Search Engine News Discuss Wikipedia is adding nofollow attributes to all external links in the vBulletin SEO Tips and SEO Questions forums; I'll try to get some solid sources, but I heard on the cnet podcast that wikipedia that the owner of the wiki is going to add no follow's to all ...

I'll try to get some solid sources, but I heard on the cnet podcast that wikipedia that the owner of the wiki is going to add no follow's to all external links even tho they voted on it to allow them

Wikipedia is adopting the policy to reduce spammers' incentives to add spam links to the encyclopedia. I wonder, though, if it could also have the effect of reinforcing Wikipedia's hegemony over search results. The sources cited in Wikipedia, many of which are original sources, will no longer get credit for their appearance there, which should cause at least a little downward pressure in their own search rankings (hence providing a little more upward pressure, relatively speaking, for Wikipedia's articles). Although the no-follow move is certainly understandable from a spam-fighting perspective, it turns Wikipedia into something of a black hole on the Net. It sucks up vast quantities of link energy but never releases any.