10:08 a.m.
Referral traffic returned to "normal" levels on 24 Sep 2010. Did you
investigate and find anything? Did you do something to stop the
referral traffic? If so, what did you do? Thank you.
W. Keith Watkins
Omniture Business Analyst
Red Hat, Inc.
919-301-3275
kwatkins(a)redhat.com
On 09/23/2010 02:15 PM, Keith Watkins wrote:
Starting on 1 Sep 2010 there was a significant increase in the
traffic
coming from http://fedoraproject.org to http://www.redhat.com and the
traffic remains elevated (see data below, although the data is for the
domain-level not the page-level). Further, this traffic is producing
click-throughs to a few specific links on the redhat.com homepage.
One last data point, there does not appear to be a pattern to the IP
addresses behind this traffic (The IPs are fairly evenly distributed
across several subnets).
My questions:
1. Have you seen an increase in your overall site traffic
corresponding to our increase in referrals?
2. Have you seen a similar increase in exits from your site to our
site?
3. Does your site have any new links to our site that went live on
1 Sep 2010?
4. Do you know of any reason we would see an increase in referral
traffic from your site?
5. Is this legitimate referral traffic or is something else going on?
Thank you and please contact me with additional questions.
Instances of fedoraproject.org being a referring domain to the
redhat.com domain
Date fedoraproject.org
08/22/10 129
08/23/10 188
08/24/10 147
08/25/10 230
08/26/10 200
08/27/10 207
08/28/10 125
08/29/10 141
08/30/10 201
08/31/10 181
09/01/10 7,133
09/02/10 14,303
09/03/10 12,878
09/04/10 11,663
09/05/10 12,894
09/06/10 13,973
09/07/10 13,318
09/08/10 8,755
09/09/10 7,142
09/10/10 8,777
09/11/10 10,927
09/12/10 9,985
09/13/10 10,004
09/14/10 9,283
09/15/10 9,675
09/16/10 11,044
09/17/10 9,097
09/18/10 8,889
09/19/10 10,862
09/20/10 9,017
09/21/10 8,116
09/22/10 7,422
--
W. Keith Watkins
Business Analyst
Red Hat, Inc.
9:37 p.m.
New subject: Significant traffic increase from fedoraproject.org to redhat.com since 1 Sep 2010
My *guess* is that a search engine crawler is causing this, as some pages running on the
phx2 boxes have a clickable Red Hat logo, and crawlers would easily be able to follow that
link.
Also, why is this such an issue? I see no reason why it'd be a problem. I would
greatly appreciate if you explained why it's so concerning.
Darren VanBuren
==============
http://theoks.net/
Sent from my iPod
On Sep 28, 2010, at 8:08, Keith Watkins <kwatkins(a)redhat.com> wrote:
Referral traffic returned to "normal" levels on 24 Sep
2010. Did you investigate and find anything? Did you do something to stop the referral
traffic? If so, what did you do? Thank you.
W. Keith Watkins
Omniture Business Analyst
Red Hat, Inc.
919-301-3275
kwatkins(a)redhat.com
On 09/23/2010 02:15 PM, Keith Watkins wrote:
>
> Starting on 1 Sep 2010 there was a significant increase in the traffic coming from
http://fedoraproject.org to http://www.redhat.com and the traffic remains elevated (see
data below, although the data is for the domain-level not the page-level). Further, this
traffic is producing click-throughs to a few specific links on the redhat.com homepage.
One last data point, there does not appear to be a pattern to the IP addresses behind this
traffic (The IPs are fairly evenly distributed across several subnets).
>
> My questions:
> Have you seen an increase in your overall site traffic corresponding to our increase
in referrals?
> Have you seen a similar increase in exits from your site to our site?
> Does your site have any new links to our site that went live on 1 Sep 2010?
> Do you know of any reason we would see an increase in referral traffic from your
site?
> Is this legitimate referral traffic or is something else going on?
>
> Thank you and please contact me with additional questions.
>
>
> Instances of fedoraproject.org being a referring domain to the redhat.com domain
>
> Date fedoraproject.org
> 08/22/10 129
> 08/23/10 188
> 08/24/10 147
> 08/25/10 230
> 08/26/10 200
> 08/27/10 207
> 08/28/10 125
> 08/29/10 141
> 08/30/10 201
> 08/31/10 181
> 09/01/10 7,133
> 09/02/10 14,303
> 09/03/10 12,878
> 09/04/10 11,663
> 09/05/10 12,894
> 09/06/10 13,973
> 09/07/10 13,318
> 09/08/10 8,755
> 09/09/10 7,142
> 09/10/10 8,777
> 09/11/10 10,927
> 09/12/10 9,985
> 09/13/10 10,004
> 09/14/10 9,283
> 09/15/10 9,675
> 09/16/10 11,044
> 09/17/10 9,097
> 09/18/10 8,889
> 09/19/10 10,862
> 09/20/10 9,017
> 09/21/10 8,116
> 09/22/10 7,422
>
>
>
> --
> W. Keith Watkins
> Business Analyst
> Red Hat, Inc.
--
websites mailing list
websites(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/websites
9:55 a.m.
New subject: Significant traffic increase from fedoraproject.org to redhat.com since 1 Sep 2010
On Sat, Oct 02, 2010 at 07:37:13PM -0700, Darren VanBuren wrote:
On Sep 28, 2010, at 8:08, Keith Watkins <kwatkins(a)redhat.com>
wrote:
> Referral traffic returned to "normal" levels on 24 Sep 2010. Did
> you investigate and find anything? Did you do something to stop
> the referral traffic? If so, what did you do? Thank you.
My *guess* is that a search engine crawler is causing this, as some
pages running on the phx2 boxes have a clickable Red Hat logo, and
crawlers would easily be able to follow that link.
Also, why is this such an issue? I see no reason why it'd be a
problem. I would greatly appreciate if you explained why it's so
concerning.
After some conversation with Keith, I think the issue was that it was
such a difference that it naturally attracted his attention looking at
the resulting graphs. If Fedora caused such a jump in eyeballs on Red
Hat's site, naturally Red Hat as our sponsor would be interested in
what caused it, whether it's desirable, or could be replicated. Not
in terms of finger-pointing, but rather, "Wow, that's really
interesting, what led to so much increased interest in our site from
people visiting a Fedora site?"
I talked to Keith about the information he might want to procure from
the Red Hat IT folks to see where the referrals actually came from.
The ball's in Red Hat's court to pursue as they wish now since their
own logs are going to give them the most valuable information.
--
Paul W. Frields http://paul.frields.org/
gpg fingerprint: 3DA6 A0AC 6D58 FEC4 0233 5906 ACDB C937 BD11 3717
http://redhat.com/ - - - - http://pfrields.fedorapeople.org/
Where open source multiplies: http://opensource.com
11:04 a.m.
New subject: Significant traffic increase from fedoraproject.org to redhat.com since 1 Sep 2010
Okay, thanks for explaining things, Paul.
Darren VanBuren
==============
http://theoks.net/
Sent from my iPod
On Oct 4, 2010, at 7:55, "Paul W. Frields" <stickster(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Sat, Oct 02, 2010 at 07:37:13PM -0700, Darren VanBuren wrote:
> On Sep 28, 2010, at 8:08, Keith Watkins <kwatkins(a)redhat.com> wrote:
>> Referral traffic returned to "normal" levels on 24 Sep 2010. Did
>> you investigate and find anything? Did you do something to stop
>> the referral traffic? If so, what did you do? Thank you.
> My *guess* is that a search engine crawler is causing this, as some
> pages running on the phx2 boxes have a clickable Red Hat logo, and
> crawlers would easily be able to follow that link.
>
> Also, why is this such an issue? I see no reason why it'd be a
> problem. I would greatly appreciate if you explained why it's so
> concerning.
After some conversation with Keith, I think the issue was that it was
such a difference that it naturally attracted his attention looking at
the resulting graphs. If Fedora caused such a jump in eyeballs on Red
Hat's site, naturally Red Hat as our sponsor would be interested in
what caused it, whether it's desirable, or could be replicated. Not
in terms of finger-pointing, but rather, "Wow, that's really
interesting, what led to so much increased interest in our site from
people visiting a Fedora site?"
I talked to Keith about the information he might want to procure from
the Red Hat IT folks to see where the referrals actually came from.
The ball's in Red Hat's court to pursue as they wish now since their
own logs are going to give them the most valuable information.
--
Paul W. Frields http://paul.frields.org/
gpg fingerprint: 3DA6 A0AC 6D58 FEC4 0233 5906 ACDB C937 BD11 3717
http://redhat.com/ - - - - http://pfrields.fedorapeople.org/
Where open source multiplies: http://opensource.com
--
websites mailing list
websites(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/websites
10:33 a.m.
New subject: Significant traffic increase from fedoraproject.org to redhat.com since 1 Sep 2010
Tools like Omniture account for and filter out most search engine
crawlers so that is most likely not the issue.
The issue is mainly from a marketing perspective and, despite arguments
to the contrary, websites are primarily marketing collateral. Changes
like these are noticed. The problem is that going from 200 views/day to
10k+ views/day is not "natural" and raises flags. The obvious questions
need to be asked -- why did traffic increase radically, is this "bad"
traffic (some kind of attack, phishing, etrc.)), what is causing this
traffic, etc. From a marketing metrics standpoint, a by-product of this
traffic is that the homepage metrics get skewed and the additional
click-throughs to the promotion spots make measuring marketing
effectiveness difficult.
Disclaimer -- these opinions are my own and do not represent anything
other than that.
W. Keith Watkins
Business Analyst
Red Hat, Inc.
On 10/02/2010 10:37 PM, Darren VanBuren wrote:
My *guess* is that a search engine crawler is causing this, as some
pages running on the phx2 boxes have a clickable Red Hat logo, and
crawlers would easily be able to follow that link.
Also, why is this such an issue? I see no reason why it'd be a
problem. I would greatly appreciate if you explained why it's so
concerning.
Darren VanBuren
==============
http://theoks.net/
Sent from my iPod
On Sep 28, 2010, at 8:08, Keith Watkins <kwatkins(a)redhat.com
<mailto:kwatkins@redhat.com>> wrote:
> Referral traffic returned to "normal" levels on 24 Sep 2010. Did you
> investigate and find anything? Did you do something to stop the
> referral traffic? If so, what did you do? Thank you.
>
>
> W. Keith Watkins
> Omniture Business Analyst
> Red Hat, Inc.
> 919-301-3275
> kwatkins(a)redhat.com <mailto:kwatkins@redhat.com>
>
> On 09/23/2010 02:15 PM, Keith Watkins wrote:
>> Starting on 1 Sep 2010 there was a significant increase in the
>> traffic coming from http://fedoraproject.org to
>> http://www.redhat.com and the traffic remains elevated (see data
>> below, although the data is for the domain-level not the
>> page-level). Further, this traffic is producing click-throughs to a
>> few specific links on the redhat.com <http://redhat.com> homepage.
>> One last data point, there does not appear to be a pattern to the IP
>> addresses behind this traffic (The IPs are fairly evenly distributed
>> across several subnets).
>>
>> My questions:
>>
>> 1. Have you seen an increase in your overall site traffic
>> corresponding to our increase in referrals?
>> 2. Have you seen a similar increase in exits from your site to
>> our site?
>> 3. Does your site have any new links to our site that went live
>> on 1 Sep 2010?
>> 4. Do you know of any reason we would see an increase in referral
>> traffic from your site?
>> 5. Is this legitimate referral traffic or is something else going on?
>>
>>
>> Thank you and please contact me with additional questions.
>>
>>
>> Instances of fedoraproject.org <http://fedoraproject.org> being a
>> referring domain to the redhat.com <http://redhat.com> domain
>>
>> Date fedoraproject.org <http://fedoraproject.org>
>> 08/22/10 129
>> 08/23/10 188
>> 08/24/10 147
>> 08/25/10 230
>> 08/26/10 200
>> 08/27/10 207
>> 08/28/10 125
>> 08/29/10 141
>> 08/30/10 201
>> 08/31/10 181
>> 09/01/10 7,133
>> 09/02/10 14,303
>> 09/03/10 12,878
>> 09/04/10 11,663
>> 09/05/10 12,894
>> 09/06/10 13,973
>> 09/07/10 13,318
>> 09/08/10 8,755
>> 09/09/10 7,142
>> 09/10/10 8,777
>> 09/11/10 10,927
>> 09/12/10 9,985
>> 09/13/10 10,004
>> 09/14/10 9,283
>> 09/15/10 9,675
>> 09/16/10 11,044
>> 09/17/10 9,097
>> 09/18/10 8,889
>> 09/19/10 10,862
>> 09/20/10 9,017
>> 09/21/10 8,116
>> 09/22/10 7,422
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> W. Keith Watkins
>> Business Analyst
>> Red Hat, Inc.
> --
> websites mailing list
> websites(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
> <mailto:websites@lists.fedoraproject.org>
> https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/websites
4:52 p.m.
New subject: Significant traffic increase from fedoraproject.org to redhat.com since 1 Sep 2010
On Mon, Oct 4, 2010 at 11:33 AM, Keith Watkins <kwatkins(a)redhat.com> wrote:
Tools like Omniture account for and filter out most search engine
crawlers
so that is most likely not the issue.
Having worked at Omniture (now part of Adobe) in a previous life, I can
vouch for
this.
Unfortunately, I don't have enough information to be able to make an
educated guess as to why we're seeing an increase in referrals from
fedoraproject.org to redhat.com. As Paul said, the http logs from Red Hat
IT are probably going to be the most valuable in helping us find out several
key pieces of information: 1) Which page(s) on www.fedoraproject.org are
referring people to redhat.com, and 2) Are there any similarities re: User
Agent on those redirects and 3) are all the redirects going to the same page
on www.redhat.com and 4) Is there any variability in IP addresses? Times of
day?
While Omniture's SiteCatalyst should be able to give you some of this
information, I'd love to see someone grab the HTTP logs from the server and
do some more focuses analysis.
--
Jared Smith
Fedora Project Leader
4947
days inactive
4953
days old
websites@lists.fedoraproject.org
5 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
-
Darren VanBuren -
Jared K. Smith -
Keith Watkins -
Paul W. Frields