Scrapebox Ping Mode...Ref Spam or Actual Pinging?

I've heard a lot of differing opinions on this subject.

I just got Scrapebox, and am enjoying it's awesome powers

But, I was wondering, what exactly does the Ping Mode do?

Does it simply ref spam like PRStorm?

Or does it actually ping sites?

The ping mode from what I've read is referral spam.

The "rapid indexer" (addon) is for the pinging of your sites.

Can someone explain what actually happens when a site is pinged?

I use ScrapeBox to ping as well, but I am not sure what is actually happening.

First, I set the list of pages I want to ping. I use a list of all of the pages that somehow send link-juice to my site, and my site itself. Let's call this my Sites_To_Ping_List.

Should I always ping all of the sites in my Sites_To_Ping_List, or only new pages and pages that were updated?


For referrers, I currently use sites like:
google.com
yahoo.com
bing.com
ezinearticles.com
facebook.com
cnn.com
gather.com
newblog.com
foxnews.com
abcnews.com


What exactly is the referrer used for and do the sites I choose as the referrer make a ping more or less valuable -- or are all referrers equal when it comes to pinging (i.e., a ping is a ping no matter who the referrer is).


I have the $2.99/mon service from Pingler dot com. I gave it a list of sites to ping. It pings them every three days. I don't know how many pings it does or who the referrer is.



Can I replace my Pingler dot com service by using ScrapeBox to ping?

How often should I ping my Sites_To_Ping_List? (Daily, Every other day, Weekly, etc.)

Should I use different referrers each time I ping?

If I ping a site 100 times using the same referrer, is it any different than pinging it 100 times, each with a different referrer