Duplicate Content

[iinuser]

I have a question regarding non-original content on multiple sites. I'm working for a client that's company has a personalized social network for it's fans (completely custom, built from the ground up - not like kickapps, or the other social network dev platforms). Anyway the network is fairly active - at least a couple thousand users -  and each one of these sites is given a subdomain.

Each of these subdomains can be given a custom URL if purchased - but essentially it's much like creating a blogger or wordpress. Each URL is basically "http://FanUsername.BrandName.c0m/"

Now the dev had the genius idea of publishing all "corporate/company" blog posts on everyone of these subdomains as well. When first learning of this, I told them it was a terrible idea - and that it may even penalize the main blog. After more research - it looks like this may not be the case? I still think they should just link back to the main blog and discontinue publishing these posts on all of these additional subdomains (and for those that purchased domain names - unique websites).

What do you guys think? Should they only include an RSS feed of links back to the main blog? Should they just link directly back to the blog? Or should they offer shortened versions of each blog post - ala links + meta description + Read More...? Or lastly, should they just keep as is?

Thanks for the help

[EGOL]

...publishing these posts on all of these additional subdomains (and for those that purchased domain names - unique websites)

Sounds like a really bad idea that will stink up user blogs and make them mad.  They should charge him for advertising if they have to pay for the blog.

and that it may even penalize the main blog. After more research - it looks like this may not be the case?

I would not do it.  Six months ago I would have worried about the posts being filtered... but since February I would worry about my entire domain being demoted by the Panda algo.

[GeorgeDavis]

As long as there is a rel=canonical in place on each one of these sub-domains I see no problem with it.  It doesn't sound like the most elegant solution the way they are doing it... If I had my own "blog" on Facebook or Squarespace I wouldn't want their stuff to be published on my blog, it's just not relevant.  Can you pm me the URL?  I'm interested to see this in action.

[iinuser]

They do not have to pay for the blog. It's all free.

It's simply apart of their blog by default when creating a social media profile. Basically it looks like an RSS feed going across all these sub-sites. Now RSS feeds are great usually right? The problem here, IMO, is that these sites are built off of the root domain. So off of one website. Which causes major issues.

I'm drafting an e-mail now to offer my options on how to fix this. rel=canonical seems like an option, but purely on user experience, I would just turn them off. Maybe include an RSS feed of just the links on a separate page.

[iinuser]

For user experience, I don't like it either. But I'm more curious about the duplicate content issue. Could they be seen as simply full text RSS feeds on multiple sites? Or since the root domain is still apart of the site, it is actually seen as "on-site duplicate content" which some suggest penalizes the main site.

i'm going to recommend removing the posts all together, and then to offer an RSS of just links on another portion of the page. Maybe on the left or right column? This could be beneficial as it builds our internal linking.