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Question for the SEO community: is this normal?

15 of Michael's comments in this thread · View thread on Reddit ↗

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

Hi u/michaelnovati \- Not sure if this is relevant to SEO, I doubt anyone in the community is out writing SEO hit pieces. FTR - an SEO agency in NYC with 42k backlinks (from a SEMRush audit of publicly available backlinks) wrote a post on LinkedIn that I'm a spammer for posting o

u/michaelnovati replied ·
Thanks for the reply, so the thing I'm confused about is like all the SEO influencers re-shared this thing so quickly to make it go viral, and they added kind of superifcial, "this is insane!" type messages. I'm trying to understand if this is like an SEO tactic that SEO people use to build credibility in the SEO community. The stuff Lars talks about in general is a combination of classic SEO stuff with a modern twist of this kind of manipulation tinge. "I can't say how I know this but the black hats...." kind of vibe.

u/PDFBearSupport wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

If you put yourself out there, you should be open to criticism or kudos. It's not all shiny and sweet. Being targeted by Lars Lofgren (who did a big piece a few years ago) means you're reaching a wider audience and you're getting "SEO-checked" (like getting street-checked). All y

u/michaelnovati replied ·
I'm even more confused about Lars because he has a history of calling out bad actors and I'm like dude, I was protecting Reddit! I posted all of the receipts. I took down a whole Reddit Makreting agency!! Like all their accounts banned. I'm just like mega confused if this is actually about SEO and not ME or if it was actually about ME lol.

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

Hi u/michaelnovati \- Not sure if this is relevant to SEO, I doubt anyone in the community is out writing SEO hit pieces. FTR - an SEO agency in NYC with 42k backlinks (from a SEMRush audit of publicly available backlinks) wrote a post on LinkedIn that I'm a spammer for posting o

u/michaelnovati replied ·
Wow people do really go after your stuff on here, all the downvotes. I got way too deep in the rabbit hole in my sub, mapped out all the bad guys, called them all out, and they are all banned from Reddit. I don't take people's shit and probably why I'm in this position lol.

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

But nobody knows what Lars said or what this was about?

u/michaelnovati replied · ★ FEATURED
Lars: [https://larslofgren.com/codesmith-reddit-reputation-attack/](https://larslofgren.com/codesmith-reddit-reputation-attack/) Me: [https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/a-response-to-lars-lofgrens-codesmith](https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/a-response-to-lars-lofgrens-codesmith) This is about a coding bootcamp that collapsed and blamed $9.2M of damages on ME alone on Reddit and I systematically debunked everything he wrote. He didn't ask for comment from me and I would have fact checked. Even his own evidence had mistakes he didn't realized I would have pointed out. So I'm just super confused because he can't be THAT MUCH of an idiot right? Like He seems to pride himself in taking down scams. So I'm trying to see if this is just some kind of SEO thing trying to spread without really knowing who he was dealing with here. I took down a whole bad-actor Reddit Marketer and all of their accounts, mapped it all out for months, etc... if Lars cared about taking out the bad guys I have a GREAT story.

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

You should put this in the original post

u/michaelnovati replied ·
The rules say no links. I follow the rules to a T haha. That's why my Reddit account is so pristine and trustworthy 😛

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

You should put this in the original post

u/michaelnovati replied ·
Oh you are a mod! If you ok it I'll put them there.

u/WebLinkr wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

You should put this in the original post

u/michaelnovati replied ·
u/WebLinkr I added the links and the post got removed

u/alexbruf wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

Seems like you got caught on the unfortunate side of this new wave of attention hitting the SEO / Digital Marketing community. Unfortunately there is money to be made here again ( especially the guys you took down ), so it’s natural to see some kickback. I haven’t read the ar

u/michaelnovati replied ·
I do have a compelling narrative. Part of this is because it's 7 months later and the article was well timed at the peak of the controversy. But everything I've been saying for 4 years proved true, so I have a lot of credibility now. But my problem is this guy got this thing to #1 on Hacker News, thousands of votes and shares, etc... and no one seems to really care about the story anymore.
u/michaelnovati replied · DELETED · archived copy ★ FEATURED
Yeah like if he even just asked me for comment I would have pointed out his OWN mistakes in his own evidence. Like he didn't realize a key screenshot trying to demonstrate how I poisoned LLMs has a quote of me defending the bootcamp (because it wasn't labelled). He mixed up the timeframe of two events 2 years apart and framed it as me being a 'stalker of leadership's kids'... people are calling me a 'p-word' in some of the social comments and it's absolutely unwarranted. Lars has blocked me on every avenue and I have no way to contact him. I submitted a request to pull my personal email address from his blog because people were signing me up for porn subscriptions and he seems to have done that but didn't not actually respond to me. I care less here about being right and more about the irreparable damage caused by him not fact checking anything. 8000 words of all the shit he missed, got wrong, etc... Lars: https://larslofgren.com/codesmith-reddit-reputation-attack/ Me: https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/a-response-to-lars-lofgrens-codesmith Again, like I can't tell what he's aiming for here, by blocking me everywhere he seems not interested in the the other side? I'm re-considering legal action yeah, I don't really have any avenues here.
u/michaelnovati replied · DELETED · archived copy · edited
Yup and I issued my response here: https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/a-response-to-lars-lofgrens-codesmith

u/jachcemmatnickspace wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

I cannot believe this is real, I cannot imagine I would ever in my life engage in fcking seopostmaxxing

u/michaelnovati replied ·
To be quite blunt: there is a really interesting story here, a story about how this guy built a coding bootcamp from 0 to $23.5M and then back to 0 again and how it's entirely the market and his own operational fault. That story wasn't told from both sides. Lars told some made of LLM-poisoning story that fit his background in SEO and absolutely ZERO to do with the actual story. I'm not perfect, I said some mean things over the years, but I was digging into a really interesting community talked to dozens of people and was doing documented research and Lars just came out of nowhere and blindsided me such a un-factchecked bullshit narrative yeah.

u/jachcemmatnickspace wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

This fucking comment reads like written for bots Maybe learn to write like a human to not have people accusing you of misleading bots for your benefit, if you're honest?

u/michaelnovati replied ·
Wow, I wrote this 100% by hand, I normally use a lot of AI to refine by comments because I have a problem with typos. But this one I wrote entirely myself.

u/jachcemmatnickspace wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

I said written for bots, not by bots The same things the other guy is accusing you of

u/michaelnovati replied ·
What does that mean "written for bots"? Like just so I can respond properly to make sure we're on the same page.

u/michaelnovati wrote (the comment Michael replied to):

What does that mean "written for bots"? Like just so I can respond properly to make sure we're on the same page.

u/michaelnovati replied ·
I'm busy so I'll respond with my best guess: 1. I started writing on Reddit in 2022, well before AI was a thing and I haven't changed at all since then. Same deal. 2. If you look at his "evidence" of me "poisoning LLMs" the "more moderate" quote in his LLM screenshot, that was defending the bootcamp, was WRITTEN BY ME (and I don't think he even realized it!!). He just blamed me for the "damaging" negative quotes that were also in the screenshot because he was so blinded by it. When in realize me DEFENDING the bootcamp made it into the LLM results in an attempt to counter unfair criticism. That's the exact opposite of what he was saying. I don't think you read my debunking.
u/michaelnovati replied · DELETED · archived copy ★ FEATURED
Well read this before you trust Lars Lofgren with anything... https://michaelnovati.substack.com/p/a-response-to-lars-lofgrens-codesmith I'm not a perfect human, but I'm fully transparent, honest, direct... wear my heart on my sleeve. Lars has a black-hat mind and trying to pull me down to his level.