Did HubPages Shadow Ban Me?

Is it about quality, or is it something else? As you are probably aware, I also write for HubPages, which is a community of several sister sites including HubPages itself. And just like here, a lot of the content I write is regarding conservative politics. 

Something that is not necessarily discouraged over there, by the way. I think that's important to point out. I don't want to be unfair to HubPages at all. Several of my conservative posts are what they call, "featured." In other words, a featured post is one that HubPages has determined meets certain quality standards such as good, solid content that is a certain length, that is generally well put together and worthy of being "listed" on their main page, or becomes published on one of their sister sites.

Unfeatured posts are almost invisible. 

I say almost because of course, over the years I have a bit of a "built-in" audience. So, it's not like no one will see a post that is not featured. And even though I have my profile settings set to only show featured articles, I can still physically include an unfeatured article in the highlights, and I did that.

When I look over the article in question, "We Must Put Our Country Before Party," there is nothing about it that seems to obviously separate it from anything else I may have written on the site that has been featured before it.

Although in it, I mention (or question) the mental capacity of President Joe Biden. Could that have something to do with it? Is it an article lacking quality? Or is it one they simply don't like what it implies? I don't even do it in a particularly mean way. In fact, it was not accusatory in so much as it was simply suggestive.

The question for me is, am I being shadow banned simply because the editorial team dislikes the context of my content rather than it being an issue of "quality," as was suggested in the form letter that is often provided when an article on HubPages is not featured.

In the letter it says, "It's possible that your article is not featured because it contains spammy elements." The post promotes nothing at all and in fact, contains no links at all. Neither does it make any reference to other articles on their site or elsewhere.

They go on to say, "If you don't see any spammy elements in your article, then it was likely defeatured for failing to meet HubPages' general quality standards." That is a fairly generic statement, especially considering I have been writing for HubPages for 15+ years and am quite aware of their quality standards and how to write and structure an article that meets them.

Over 50 of my articles are featured, and of the ones that aren't, they were featured at one time. The reason they are not now is due to their age and their current relevance, since many of my articles are not evergreen, and became unfeatured over time simply due to a lack of traffic to them.

How many people today are reading about the presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama?

Other suggestions regarding quality they suggest is that the article may have been too short or underdeveloped. It far surpassed the 700 minimum word count, and it was not laid out any different than previous similar content. "It may have had formatting issues, broken or unrelated links, and/or significant grammatical errors."

None of those are at issue. Granted, that's based on my own personal assessment. But again, the article follows the same general manner in which I write all of my pieces, regardless of where I happen to write them.

The point of my discontent here is not that my article was not featured. I have been writing long enough to know that not everything is the highest quality, and even I can admit when I may not have put my all into something. 

It happens. I get it. It doesn't bother me. 

What does bother me is that if it appears to be the case that a form of censorship, outright or simply making something hidden, is what's happening—that's where I take issue. I write opinion. Sometimes it's not a popular one. But it doesn't mean it doesn't belong somewhere.

And that's not to discount the fact that I actually appreciate the high standards by which HubPages determines its content. It makes the site better. It drives more traffic to the site because even though it is a mostly self-publishing platform, there are still eyeballs making decisions in back rooms to determine what they show to readers to find.

Like I said, I have a built-in audience. But that organic traffic which can help to build and grow that audience comes from articles that are featured. So, what happens to an unfeatured article and why does it matter? Why could it be considered a form of shadow banning? 

Featured articles enjoy increased visibility is one reason. For example, an unfeatured article lives on HubPages. But it's not on their "Discover" page, which is the main page everyone sees when they go to the site who do not have an account. If something is not featured, only your existing audience will ever see it.

Featured articles are showcased on topic pages and appear as "Related Articles" on other similar featured posts. They are also made available to search engines. In other words, if your article is not featured, it lives on the site, but it is kept from searches. It is internal to HubPages, but is deeply buried and much harder for anyone to find.

As I said before. It is almost invisible.

Just like any media is going to be, there are many within their office walls who tend to be liberals and of course, carry on with a very liberal agenda. Conservative speech is not banned on the site. Not hardly. But it's also not the first time very specific speech has been shadow banned by the site.

To me it is a matter of that slippery slope. Free speech is free speech, and all opinions, even if we strongly disagree with them, deserve to be heard. If you're not careful, eventually only certain selected speech is ever allowed.

I don't think that my comments in the article in question were harsh or mean. I also do not think they were unfair or didn't at least provide some context and explanation behind why I made them. I think they just made an editorial decision to keep the opinion as quiet as possible.

I did send a response asking if they could provide a more detailed explanation. But often times those go unanswered. 

The important thing for me is that all voices be heard and that even if the content does not agree with the opinions of the editorial staff, articles should not be hidden from view based only on that alone. At the same time it is their site and I respect what they do, and what their site allows me to do. I will respect their decision regardless. 

But of course, I will also publicly share my opinion on what I think about it.

Like the way I write or the things I write about? Follow me on my Facebook page or on X to keep up with the latest writings wherever I may write them.

© 2024 Jim Bauer

Writing Update: May 25th 2023

Is this just more wasted space? Shameless promotion? I guess it is a little bit of both. I try to keep The Springboard here as "serious" as possible. That may be an overstatement, of course. But hey, this is my blog and I guess I get to make the rules.

I frequently promote my Facebook page where I compile a lot of the things I write about here and in other places. That's partly since I write a lot and I write in several places, and of course, if people like what I have to say or the way I write, I want to have a one-stop place where they can find more of me.

As such, I thought maybe it would be a good idea to occasionally share links here as well to other posts elsewhere that you may find some interest in. From more serious stuff to rambles to me trying to be funny. And I do mean trying.

If nothing else it helps to keep the page updated, and AdSense gets to advertise, why can't I?

Here are some of the more recent things I have posted in various places that you might want to give a quick read to. If not, no harm no foul. All I can do is let you know they are there and the rest is your choice.

Nonetheless. Onward and upward and here we go.

First Camp of 2023 on the Books

Does Anheuser-Busch CEO REALLY Get the Boycott?

Why We Can't All Be Rich

He Shot a Man in the Behind for WHAT?

One Stock I Have Trouble Owning

Where Was I, and How the Hell Did I Get There?

Can We Call Trump's Election Claims Lies if we Don't Know the Truth?

Busting Down the Barriers of Writing

What Do You Think About the J.K. Rowling Controversy?

And for this one, that's a wrap. I may post links once or twice a month depending upon how much new material is out there to share. And I hope I have not wasted anyone's time. That's all folks, and I will see you on the other side.

HubPages Makes a Breakfastpop Pop Out

Don't get me wrong when I say that HubPages over the past couple of years has taken on far too much editorial control at their site, and it has irked more than just a few writers. I was one of them a while back as I wrote my farewell hub to my faithful readers, Goodbye HubPages sometime back in October of 2011.

HubPages is not a bad site to write for. It's just not as easy as it used to be to write content that you want without a lot of added scrutiny by the site moderators.

A couple of things that stood out for me were simple references that I made to the Boston Beer Company as I was simply saying that it was the last real American company left to brew beer. That hub it turned out was cited as promoting drinking. Another hub was simply an anecdote about the prospects of winning the lottery, and was primarily meant to be somewhat humurous in nature. This hub was cited as promoting gambling.

Neither of which were true in the context of my hubs. I eventually reposted the latter hub here on the Springboard, Winning the Lottery: The Dream of the Big Win.

If the moderators would have actually read the hubs, the fact that neither were really promoting anything would have been all too clear. Even after I wrote them citing my concerns, it was clear that they did not bother to read a word of what I'd posted. Worst of all I got a nasty bit of a response back from them which I talked about in a follow-up hub titled, On HubPages—October 21, 2011, wherein they said, "Like most websites, there are many topics which are protected under free speech that are not permitted on websites like HubPages. Please feel free to publish any content that violates HubPages Terms of Use elsewhere. Let us know if you have any questions."

That was the real stab, and those words hung on me like weighted chains hooked to my nipples. Please feel free to publish any content that violates HubPages Terms of Use elsewhere. Thanks for nothing, guys. Really?

To date my hubs have received over 72,000 views, and these figures do not count any hubs I deleted which became irrelevant due to time decay of the material. It doesn't make me the Stephen King of HubPages, but I am sure my 72,000 plus views certainly helped the site to make a few bucks over the years.

Which brings me to Breakfastpop who is, for all intents and purposes, a conservative blogger at HubPages. To date she has written around 913 hubs, and has earned the following of somewhere around 762 other hubbers, and who also gets read by many people outside the site who are not even members. Her blogs, as I would classify them, always get quite a few comments, and I would think her total views would blow mine clear out of the water.

And despite that, she recently announced she will be reducing her activity on the site citing mainly that HubPages has "institued changes that seem to be anti-writer." And she is spot on when she makes this comment. When I wrote Goodbye HubPages I said, "If we are to truly call ourselves writers then no writer I have ever spoken to has ever been for censorship in any form. This is censorship if you ask me." Breakfastpop went on to say, "This site is no longer a haven for writers who wish to express themselves freely and creatively."

This becomes especially true when one takes into consideration that the site touts itself as a site for writers, and is essentially a means to self publish your work. I understand why any site of this nature would want to be careful about some of its content simply because any content that might be negative could impact their entire site overall. But there is a big difference between inappropriate content and simple creative and free thinking by writers who provide it. And again, if the site wants to run itself more like a magazine and filter some of the content, then they must take the time to actually read the content that is deemed to be objectionable, substandard, or the quality of the content simply be determined by "word requirements, graphs, charts and polls" as Breakfastpop also rightly pointed out.

It is also true that many quality writers have left the site for the very reasons that I stated, along with Breakfastpop's statements as to her reasoning for slowing down her activity. What will they have left if the good writer's go is the question I have posed more than once? When you drive away those who actually make a positive contribution to the site, what is left? What's more, many times HubPages has said that they are simply going along with the TOS of Google Adsense. Yet not once have I ever had any notices of violating Adsense's TOS, even when I have published exactly the same material which was deemed a violation of HubPages TOS on one of my blogs, all of which are directly owned by Google.

One thing I have long said in looking into the actions of the moderators and owners of what is supposed to be a site for writers, is that none of these moderators or owners have a clue about the importance of freedom of speech that is inherent in anyone who actually considers themselves to be a writer, and as being a former editor involved in the publishing of an online monthly fiction horror magazine, editor of a horror fiction anthology, and having associations with other editors and writers like Mort Castle, Richard Chizmar of Cemetery Dance, T.M. Wright, Peter Straub, Michael Laimo (who recently had one of his books turned into a movie on Chiller), and former Dorchester Publishing Leisure Horror books editor Don D'Auria, I know what it means to have editorial control over content. Nothing was published, nor rejected, without first reading the material. That's how you deal with writers. No programming algorithm can ever replace that, and non writers/editors should not have a thing to do with editorial control. Instead this task should be delegated to those who know what they are doing.