Updated 2026: This post originally explained the mechanics of article spinning, a technique used to create multiple “unique” versions of a single article for submission to article directories. Article spinning was a common SEO tactic in 2009. Today it is widely recognized as a black hat technique that can get your site penalized. But the history is instructive, especially as AI content generation raises similar questions about content quality and originality.
How Article Spinning Worked
Article spinning used a simple syntax to create variation in text. You would write a base article and then add alternative words and phrases using curly braces and pipe characters. For example:
Spot is a {red|blue|yellow} stuffed {dog|cat|bear}.
Spinning software would then randomly select from the options to generate multiple versions. In this simple example, nine unique combinations were possible. Apply this technique to an entire article, including spinning paragraphs and nesting spin commands within each other, and you could generate hundreds or thousands of “unique” articles from a single source.
The goal was to avoid duplicate content detection. If you submitted the same article to a hundred directories, search engines might recognize it as duplicate content and devalue the links. Spinning created versions that looked different to algorithms while saying the same thing.
Why Spinning Was Always a Bad Idea
Even in 2009, I described spinning as a “gray hat” technique. I was being generous. The problems with article spinning were fundamental:
- The content was terrible. Spun articles were often barely readable. Randomly swapping synonyms produces awkward, unnatural text that no human wants to read. The content served search engines, not people.
- It did not scale quality. You were taking one mediocre article and turning it into a hundred mediocre articles. At no point in the process did anything get better.
- Google caught on. Search engines became increasingly sophisticated at detecting spun content. The Panda and Penguin algorithm updates specifically targeted the kinds of low-quality, manipulative content that spinning produced.
- It devalued real work. The existence of massive amounts of spun content made it harder for people creating genuinely useful articles to get noticed.
The AI Content Parallel
Article spinning is relevant history because AI content generation raises similar questions in 2026. Like spinning, AI can produce large volumes of content quickly. Like spinning, the quality varies enormously depending on how it is used. And like spinning, using AI to mass-produce low-quality content for SEO purposes is a strategy with an expiration date.
The parallel is not perfect. Modern AI can produce genuinely readable, sometimes excellent content. But the principle holds: if you are using any tool, whether it is a spinner from 2009 or an AI model from 2026, to produce content that exists solely to game search algorithms rather than serve human readers, you are building on a foundation that will eventually collapse.
What to Do Instead
The marketers who thrived after the article spinning era were the ones who shifted to creating fewer, better pieces of content. That lesson applies directly to the AI era:
- Use tools to enhance quality, not replace it. AI can help with research, editing, and brainstorming. Use it to make your content better, not to avoid doing the work.
- Publish content you would be proud to put your name on. If you would not want your audience to know how a piece of content was created, that is a red flag.
- Focus on originality and experience. Google's E-E-A-T guidelines (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) reward content created by people with genuine knowledge and real-world experience. No tool can fabricate that.
Article spinning is dead, and good riddance. The lesson it teaches about shortcuts and content quality will always be relevant.
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Hi Mark, nice description on article spinning. Since you’re saying that you’re working on a piece of software that will include spinning I am curious about what will make your spinning different from the many spinners that are already doing what you have described?
Sorry — what I was trying to say is that I am working with some new article marketing software, and that one of the great features it has is a good spinner.
I’m unsure how I feel about this gray hat method – seems to be somewhere in the middle. 😉 Just goes to reason to me that you don’t want the exact same article pointing back to you 49 times? But, I’m not Google.
Okay, then I get it 🙂
As for spinning articles I am a big fan. I do however prefer the UAW method.
@Kent — Understand. Some people think that back algos do not consider uniqueness.
@Mikael — I know a lot of people like UAW. From what I know about UAW, that sort of paragraph spinning works just fine here. I just used a simple example to show the idea.
Thanks for the heads up about article spinning. I know its a gray hat method, but I use it as my seach engine marketing campaign, and do spin some of my articles most of the time.
Hi Mark. I tend to use spinning for rewriting PLR when I need to for niche blogs.
Some time ago I used UAW for article submission but found it way too costly for what it produced. I now have the article submitter you referenced, it’s brilliant and having the article spinner included just makes it all the more powerful.
I am what you might call a manual article spinner. Clients ask me to rewrite articles several times into completely unique pieces. I am not an expert when it comes to SEO, Google or internet marketing because I’m just the monkey assigned to write stuff.
I was wondering if there are any significant disadvantages to using software for spinning articles.
Hi Mark,
What would you say if it was possible to “spin” without using the special syntax? Methinks it would be quiet a bit easier 🙂
I’ve relaeased a new Web App that does just that!
cheers
Tony
@Tony — if Article Boxer is ready for a beta, I am interested in taking a look.
Hi,
Have sent you a login……hope you like it!
cheers
Tony
Just purchased the 7 day trial of The Best Spinner only to find out it is for PCs. Â I’m on a Mac. Â Any ideas?
Sorry to put this here but I ran out of options: Â I submitted a couple support tickets but was not given a ticket ID number online or through an automated email. Â I can’t log back in to check my responses without the ID number. Â Help?
When I tried to submit this note on support page, it told me that I’d reached my limit for open support tickets….  One is requesting that I be added to the FA Facebook Member page.  I’m very excited to be a part of that and am eagerly anticipating the valuable dialog with others like myself.
Thanks for all you do and for a bit of help here.
Allen