Google removes LindaIkeji Blog - Haters

Popular news and entertainment site, Linda Ikeji Blog, was taken down Wednesday by tech firm, Google, after a row over the originality of the blog’s contents. Linda Ikeji Blog, published on Google-owned Blogger, has grown to become one of the most visited websites in Nigeria. The site mainly aggregates and republishes news items and entertainment bits sourced from other channels, although it occasionally publishes exclusive contents. Its publisher, Linda Ikeji, has emerged one of the most successful online entrepreneurs in Nigeria and has been rated amongst Nigeria’s most influential young women. Lately, the site has been hit by multiple allegations of plagiarism with critics allegedly prodding Google to suspend the blog. The tech firm disallows plagiarism on its platforms. Ms. Ikeji denies lifting materials without proper attribution. On Tuesday, Ms. Ikeji said the site came under attack by her competitors driven by envy over her success. The claims followed allegations of plagiarism by the publisher of another blog, 15Past8, known by the name Aye Dee. Details of the controversial work are not clear. But on Tuesday, Ms. Ikeji dismissed the allegation in an article, saying she cited sources in all published materials. https://www.premiumtimesng.com/arts-entertainment/169206-google-removes-linda-ikeji-blog-over-plagiarism-allegation.html

From LindaIkeji's Tweets Oh wow! Thanks guys for all the love and support. I'm overwhelmed. Trying to get a new site...please bear with me. Long live LIB. Kisses.. The blog is still up on http://lindaikeji.mobi ...please read there for now until I sort this out Linda Ikeji Blog will be back in a bit...biko bear with me...:-)

And Google restores http://lindaikeji.blogspot.com. I hear it's a record. Normally it takes weeks or months to restore a deleted blog. But not LIB. — Linda Ikeji (@lindaikeji) October 9, 2014 lindaikejionline.com, lindaikejionline.comr, lindaikejionline.com. As squatters have taken everything, this is all i have left...lol — Linda Ikeji (@lindaikeji) October 9, 2014 l

So, What Really Happened Here? Were Nigerians scammed into believing a fabricated falling out just to get Linda’s ratings & site visits up? I realize that is a bold accusation and I do NOT make it lightly. I therefore humbly invite Linda and Aye Dee to respond if they so desire because I have some rather startling, though speculative, information to share that requires their input for things to be clarified. Inconclusive Evidence #1: After some research, I found that the Linda Ikeji blog had been losing site visits loosely estimated into the hundreds of thousands monthly over the past 13 months to the tune of close to 1 million monthly site visits lost within that time. The screen shot on the link below is from a little known Internet-based investigative site which estimates (from the outside) the number of non-unique visits to popular web sites like Linda’s blog. See the screenshot here. As you can see from the image shown above, Linda’s blog visits appear to have been on a steady decline for over a year. If that estimate is accurate to any degree, then it stands to reason that if her blog’s popularity was on a steady decline, it would only be wise to do something urgently to ensure those precious site visits are immediately restored or even dramatically increased, to block off any loss or possible loss of income as a result of less and less traffic visiting Linda’s blog. Now as I stated, this is a speculative deduction as I am not an inside source and have not performed inside forensic analysis on her blog traffic or income from her site. But any expert internet marketing analyst will tell you there is reason here to suspect some form of “foul play” as if indeed her site traffic was on a steady decline so would her income (eventually), which would likely prompt an attempt to regain any loss in popularity. So, did Linda and/or her friend Aye Dee see this constant declining trend and then plan a fictitious reason to regain the lost attention to Linda’s blog and even catapult it to greater fame than it had in the past? You have to agree this is a possibility especially in light of the “confession” by Aye Dee and a clarification of whether or not the trust of loyal readers has in any way been tampered with in an attempt to rescue a slowly dying blog. Inconclusive Evidence #2: The domain name change from the free URL lindaikeji.blogspot.com as we all agree (Linda included) is something that should have taken place much sooner than it eventually did. However according to Linda’s own statements, she never bothered to make the change since most of her most obvious choices had already been taken up by cybersquatters. Well, it turns out that one of those cybersquatters was her mentor and friend Aye Dee. So then I am forced to ask the following rather obvious question… Why on earth would a mentor and friend purchase a relevant domain name years before their alleged rift and not pass that to his friend and mentee for her required needs? It simply doesn’t add up that Aye Dee purchased such a valuable domain name (lindaikeji.net) since 2011 and yet did not release it to his friend immediately upon his purchase when it made sense to do so. Now, three years or so later, that same domain name is what he offers as part of a peace offering to “help Linda get her blog back on top”. All of this barely 24 hours into the ruckus of her blog being shut down. Something is definitely out of whack here. My theory: Either Linda or Aye Dee or both decided it would be best to effect the domain change only after a scandal like what we just experienced would force the world to pay attention to Linda’s blog at the time of the change. Why wait for the latter? Well, recall that Linda’s blog was already haemorrhaging huge amounts of traffic and/or visits monthly. It would therefore be foolhardy and downright dangerous to effect a domain name change that could easily and very likely result in even greater loss of traffic. Most online users have such poor attention spans that if a domain name change is made suddenly and quietly thousands of visitors would lose interest within minutes or days if they are unable to access the blog via an old name they are used to and then are forced to find out where the new site has been moved to. Many people simply won’t bother. So, rather than risk further heavy losses in traffic, it would make sense to for example to create a situation in which all eyes would be on the old blog’s domain being shut down, and then Linda would of course be forced to find a new name and relocate in order to carry along all her old and new readers. The incidents of the past few days and weeks look too much like a set up to invoke interest in a dying blog and make a long needed change to its brand without risking any loss in traffic and thus income. Now while rejuvenating a dying site or creating interest in a changing brand are not wrong in any way, the way in which this is done is what must be carefully considered, analysed and reflected upon to ensure the people’s trust and loyalty that has helped make Linda famous has not in any way, shape or form been betrayed by the need to retain her income. I therefore invite Linda and friends to clear up any misconceptions their actions over these past days may have created. More: http://saharareporters.com/2014/10/12/linda-ikeji-blog-shutdown-scam-resurrect-dying-blog-kunle-olomofe