

February 27, 2006 12:58 PM

A friend noticed that self-linking Amazon links in his Amazon blog included "ref=ase_artandlies-20" in the url. That's definitely not his referral id, publisher, booktitle, username, or anything else he could connect to himself or his book. Any idea what artandlies is about?

At the time, I noticed a large number of results in <a href="this google search, though they seem to have all disappeared for me now.

posted by davebug to computers & internet (13 comments total)

er, this:
http://www.google.com/search?q=inurl%3Aartandlies+site%3Aamazon.com

It seems to sometimes show results and sometimes not.
posted by davebug at 12:59 PM on February 27, 2006

ase = 'all seeing eye' in some contexts

artandlies is a webring mechanism I think
posted by unSane at 1:04 PM on February 27, 2006

The only place I've seen artandlies is in the Amazon referral URLs at Bookslut.
posted by camcgee at 1:10 PM on February 27, 2006

He more than likely has some sort of parasite running on his system which is hijacking his links and inserting the referral code of someone else, in this case: "artandlies-20". He should scan his system to remove any spyware/parasites/etc... and report the scammers to the Amazon affiliate program.

As the person above mentioned, that referral code is associated with the Bookslut website.

Did your friend set up his blog himself? Did he correctly enter his right Amazon referral code? It could be that he was using a preformatted script or something that already had the artandlies-20 code in it as an example, and forgot to change it to his own... in which case there is no foul play going on. If that is not the case though, then these Bookslut folks are playing dirty. If it is the case, then all he needs to do is correctly format his blog to insert his code instead of theirs.
posted by RoseovSharon at 1:32 PM on February 27, 2006

Perhaps he happened to copy and paste the URLs from Bookslut (or from someone else who got them from Bookslut)?
posted by mbrubeck at 1:38 PM on February 27, 2006

perhaps his host auto fills the referrer like mefi does? Is his blog on some free site?
posted by tiamat at 1:56 PM on February 27, 2006

Probably just pasting links in from somewhere else.
posted by delmoi at 2:06 PM on February 27, 2006

I really doubt the Bookslut people are running a spyware Amazon kickback racket. He probably just copied the address and forgot, as other posters have suggested.
posted by BackwardsCity at 2:11 PM on February 27, 2006

Just another "he probably pasted the wrong associate ID" comment. I've done it before, as I'm sure most others have. I've never knowingly propogated it throughout my web site, though.
posted by jdroth at 2:40 PM on February 27, 2006

He more than likely has some sort of parasite running on his system which is hijacking his links and inserting the referral code of someone else...

That's quite a leap, and I doubt it. "More than likely"? Certainly not.
posted by cribcage at 2:40 PM on February 27, 2006

It's not "quite a leap" at all. It's a very big and ongoing problem with the Amazon associates program. Are you an associate? If you are, then log on to the discussion board there to see what I'm talking about. If you're not... well... best I can tell you is that it is most certainly "more than likely" possible.

It doesn't seem like the folks at Bookslut would be that shadey though, which is why in my same post I suggested other options, including the one stating that it could be that he just forgot to change his referral id in the code.
posted by RoseovSharon at 4:05 PM on February 27, 2006

Without knowing how or where he got his Amazon links, we can't really say where it came from. What it sounds like to me is this:

He went to Amazon through some referral link (in this case, Bookslut?), found his book, and copied the link fro mthe address bar. Resulting link had the bookslut referral ID in it.

Just a guess though, we need more info!
posted by antifuse at 3:08 AM on February 28, 2006

When you click on anyones referral link, a cookie is set on your system which will keep that referral id on your computer for a short time, until you click through a link with someone elses ID in it which will reset it to the new ID. So if you click on a Bookslut coded link, you now have their cookie on your system. If you then go and click on one of my links, the Bookslut cookie will be gone but now you will have mine instead.

Just clicking on a link though to view something on Amazon cannot change the coding on his blog or website or whatever.

So, either this is a case of link hijacking, OR, he simply needs to change the referral link code that is programmed into his blog. It seems like what you are describing is a blog that automatically is supposed to add his referral code into any Amazon links he puts on his blog, right?

If that's correct, then he needs to look at the codiing for his blog, find where the part is that is inserting the referral ID, and see what it says. If it is the id for Bookslut (artandlies-20), then problem solved. It was probably there all along as an example which he never changed. It just needs to changed to his correct ID.

If it's is not coded there for Bookslut and shows his correct ID, then it's either hijacking like I explained above, OR, he is clicking on an outside Bookslut link somehow which is setting a cookie on his system.

Did he set up this blog himself? Does he remember even entering in his own referral ID into the coding? It really seems like it's a case of this not happening and the settings on his blog just not being correct... as has been noted, it doesn't appear like the folks at Bookslut would be dirty dealing and playing with link hijacking (although it IS possible). He needs to check the coding and see whats there, that is the only way you are going to get to the bottom of this to know where it's a human error on his part, or foul play by any outside source.
posted by RoseovSharon at 12:42 PM on February 28, 2006