How do they rate websites, anyway?
November 19, 2005 11:06 PM   Subscribe

What/who is silktide and how do they get these results? I submitted Metafilter to Silktide on a whim and now I'm wondering what tools/rubric(s) are these folks using and how do they arrive at their results?
posted by Lynsey (48 comments total)
 
I'm baffled. Why on earth did you post this here, and not in ask.
posted by metaculpa at 11:08 PM on November 19, 2005


Here I include the question mark that went missing in the previous post. Please accept my apologies.

" ? "
posted by metaculpa at 11:09 PM on November 19, 2005


Uh, oh. MeFi is in violation of the British Disabilities Discrimination Act. What British disabilities are being discriminated against?
posted by brundlefly at 11:12 PM on November 19, 2005


Why on earth did you post this here, and not in ask.

Or in MeTa, since it's MeFi related?
posted by rhapsodie at 11:15 PM on November 19, 2005


I like that 'moderate profanity' is described as feature of MeFi.

Interesting tool though.
posted by MetaMonkey at 11:15 PM on November 19, 2005


Design makes proper use of modern technology
posted by metaculpa at 11:15 PM on November 19, 2005


I wanted to post earlier, but there was no wheelchair ramp and I had to have a friend carry me to the posting box. Please, Matt, make this handicap accessible.

Actually, the British Disabilities Discrimination Act violation is probably has something to do with the blind.
posted by Falconetti at 11:19 PM on November 19, 2005


I like how that site determines the topic that MeFi is about based one what posts were on the front page when they did their sampling.
posted by vernondalhart at 11:19 PM on November 19, 2005


What British disabilities are being discriminated against?

Y'know, bad teeth, bad food, overly-mannered, all the stuff they make fun of on Family Guy.
posted by afroblanca at 11:22 PM on November 19, 2005






What/who is silktide?

did you try clicking on "about us"?
posted by Pretty_Generic at 11:33 PM on November 19, 2005


Speed: Your website responded in 1.83 seconds, and your homepage downloaded in 2.65 seconds. This is quite respectable and suggests your website is running on a fairly powerful web server.
Well!
posted by boo_radley at 11:39 PM on November 19, 2005


According to Silktide, Silktide is slow to respond, and has very poor popularity on google.

On the bright side, Silktide reports that Silktide passes British legal requirements for ramps and grab bars.
posted by I Love Tacos at 11:57 PM on November 19, 2005


This thing is hilarious. Profanity as a feature! Hurrah. I think we really need to drive that feature home a little more. Because it's the features that bring people here.
posted by panoptican at 12:08 AM on November 20, 2005


I mean really, I refuse to believe the law is as open as they claim (which leads to them getting more clients). Does every book published need an accompanying audiobook with braille inlay? Does every TV show and movie need audio-and-morse-code-electrical-impulse-based-description?
posted by Pretty_Generic at 12:10 AM on November 20, 2005


No automatic validator is going to be perfect, but this one does seem to have a nice range of analysis. Interesting.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 12:15 AM on November 20, 2005


Metafilter: japanese food blog
posted by Optimus Chyme at 12:57 AM on November 20, 2005


Silktide's always seemed to have trouble finding my web site.
posted by Captaintripps at 12:57 AM on November 20, 2005


Does every book published need an accompanying audiobook with braille inlay? Does every TV show and movie need audio-and-morse-code-electrical-impulse-based-description?


Why don't you tell us, you despicable, dog-snogging Pommy!
posted by Kwantsar at 1:26 AM on November 20, 2005


Wow, my site gets a 3 point something on the satisfaction scale. I'm highly biased in favor of this site, but I would never rate it so satisfying.
posted by Jawn at 1:27 AM on November 20, 2005


The W3C access guidelines are universal and many countries have them included in legislation. They are hard to enforce and go largely ignored. However, there are many businesses that make their living by consulting to large firms on how to comply with these guidelines. They are mostly for visually impaired users who use screen readers, but also for deaf users who may not hear audio cues, and for other people who use adaptive tech such as voice recognition or alternatives to keyboard and mouse and gui operating systems.

As an aside, they also make websites easier for people to use on pdas or cellphones, etc.

I'm not sure why they chose the British Disability Discrimination Law, but the thing says that my website is number 254 in the world which is total bullshit, it also says my website has no text, so hmmph.
posted by Bueller at 2:28 AM on November 20, 2005


Goes does my site suck.
posted by Mutant at 2:30 AM on November 20, 2005


It's not a motherfucking bug, it's a motherfucking feature.
posted by klangklangston at 2:34 AM on November 20, 2005


However, it says my blog is of the top 30 sites on ALL the internets. It appears Silktide doesn't differentiate between foo.blogspot.com and bar.blogspot.com.
posted by emelenjr at 2:35 AM on November 20, 2005


Your website is ranked 30 in the world.

HAHAHAHAHA!!!

Eat my dirt metafilter!
posted by thatwhichfalls at 2:38 AM on November 20, 2005


How ironic that I was using this website yesterday. My site scored 8.6 and it's not even finished. Do I get a prize now? Um, I don't trust this thing though.
posted by sjvilla79 at 3:02 AM on November 20, 2005


Also:

All webpages were found to be fully compliant with the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, and therefore likely not in violation of the British Disability Discrimination Act. Pages make proper use of the latest XHTML standards.

Although I'm redesigning soon, I still haven't factored accessibility features into my original site. Thus, how can I pass this requirement?

Don't trust the machines.
posted by sjvilla79 at 3:06 AM on November 20, 2005


How is that ironic?
posted by adzm at 3:08 AM on November 20, 2005


How is that ironic?

It's ironic because the next day this lame thread appears as a FPP on MeFi. By the way it's Sunday here in Australia. We're in the future don't forget.
posted by sjvilla79 at 3:15 AM on November 20, 2005


The Royal National Institute of the Blind is also in violation of the BDD act. I reckon Silktide's marking is a ruse to make people buy into their services.
posted by movilla at 3:15 AM on November 20, 2005


I think we really need to drive that feature home a little more.

Yup, if moderate profanity is a feature, how much more of a feature would extreme profanity be?

If ranking sites like this tell us anything, they tell us that more of everything is always better.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 3:22 AM on November 20, 2005


Whoo-hoo! Use of page title on you-suck.com was EXCELLENT!

"The title of your homepage was found to be "Fuck off!". Your title appears to be fine."

Heh.
posted by Mutant at 3:42 AM on November 20, 2005


I use a buttload of tables, so the results are highly suspect. I do have good rank, though. :)
posted by bairey at 3:58 AM on November 20, 2005


It's ironic because the next day this lame thread appears as a FPP on MeFi.

Ah, the irony. A FPP about the *very same site* that you visited yesterday!

No, wait, that's not ironic at all, that's just accidental or chance.
posted by sour cream at 4:24 AM on November 20, 2005


I Love Tacos: According to Silktide, Silktide is slow to respond, and has very poor popularity on google.

According to Silktide, Google has very poor popularity on Google.

"We took the top 3 phrases and searched for them in Google, along with your website/company name.

No matches on Google were found at all.

The includes searches for Google, programmes business, business solutions, web pages."

posted by dsword at 4:51 AM on November 20, 2005


Ahh, but searching for www.google.com is a bit different.
posted by dsword at 4:53 AM on November 20, 2005


Ok... as someone who considers himself a webdesigner, I find it funny that that site says you should use the latest technology, but then goes and gives you non-XHTML code to link to the image of your score. (It doesn't end with />, it is just >. An image tag is 'self closing' and thus should end with a slash+less-than.)

It also doesn't tell what the score is in the image's ALT tag... which means their image could possibly violate laws designed to protect the visually impaired.
posted by aristan at 4:53 AM on November 20, 2005


The analysis fails to mention the wit, cleverness, and charm of the many comments
posted by Postroad at 5:15 AM on November 20, 2005


The analysis is really suspect (and of course biased towards encouraging you to give them your business).

It said that the sites I checked, boysetsfire.org and thelookmachine.com, weren't showing up under "boy sets fire" and "the look machine" searches in google. However, those phrases actually both produced the first hits in google.

Just a marketing tool, really. And considering that silktide itself can't trick out its own tool to look competent , how would they expect you to give them money so they could work on your site?
posted by jasonlatshaw at 5:47 AM on November 20, 2005


oh..are these guys in edinburgh ....theres a hot air balloon near college with silktide written on it......
posted by sgt.serenity at 8:56 AM on November 20, 2005


I put in my school district's webpage. I got this:

No matches on Google were found at all.

and this:

Your website is ranked 1,532 in the world. This is very good and shows you have a very popular website.

I have trouble reconciling these two statements.
posted by SPrintF at 10:19 AM on November 20, 2005


(metafilter)these appear to be the most significant phrases:

1. budget filter posted
2. budget filter
3. web contact
4. filter posted
5. body parts
6. mefi projects
7. windows media
8. yiddish curses
9. physical world
10. comments quot

Humph.
posted by IronLizard at 10:22 AM on November 20, 2005


#5 sounds about right.

Just to add to the featureset: fuck, shit, ass. balls. body parts. web contact.

That oughtta bump mefi up a notch.
posted by zerolives at 10:40 AM on November 20, 2005


1,484,776 to go. hmph.
posted by andrew cooke at 1:55 PM on November 20, 2005


Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, Tits.
posted by jewzilla at 2:14 PM on November 20, 2005


You forgot fart, turd and twat.
posted by IronLizard at 2:59 PM on November 20, 2005


bugger all fuckwits
posted by [expletive deleted] at 6:31 AM on November 21, 2005


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