"It's Too Hard to Make Money Online" ::: NO KIDDING! With every click of the mouse there's another "expert" beckoning me to download his/her pdf, throwing up an annoying pop-up screen screaming at me to subscribe - sending me another email thanking me for visiting. ENOUGH!

A month or more ago I ran across a relatively new blog that had more than 40 amazing comments. What was so amazing about these comments? Commenters included:

Mavis Nong from Online Business Tools

Kristi Hines from Blog Marketing

Stacy from Blog Tips

Janet from The Natural Networker

Devesh from Twitter Marketing

Marlon from productivity bits

Obviously, this blogger was doing something RIGHT! A "right" collection of comments, from all the "right" people, including some of the hottest bloggers of 2011! How was this accomplished? the blogger stopped by one of the blogs that these other bloggers were featured on, leaving a comment there, and in some cases asking that blogger to return the visit and check out a particular post. It worked like faery dust! (before YOU try anything like that, you'd better make sure you've posted a quality kick-ass article. This is one of those things you only get ONE chance at!)

Onto "too many visitors" - I have "too many" on this very blog! I briefly discuss the problem here.

Does Your Blog Have Too Many Comments or Too Many Visitors? (How to cope!)

Help cbs2 Find New York’s MVBs.

Calling all foodie, sport and mommy blogs! CBS is looking for the best

and brightest bloggers in New York to compete for the title of

Most Valuable Blogger in each of six different categories:

• Dining/Entertainment
• Sports
• Lifestyle

• Local Affairs
• Health/Fitness/Medical
• Everything Else

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Nominate the best bloggers in your community, as many blogs as you’d like. They can be your own, a friend’s, or just one you think deserves the title of New York’s Most Valuable Blogger.
2. Vote for MVBs in each category from August 16 – September 9. You can vote once in each category per day.
3. Come back and see who won. We’ll tally the votes and award a $50 Amazon Gift Card to each category’s winner. In addition, we’ll choose one editor’s choice winner per category for another Amazon Gift Card. Feel free to check out the rules for details.

New York’s Most Valuable Blogger Awards 2011

To All You 'Aggregator Haters' Out There

Splitting hairs regarding journalistic ethics aside, readers familiar with HuffPo and many other blogs (including mine) have come to expect that they will encounter active aggregating every now and then. I've had brushes with those who would accuse me of "over-aggregating" - and I've had to address the issue - even though regular readers have come to recognize it is something I do (in some instances just to save a lot of time, not at all for 'SEO').

Aggregating, when done properly (see Global Voices) provides a valuable collective portal of information. LAweekly comes to the defense of suspended HuffPo blogger Amy Lee, taking aggregation by its horns and showing it for what it is: "...a staple in blogland. Love it or hate it. Let's debate it by saying it's a prominent model and we all do it..." The following has been "aggregated" from New York Magazine:

Earlier this week Simon Dumenco published a column in Advertising Age griping that, for all Arianna's promises that she drives traffic to outside sites, the Huffington Post actually takes ideas and hands out few page views in exchange. His example was a column of his own, which was liberally quoted and minimally linked by HuffPo. In the end, the massive "traffic-driver" sent only 57 page views his way. It was an egregious but not uncommon example of the site's aggregation philosophy, on the far end of a sliding scale that often tries and succeeds in proper attribution. (Some of our posts get big bumps from a HuffPo link. Others don't.) In response to Dumenco's column, HuffPo's executive business editor, Peter Goodman, profusely apologized and suspended the young blogger who had "over-aggregated." (Read the complete NYmag article)

TechMeme founder Gabe Rivera is irked that the term “aggregator” is being misapplied ::: he argues that the Huffington Post is not an aggregator --- What irked me was the reminder that “aggregator” is a rather broad-brush term that paints systematic news-rewriters like the Huffington Post (who bury links) as cousins to snippet-quoting sites like Techmeme and Mediagazer (which link prominently). Dumenco’s piece, whose subtitle begins with “The Blog Queen Defends HerAggregation Practices” also cites Bill Keller’s famous column from earlier this year, entitled “All the Aggregation That’s Fit toAggregate“, which goes as far as coyly utilizing the term “aggregate” repeatedly as a euphemism for “steal”.

You may also enjoy:::

Successful aggregation

and here's a snippet of a "post from the past" :::

To All You 'Aggregator Haters' Out There

A bit of misplaced criticism has come to my attention: a statement that this humble weblog "publishes pages and pages of information that may be found elsewhere on the world-wide web but provides no added value to it." Here's another: "You ape what others write and publish through your unstoppable cut and paste routine."

To those above allegations from windbag Windy, I answer:

My blogging work includes, but is not limited to, reporting and editing in the traditional way, as well as aggregating information from a variety of sources, sorting and presenting the data to make it understandable.

Those who would criticize me for "cut and paste" would do well to look at their own blogs and tweets to search for occurrences of fleeting instances of originality.


Tags: aggregator, Huffington Post



Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and Dave Lucas are properly cited. Permission to reprint any comments below is granted only for those comments written by Dave Lucas and staff.

Aggregation Aggravation

BlogLab ::: eXperiment FAIL

"The mechanics of search engines and emergence of trends are changing the quality of googles." ~ J. Felonious Fisch

What?

Search engines like google are powered by algorithms that have been refined to a point of near pseudo-self-awareness.

Earlier this year the title I gave to a particular post atracted search engines (and visitors) like flies: "Paris Hilton Sex Arab Britney Nude Charlie Sheen Photo Video Shakira Hot Free Hareega Bush Libya Man Men Girl Teen Obama Osama Sexxx XXX Nokia TV Bin" - it was done intentionally, experimentally, after I'd seen a similar headline on another blog. I tethered it to a post about traffic and my dear internet friends Windy and Lainy.

And it worked like a charm. I got 7X the usual daily traffic for nearly 4 days in a row before it trickled off.

Fast forward to THIS WEEK. I chanced upon an article all about tinkering with searches, search engines, social networks and SEO. Before proceeding, read "Experiments on Google+ and Twitter Influencing Search Rankings"

A very interesting article, yes?

Inspired by that article, I constructed a new post, entitled "Assist a Mom Euclidean Taeniasis of Galapagos Portly Domesticus Connochaetes mta Elizabeth Smart Shuttle Launch Rupert Murdoch Euclidean Perry Euxlis".

Now, based on what you've seen so far, you'd think my new post would be an SEO "Slam dunk". It was not. It attacted ZERO search engine-directed traffic!Here's my analysis:

New algorithms recently put into service are pouring through topics, headlines and keywoprds faster than mice through a sack of grain. By the time I published MY experimental post, the terms seomoz used in its experiment had decayed in importance and relevance to such degree as they no longer mattered.

The "curve of deterioration" was short for my first post, and my second, experimental post could best be compared to a horse race: there was a race on Tuesday, I entered my horse, but me and my horse didn't show up athe track until Thursday. We ran in record time! We beat everybody. But we missed the actual race, so "nothing counts."

MORAL: You're going to have to get up awfully early (or be extremely lucky) to impress the search engines!

Good Luck, and BLOG ON!

ANOTHER HEAD-SCRATCHER ::: I've seen a lot of 'contest posts' where blogs encourage bloggers (and others) to win a cash prize by essentially making the visitors jump thru hoops in competition for the prize. So, I decided to offer my own unique contest. I decided to give USD $100 away to one lucky player. But there's been no 'buzz' and ZERO search-engine traffic. And although the URL is high-ranked on one of the stat-widgets appearing in the right-hand column on this humble weblog, I haven't seen one single instance of anyone arriving on the blog from another URL to that particular post. Frankly, I'm PUZZLED!

Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and Dave Lucas are properly cited. Permission to reprint any comments below is granted only for those comments written by Dave Lucas and staff.

Google Doesn't Love Me Anymore

Blogging With No Crutches ::: A lot of long-time bloggers (Steve Rubel immediately comes to mind) have been embarking on quests to set their blogs and blogging habits free. Or I Gues what they really want is to remain popular but not tethered to their blogs as they are now, a la ball-and-chain.

The One Minute Blogger (WordPress) comes close to what I'd like to achieve. My experimental blog on the tumblr platform even more so.

Which of the "top three" - Blogger, WordPress or tumblr, do you think has the best chance of being deleted or taken down? Comments are open for your remarks.

Let's take a brief look at Entrecard ::: I see a lot of people dropping out or criticizing the EC program. You shouldn't rush to eliminate your EC or adgitize widget. Take a look at your visitor statistics. Here is a screenshot of mine from June. Of the "returning visitors" approx. HALF swooped in and out dropping on my ec widget. No worries there! (Of course on days when my advert is being displayed across some of the more popular blogs in the EC system, like for example, Seek No More or The Ad Master, those numbers can shoot up into triple digits!)
Stop, Go, Blog! ::: Protect your blog from litigation (and attract a bigger following) by providing original content!

I realize that we bloggers cannot always 100% of the time do that.

TIP ::: Using Images: do not use copyrighted images without the permission of the author. Thumbnails, however, tend to be considered “fair use” under the Copyright Law.

Many bloggers copy images and text around the Internet thinking that in the worst of the cases they will receive a take down notice from the author and remove the material from the website. The removal of the copyrighted material will not remove the copyright infringement at all. Should the author decide to go after you in count you will be in trouble all the same. [1]

Not all bloggers are aware of the fact that they do not own the comments that are posted on their blogs. Once a person publishes a comment on your blog he or she will be the copyright holder of it. You can solve this issue by having a “Terms of Service” section on your blog. [2]

BE VERY CAREFUL when commenters leave whole articles or lyrics to poular songs on your blog! while the people commenting on your blog will retain the ownership of the content you might still be liable if they commit intellectual property violations.

In June 2011, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approved S. 978, a bill that would expand the scope of felony criminal copyright infringement under federal law. While the legislation enjoys broad congressional support, a number of bloggers have slammed the bill on the grounds that it would allegedly impose criminal liability on lots of innocent U.S. Internet users.

Bblogger Luke Pelican answers a few “Frequently Asked Questions” about the legislation — and explains how he monitors infringement of his own online content, as well as how he advises clients to do the same.

Of course, content thieves in places like Malaysia and India will continue stealing and scraping --- or will they? Word's out Google will suspend adsense and cripple PR of any Malaysian blog guilty of content theft!

CAUTION! DANGER! ::: http://righthavenvictims.blogspot.com/

This is interesting. Righthaven going after people who used an image in a parody or criticism. Parody has a long history and numerous court precedences that put it square in the realm of not only fair use but free speech especially in the realm of political speech. Righthaven owns the copyright to an image of a TS agent touching the junk of a passenger. A website owner used this image to criticize the TSA’s handling of airport screeners.

Righthaven has to know this and will surely lose in court but again they are not about fighting the merits of any case but to get settlements.

It is interesting also that the Denver Post’s website where the photo can still be viewed it says nothing about Righthaven being the copyright owner, infact Denver Post still claims copyright. Sounds like there is some deception here. I would leave a link but I will not link to the Denver Post.

WIRED.COM ::: Righthaven Loss: Judge Rules Reposting Entire Article Is Fair Use

john_sealander John Sealander

A few things we're learned by being online for 16 years...http://vltb.com/4ba07078?30419

Righthaven vs. The Blogosphere

It's on! Battle for control of the interverse!

Stargate TV-show fans know that as Teal'c has told the Jaffa many times that the Goa'uld may be powerful but they are NOT gods, I will tell you bloggers that Darren Rowse and Steve Ruebel may be a-list respected bloggers, but they also are NOT gods.

You hear about it whenever Rowse and Ruebel are right about something, but it gets "forgotten" when thay are not (anybody remember "lifestreaming" which was going to replace blogging? hahahahaa!)

Why Lifestream? To Model Leonardo Da Vinci - Steve Rubel

www.steverubel.com/why-lifestream-to-model-leonardo-da-vinci - Cached

Jun 26, 2009 – There have been a number of posts since I wrote yesterday that I am quitting blogging in favor of lifestreaming. A few of you wrote in ...

And who can forget that groundbreaker, Google BUZZ?

Google Buzz: We Might Be On To Something

www.dailyblogtips.com/google-buzz/ - Cached

Feb 11, 2010 – To illustrate my point: I received a Google Wave invite early on from a friend,... Darren Rowse also posted a similar post on Problogger. ...

Now, in July 2011, everybody's suddenly an expert on Google +1! It's amazing! They're spilling out of the woodwork! (there's also a lot of confusion about the Google+1 button and the Google facebook alternative. Are they one and the same? Related? Totally different? What is YOUR understanding of that? Care to leav it in comments, please?)

I was moved to comment on one of these "Google expert" articles. I wrote (see image above) that bloggers shouldn't act like lemmings and walk off digital cliffs on the say-so of Rowse or Rubel.

Here's a new knee-slapper for ya! Rubel now thinks TWITTER should be SCARED!

He bloggeth thus: "Social media networks have typically have one of two lineages - not both. They either first catch on with teens and twenty-somethings or they catch on with nerds (of which I count myself as one). Eventually there’s overlap.

Group A Graduates (Youth) Friendster, MySpace, Facebook and now Tumblr I would argue

Group B Graduates (Geeks) Blogs, Twitter, Friendfeed (RIP) and now Google+ I would say

I am seeing a lot of the same patterns here as when Twitter took off at SxSW several years ago. Except this time it’s much faster! Media, brands and celebs are jumping in. And, by it’s nature, Google+ can be a much more public network than Facebook will ever be."

"The bigger they are, the harder they FAIL."



Tags: problogger, Micro Persuasion



Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and Dave Lucas are properly cited. Permission to reprint any comments below is granted only for those comments written by Dave Lucas and staff.

Google Vs. Facebook Vs. Twitter

Big Brother 13 premieres tonight (July 7) on CBS
Did you know that those so-called "scraper" blogs could actually be your friends? And those fake twitter followers too?

Hello! Thanks for dropping by! How on earth did YOU arrive HERE? Can you tell me by leaving a message in my "comments" area below?

You may have noticed that I am running a few experiments here on this humble weblog. Here is one. The fascination with these experiments has temporarily sidetracked my blog redesign plans. And the I wonder if I should really bother with a re-design at all, considering... ah yes, considering WHAT, you ask? Well, that "WHAT" is something I am not willing to share right at this moment.

COMING SOON: a contest where you could win $100!

Assist a Mom Euclidean Taeniasis of Galapagos Portly Domesticus Connochaetes mta Elizabeth Smart Shuttle Launch Rupert Murdoch Euclidean Perry Euxlis

...and the bloggers are correct! Heck even GOOGLE agrees!



The guru bloggers have been quiet lately. Maybe they've been counting the money they made selling their latest PDF's and eBooks!

I've told you that I've been considering a new template - and I came THIS CLOSE to activating it this week - but I'm holding off - something whispering in my ear "not yet".

Meanwhile, the latest "blogger buzz" (and battle cry) seems to be "LESS IS MORE" ---, minimalists would definitely agree!

Brankica posts that cry of "LESS IS MORE" right out of the gate in an article on weblogbetter.com ::: "For those of you that have been reading my blog for awhile, I guess you may have noticed that I am removing social buttons left and right. There are also some numbers displayed and some hidden.

Brankica goes on to discuss what one should display on one's blog when it comes down to numbers of followers, subscribers, alexa rank, etc. To which I commented "Numbers mean nothing. You can buy 2000 twitter followers on fiverr for $5 – you can buy subcribers to your blog and purchase ‘hits” as well. There are A-list blogs that have 0 page rank. There are crappy scraper blogs that are autogenerated with PR5 and “5000″ subscribers!

I don’t display too much in the way of twitter and very little facebook information. I have a personal cap of 300 I follow on twitter. My facebook is my business. I do have some google connect numbers displaying, but I feel those are kinda sketchy, and they’ll probably be gone when I redesign the blog.

I have a bunch of sharing buttons on my blog. I keep them there just in case someone wants to use one of them. They rarely do, but WHEN they do, I get beaucoup visitors!

As for alexa: there are so many conflicting stories about it! I think I might still have the widget (or at least a link to alexa) on my blog.

I use 3 different sitemeter services PLUS the google/blogspot one that now comes with the platform. None of them ever agree. There was a day in May one hitcounter racked up 212 visits for the entire day, while google showed 1,511 “unique’ visits! Did you know that if someone is reading your blog via Google Reader that visitor is never counted? (Except maybe by Google – is that where those higher numbers come in?)
I think that there is a fashion rule that we can and should apply to blogging – Less Is More (most of the time)."

Hasan of MarketingTheInternet posted "Lessons Copywriters Can Take from Charlie Chaplin" on blog.2createawebsite.com ::: "Make sure your blog or website’s template is clean, simple and visible. The template of your blog or website should not be complex with too many graphics and pictures. It should easily be able to load on all a web browsers." - to which I commented - "The latest trend appears to be 'less is more' so your article is right on track!" - and it absolutely IS on track. I recommend you study the article!

Bloggers Say "Less is more!"

Blogger Frank Dickinson put up a post entitled Three Social Media Mistakes And How To Fix Them... If you don't want to read the entire post, here are a few fine points, along with my comments.

FRANK: If you would not want someone coming to your “hub” and throwing up their feet on your coffee table and acting like ol’ asshole Uncle Ernie – why would you go to another bloggers’ hub and act the same way?

Blog commenting (which some have mainstreamed as blog hopping) is all about being social (yep – more on that in a sec) with your fellow blogger neighbors. It is about contributing, enhancing, developing.

It is not about taking, promoting and getting all jiggy with your wants and desires.

Do I enter my website when I leave a comment? Do I use CommentLuv when it is available on a blog?

Yes – you bet your ass I do."

ME: I don't need to use cusswords to say I will comment on a blog whether it has comment luv or not. I will comment on a blog if it doesn't display my link.

FRANK: We are all tempted to join up with the newest wizz bang phenomenon that is ready to take Social Media by storm. The newest craze comes on like a hot chick in a short skirt and lasts about as long as Aunt Gertrude in her flannel PJ’s. But, by god, we are going to join it!

Every time you do that you contribute to your Goggle (SP) paper trail.

ME : I don't think people pay all that much attention to the "paper trail" as you describe it! I joined twitter and facebook when they were brand spankin' new and forgot all about 'em - until the day they were 'hot" and I went to sign up and found I already had an account WITH THE EXACT NAME I WANTED! Rejoice!

FRANK: Social Media is about being social. It is about relationships, engagement and interaction. It is all about being a real person in a real way with other real people and their real life concerns, desires, needs and dreams.

Let me just say it straight out – if you cannot have a decent, respectful, engaging conversation with your next door neighbor and then translate that over to Social Media – heaven help you.

We don’t “do” Social Media as bloggers. We are a part of a HUGE community and we should treat each other like community members.

ME : The Blog neighborhood is not a Communist "Utopia" - just as disagreements in real life are part of analog life, they appear in digital life as well! You gotta deal with it, baby!







Tags: Social Medai Tips, Social Networking Tips



Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and Dave Lucas are properly cited. Permission to reprint any comments below is granted only for those comments written by Dave Lucas and staff.

Three Social Media Tips (Highlighted in RED)