Blogging For Humanity: My Most Important Post
The Truth
Wouldn’t it be great if the top bloggers were all the types of people that helped people, fed hungry children and represented things deserving of respect? Unfortunately they are not. It seems that making money is all that matters to 95% of them. Blogging is a powerful tool and it is sad to see those in charge take advantage of the most reliable marketing strategy known. That is greed.
In order for those in blogging who want to benefit humanity to ACTUALLY GET IT DONE, you need to listen to what I am saying. Sure you can write all day, but without stripping power away from those money hungry people who run the blogosphere, it cannot happen. Besides, if a rich blogger gives money to help people, it is just to improve public relations and image.
What You Can Do To Change The Power Balance
Blogging is very unique and Different from anything else. It’s not just about writing, making money, making friends, building linkage or gaining popularity.
Lets get into something that may upset you as a blogger. This is about the reality of how things really work. Google is the biggest and most powerful search engine. Google is also the most unethical corporation in the world today. Do you disagree? Google tells us that to be relevant as a blogger, it is not recommended to link to low ranking blogs.
They want you to link to high ranking blogs only. That should clear things up for you. If it doesn’t, perhaps you are a greedy, self righteous sheep like most of the other money bloggers who want to be just like the ones on top who help perpetuate this cycle.
First and foremost, the number one thing you can do is never link to the super high ranked blogs. Don’t advertise on them and never respond to their silver tongued tricks to lure you in. Stick to where the real power is, the mass public of people who you can be friends with. If we do that, we will take the power and put it to much more important uses than making money for our own vanity and greed.
Ask Yourself What Is Important
I want all of you to answer my questions here. Let me know how you feel.
Here’s the situation. You have just gained a page rank of 5. All of a sudden, a rich A-list blogger starts paying attention to you. They aren’t your friend and you know it. They want to be your friend and promote you. Now you have the chance to make some real money. We will call this blogger, Blogger-X.
Blogger-X is rich and powerful with a sports car header on his blog. He now likes you and here’s your big chance. WHAT WOULD YOU DO? Please let me know what you would do.
To make money, a lot of bloggers pay for services and advisers. You adviser tells you that by deleting all outgoing links on your blogroll and all links to low ranked blogs, you can triple your money making chances. WOULD YOU DO IT?
What I Would Do
I would completely ignore Blogger-X. I wouldn’t say thank you because I am not his friend. I will not be someone’s friend for money. If I received an incoming link from Blogger-X, I would redirect it away from my blog and back at him. If Blogger-X took the time to really get to know me (through several months), then maybe I could start believing that he was more than just a greedy blogging “professional“.
On the 2nd question, I would tell my adviser I was in no way interested. It’s as simple as that. Blogger-X is no more important than you or I. However, when facing a shot at making a lot of money, most of us will sell out. Would you sell out? How much do you want to benefit humanity? This article will be continued in part 2.
Read this related post from Nafasg entitled: Technology Brings People Together
Related Posts
Comments
61 Responses to “Blogging For Humanity: My Most Important Post”
Leave a Reply
Comment Count
Get your Badge!
-
Subscribe!
Hi Bobby,
I could sense how strongly you feel against these A-Listers just by reading this post.
The questions that you have put across to your audience are, to me, rhetorical. I am not sure if some of those “snobbish” sites that totally ignored my comments are considered A-Listed. One thing I do know, such are totally feelingless sites even as they blog about helping you to succeed in life or whatever topics of self-development.
I do agree with you on the second question that when faced with a lot of money, most would sell out. It is very easy for me to say “No, I will never do it.”. But that’s because my blog is now even less than mediocre!
One thing I do know for sure is that, one need not sell one’s conscience for the sake of success or any material gain. If one sincerely values the relationship that has been established and has a sincere wish to do good for others, he would naturally know how to write a blog that both earns money and yet not lose that personal touch.
There are doctors, lawyers, businessmen that I know, that are earning big bucks but yet can relate to you on a common platform. No airs at all. I believe a real and successful blogger should be able to do the same.
My humble views!
WaterLearner: The point is, if we do not strip the power away from these people, the incredible things blogging could be used for will never happen. It is possible. This is not some crazy pipe dream. I know for a fact if this accomplished, we could stamp out world hunger and prevent wars. I am here to do just that!
This is a huge sore spot for me because I hate what google has done to the web and the completely biased hierarchy it’s created. If they had any ethics what so ever they would have hidden the ability to see PR from users so that there would be a more even playing field and people would be forced to care about the actual CONTENT of another site and how it relates to your own rather than PR.
PR is a joke. There are so many ways to boost PR through blackhat methods and have high ranking pages with little traffic because all the backlinks are manufactured. Google tells us that it’s better to get a link from a page with high PR and no traffic than a page with decent traffic and a lower PR rating and gullible people actually buy it. That’s what’s so insane!
Dawn: I agree 100%. PR should have been secret. The secret would have been sold to the highest black market bidders though. It’s the average bloggers fault. I see new bloggers all the time who start off writing about and linking to these people. People who do their blogs like this are a disease and it makes me sick.
That’s why I created the generic Blogger-X, to simply avoid linking to any of them. Should I start the anti blogger-x movement? You have a sharp eye! I knew that the 1st time I met you!!!!!
It depends on why they suddenly want to link to me and are they asking for a return link. I do not just link to someone because they linked to me. I am trying to be ethical about it all and I do not participate in these link exchanges. I want to really support and like the people I have on my blogroll.
Definitely I would not get rid of my blogroll just because an advertiser asked me to and suggested I would make more money.
However, money does make the world go round. And it does pay the rent. So I would like to earn some, but I would like to earn it in what I consider to be a respectable way.
cardiogirl, low tops optional
Cardiogirl: I think if I had a PR of 5 or better, new folks would be coming out of the woodwork. I would ignore them all and make friends the same way I do now! I want to make money so I can help humanity, I have enough money to eat already!
Hola Bobby, if Blogger-X wants me to join him, he has to love my blog enough to accept it the way it is. Don wanna lose my identity or my buddies for sure. Without them, I won’t feel the support and that is what gives me the will and desire to continue blogging. Thank you friends!
Genie Princess
Genie Princess: Beautifully said!!! That’s right! You and my my many blogging friends are what makes me smile. I couldn’t enjoy any success without all of you! I was thinking and I need to say it. You, Genie Princess have been there for me through thick and thin. You are truly great! Thank you and all my great blogging buddies!
Genie Princess
Genie Princess: You sure know how to make me feel better! You are welcome and I am here for and everyone too! Thanks for making my day so much better!
Hi Bobby, you have been tagged by Santa?s Community Blog in a Collective Christmas Meme. Hope you can find a way to participate!
-Jos:)
http://santasmailbox.blogspot.com/2007/10/santas-community-christmas-meme.html
Hi Bobby, PR is not that important, friends are. So if I were in the situation you mentioned, I won’t adjust my current links for the sake of higher PR or for some advertisers who told me too. Blogger X would not be in my list too because having his/her link will definitely be unrelated. I’m looking to link to normal bloggers who blogs about their life (of course it’s ok if they do PPP once in a while coz I, too, am doing PPP).
I’ve had PR3 when I started blogging and right before I changed to wordpress and made new friends, my PR was 4. I was able to witness it for few days only. After adding more friends, links and involved in memes, I was penalised and the PR went down to PR2. That doesn’t matter because, instead, I’ve met great new friends who faithfully read my blog, see my art and tagged me for fun memes! That is all that matters to me!
Emila: I believe your pagerank will be 5 when they do the next update. Google only updates PR a few times per year. I am here to help change PR and the way it works. Mine was PR3 before I moved to wordpress but I’m confident it should be good coming up.
I really don’t hate the top bloggers. However, with so many people exclusively doing as Google asks, PR will remain one of the most important ranks. By having an attitude like yours (and mine) we are basically ignoring Google. This is what we should be doing. If more and more people do the same thing, we can change the whole system for the better!
I personally think you are a great blogger and if I ran things, you would be more famous than Oprah Winfrey…Yay Emila!!!!!
Shocker that you’ve written another unbelievable post Bobby. haha
Before I started to write my response I had a million and one things to say, but I think WaterLearner may have said most of them for me.
I mean, you bring up a lot of stuff that’s true and that I agree with - But I’m not sure that I agree with 100% of what you say about the A-List bloggers. Personally, I don’t know any of them personally. So I guess I’m not really in a position to say anything about them in regards to how charitable they are or are not with their money/blogging income.
To that end, with ppl who make so much money it’s always something to think about in that - Right now if I’m making 100K, me and my family could undoubtedly live comfortably. If I was making 1M, I could easily live comfortably and SHOULD have a bunch of money that I could just throw around but will I? I dunno…Will I just give 900K away that I’ve allegedly worked hard to make? Probably not. Well then why not 450K if it will make the world better? I hope if I ever found myself in that position I would do that. But perhaps I would turn it towards my family, my parents, my grandkids and make sure everyone was taken care of for generations to come. Is that wrong? I don’t know.
And also on this front, I heard that ppl have a hard time giving money to help a group of people. Like say someone asked me to help ONE person…Apparently I’d be more apt to do that than give an amount of money for say starving children in Africa because we as ppl have a hard time visualizing that. *shrugs* Just some food for thought.
Finally on the tip about relationships, I hear what you’re saying about not being able to trust everyone who approaches you when you start to “blow up”. And then there’s the point about tossing out all your links and (maybe) starting to charge for all your links.
I just don’t know. You bring up a lot of GREAT points about blogging ethics that is really making me take a pause for the cause.
Take it easy Bobby!
Bush Mackel: I am playing devil’s advocate as I do so often. I don’t agree with myself 100% either…LOL!!!The point is that is the mass public of bloggers stopped linking to the big blogs, it would force a change for the better. Basically what Google is doing is FORCING AND ENFORCING GREED. I say ignore pagerank and think of it as insignificant. SEO is a money tactic. If non-money blogs used seo and keyword tactics it will throw Google a curveball so wide it would completely disrupt the entire system.The big blogs are like 1% of all bloggers. I say no to them. I don’t hate these guys and gals at all. What would be even more effective is if ProBlogger gave out 1000 links a day to PR-0 sites only and so did all the others like him, it would change things. I am just throwing out something to think about!Of course it isn’t wrong to keep money for your family. If you were making say 150K per year blogging, you would be forced to never link to any low ranked blogs as you of course would lose that paycheck and that wouldn’t be smart. The answer is changing the algorithm by forcing the change. We as bloggers control things, not Google. However, we dot exercise our power. We have to sacrifice to gain! That is my dream and I believe I can help it happen. Thanks Bush!
Bobby, I wouldn’t sell my soul for any amount of money. I believe you can do both, like you’re always saying. Making friends and making money at the same time is possible. If one of the ‘big guys’ starts paying me attention and it’s only to use me it wouldn’t take me long to figure that out and decide to cut ties. It’s not worth the stress.
If I’m advised to delete links from lower ranking blogs, I would say absolutely not! For me it’s more than just money and people can tell a phony when they read one.
There are truly great people and bloggers in this world who have pure hearts and intentions and are spilling over in success. I’m sure they didn’t get there by stepping on and using others.
I’m learning Bobby, keep talking
Lisa C: I would. My current price is 750 billion dollars. The first person to pull up in front of my house with a fleet of Wells-Fargo trucks will get my signature…LOL! What bothers me is that if you did make a lot of money and earned it right, you WOULD LOSE IT unless you adhered to the Google Greed Standard or G.S.S. (ha ha ha)!
Would that not be terrible? Take care of your family or trash your blogging friends, what a horrible choice to make! That’s why they seriously need to change some things. Of course the entire world and the whole of humanity need to change things too. What a crazy world we live in! Thanks for engaging in this most excellent discussion!
Some people forget that it’s not black and white when it comes to blogging. Just because a person has a long blogroll and participates in memes does not mean his blog will never “make it” or that the blog is unprofessional.
You can make it while doing both sides. Go ahead and apply good SEO techniques, target search engine traffic, and market your blog. At the same time, participate in memes you like, do link love posts to give other blogs a chance to be discovered, and expand your family by connecting with other bloggers and surfers on a deeper level.
What should be changed is the perception that if a blog does a meme, has low PR, has a long blogroll, it’s worth nothing.
If you happen to be one of the lucky ones that have “made it”, don’t forget that you started out with nothing but a few posts and a lot of dreams. These low traffic, undiscovered blogs are another side of you. They are you, you are them.
There’s enough for everyone. Don’t push them down, give them a ladder to get up. At the end of the day, your worth is judged by the person you are, not the person you pretend to be.
Whew, that was the longest comment I’ve ever written. I need a glass of water
Brown Baron:You are absolutely right. The perception of what makes a pro versus what makes one an non-pro needs to change. Memes and awards posts actually can make a blog seem less professional if they are overdone. There have been times where I was tagged 20+ times in a day! There is no way I can do that. I cannot write 3 awards posts per week either.
I don’t even tell people they were tagged. It makes no difference whether they do it or not. I will however at a minimum, go thank them for the award. I have received a lot of awards. I need to do a post and I am behind. Just thinking about it, I have no idea who gave me one last month!
Some folks may read this and think, “I won’t give him one, he is overwhelmed.” Not true. It comes with experience. I stay indifferent to feeling guilty and always say thanks. Meme’s are a rite of passage and we all go from no tags to endless tags. Some people stop visiting like I purposefully ignored their tag if I don’t respond. You can’t do them all. I can only do one “8 facts meme”, I can’t do 47!!!!! You know exactly what I mean!
LOL! That’s blogging. I like my friends the same no matter what. I will save the good stuff for part 2. It will not be what anyone expects, I assure you! Thanks Brown Baron! I need some water now! LOL…BTW, I am so glad you participate anytime a good discussion starts up here. If I can get you typing away on a great comment, then I feel like I’ve accomplished something. As always, Thank you BB!!!!!
Hi Bobby,
Another good post. This article is somehow related to our article on Don?t Get Yourself ?Stabbed At The Back?.
I will link the post to it. http://nafasg.blogspot.com/2007/10/dont-get-yourself-stabbed-at-back.html
Its up to individuals how they are able to determine it. I am sure that there are people agreeing to my statement that earning cash online is part and parcel of blogging.
Some of us place advertisements, referrals and writing paid reviews, etc, in their blogs as long as they can generate income for themselves.
Of course, not to be a millionare, you can use the money earned to pay off the hosting and domain fees just like your wonderful site here, Bobby. As for NAFA, we shared the money earned among us and donate some to charities as we are using Blogspot for FREE!
Answering to your first question, in my honest opinion, i would refer it as an opportunity knocking on your door because there is nothing to lose here. Even you do not know Blogger X from Adams, try to negotiate your way to an acceptable term.
If you take a look at a bigger picture, it is a win win situation.
Blogger X gets your ?friendship? in whatever he perceives it while you earn that ?promotion? doing nothing.
You don?t have to substantially do anything that is against your wishes. You don?t have to do what you do not want to do.
On to the next question, I will agree with you on this, Bobby. As long as NAFA team is concerned, we will never SELL OUT our friends or listening to all of this loads of trash advice.
Our team, made up of friends back in the university for 10 years now, so we know what friendship is all about, staying through thick and thin together. Our bonds are getting stronger each day, thus the birth of our blog.
You dont have to wait for these self proclaimed advice from these advisors to approach you to remove links cause we have already experience with bloggers among the blogging community who remove your links and badges.
An example, i would like to highlight, recently we have started a campaign on community service to help people in need. It started off when Sandy email to us to look for her best friend, giving us the idea to start a campaign to help others, followed by an email from Shinade, looking for her long lost sister.
We DO NOT KNOW THESE LADIES!
We are from Singapore and they reside in the US but we feel it is our responsibility ( humanity, you mention, my friend
) to help people.
Thus, we make an effort, spending some time writing an article, then seek help from bloggers in our community. All we ask for is to simply copy the article and we even link back to those who join in the search just in case they care so much about their Technorati rankings.
Sadly, there are bloggers who completely ignore our messages and our call and pretend nothing had happened. In my opionion, these people are worst off than the Blogger X. We must always remain vigilant and identify those who are our true friends.
How do you define this, Bobby? ( Friends In The Blogging Community ?)
Another good post Bobby.
Keep up the great work!
Looking forward to the part 2 of this article
Nafa: Wow! I really love the way you say things. You have provided me and all our readers with a fresh and extremely unique point of view. My goal in this article is to take a stance simply to incite a great discussion we can all learn from.
I didn’t publish one of your posts and I will now. I was thinking about that the other day. It takes me a little while to get to know what someone, or in your case, a group of people are really about. I know the Nafa team much better now and to be honest with you, I am grateful for it.
As far as friends go here, I really try to take my time getting to know each one individually and build a solid relationship and trust. Not everyone will be my friend but I will stay loyal to friends who have made an effort like I have with them. I consider the Nafa team to be honest, filled with integrity and also very giving and sharing of love.
I stand beside you Nafa. I sincerely mean that from the bottom of my heart. The Nafa team is irresistible and you know how to treat everyone in the best way. Like I told the Brown Baron, I can’t say much more as part 2 will be worth reading.
Thank you Nafa for participating and I am your friend and plan to stay your friend!!!!! Have a great day and I will be by a little later!
Sorry for the double post, but I forgot to say, thanks Bobby. One of my favorite posts. Stumbled.
Brown Baron: Thank you!
You surely help inspire me on every post I write. 
If I were in this situation, I just might ignore Blogger-X or say I only exchange links with friends. I don’t think I would have to elaborate. No, means no.
Rolando: Ah…the simplistic approach. I just don’t like it when a woman tells me “no!” Usually what will happen to someone, is out of the blue, an A-lister will write a post about upcoming, super smart, rising stars. And then you’ll hear about it maybe from someone else. That’s how they get you! That’s when the ignoring should start!
Hi Bob, it’ll be great if we can create a level playing field if there’s such a thing as the “blogging proletariat” to make it happen. But it’s gonna be one hell of a job to see it through. No, I’m not of faint heart, but there’s a constant flow of new bloggers coming on and you guess it, most of them will gravitate towards those so-called A-listers sitting on their high horse. Despite all this, we should stick to what we believe and carry on regardless. As for Google PageRank, it always reminds me of a dictatorship where only an elitist group lord it over the rest. “All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.” George Orwell wrote that in Animal Farm. PageRank, as mentioned by Dawn, is a joke with their mantra about authority blogs, quality content, and so on so you can get a good ranking. Has anyone ever seen some blogs that leave a lot to be desired and yet they have PR4-5? Has anyone seen a high profile blogger writes one or two paragraphs of inconsequential ramblings and gets a swarm of comments? And how about those blogs that brag about the amount that they are raking in? And if we don’t perform like them we’re noobs! I understand your feeling. I don’t know what’s down the road, and you never know unless you keep moving on.
Markk: Indeed something has to be done and soon. Most people that don’t blog or who are new to it, have absolutely no idea how unbelievably HUGE it is. There are billions to be earned, great authors to be discovered and brilliant minds with revolutionary ideas to be shared. It is truly mind boggling when you think about the magnitude of bloggings impact on the web.
Blogging has taken over the internet, that’s all there is to it. That being said, Google has the responsibility to do something. It’s worse than life when it comes to a hierarchal structure of classes. You have the successful, and you have the rest of everyone else. The successful are a small group and the rest are over 100 million. That is insane.
Like I say, greed is the most reliable marketing strategy of all. I saw all these things within my first week doing this. With discussions like this one, spreading the truth, we can and will change it. Thanks Markk, this particular discussion has been very beneficial and I am listening intently to each one of these great commentators. Have a great week!
This is interesting stuff Bobby! Believe it or not I don’t spend a lot time thinking about how Google works etc. But I do blog to earn money.
I link to who I want, do what I want, I never check someone’s pagerank or rankings before I link to them, and I never would. I wouldn’t change for anyone, hey I’m a poet, I do my own thing.
The only thing I don’t agree on is boycotting the Problogger’s. First of all every person is an individual, and I wouldn’t want to judge someone wrongly. If you like their blog link, if you don’t like it don’t. The whole worshiping of the A-Lister’s need to stop, that’s for sure.
I think by focusing on the A-Lister’s you are directing your energy in the wrong direction. I think we’d be better off just forming a massive group and trying to raise money for charities, etc. You are completely right about blogger selfishness. When you have a chance to make a difference in the world you should use it to help others.
If we could all get together and think of some ingenious plan of how to use blogging to help children or others in need that would be fantastic.
Great post as always Bobby! You make everyone stop and think!
Hugs, Christy
Hi Christy! I really don’t think there’s anything wrong with linking to an A-list blog either. I said that to create a good discussion! Like you said, it’s when all these people start blogs and follow Google’s plan for success. In most cases they are only assuring themselves of failure.
If I see a post from an A-list blog that inspires me to write a post, I will link to it and backtrack (if they allow backtracks). It’s all about why you linked that counts. We as the collective whole are the ones that truly have it within our power to literally change the world as we know it in ways most couldn’t imagine.
I like haw the Brown Baron said that the perception of a professional should be changed. Put yourself in this position:
You are making $5,000.00 per month. To prevent yourself from losing that income you will have to delete outgoing links to low ranked blogs. It happens every day. Paychecks disappear. Of course if you are making that much through affiliate marketing your goal is to keep from losing it and maybe make more. Google knows that and that is how the famous 12 year old algorithm is designed.
That is what I want changed. As long as tons of people link like crazy to the big blogs, it won’t change, it will only get worse. You and I, and most of the bloggers we are friends with are a new breed. We are smart, savvy and generous. That alone gives me hope that we are changing things one post at a time.
You blog for money, and that is great. You also really participate in the community and personally know a ton of bloggers. You do memes and you place friendship high on your list. That’s why I like you and what you are about. Thanks for a meaningful comment and as always, I love it when you come by!!!!! Thanks Christy!
Hi Bobby,
This is a most interesting post! To be honest, I never know who you’re referring to when you say “A-list bloggers”, though recently I did run across one with a sports car and I ran away pretty quickly. wasn’t my speed.
As you probably know, on late night tv comes all of the ads for ways you can “get rich quick”, could be online auctions, real estate, you name it. Lots of ways with “little effort” - ha! Blogging is like that to a certain degree, to be honest the thing that gave me the push to start blogging was an article that was on AOL that named ten bloggers that are making “beaucoup bucks” blogging. Wow! Is that all there is to it? Just typing away for a short period of time a day? That’s for me!
I know that is probably the motivation for most newbies, make some money, preferably a lot of money- easily. To that extent Bobby, we newbies are rather alike I think. Certainly there are the exceptions, but I would hazard a guess that folks don’t start blogging with altruistic intentions.
I think where the newbie blogger starts to lose the stars in their eyes is when they go to a blog where the blogger may be pulling down the cash (or says they are) and they comment, and there’s no reply, or they ask a question and get an answer that doesn’t help them or they get a whiff of something that isn’t quite right and they think: “Hey, wait a minute!”
When the newbie blogger is told they can’t have fun with memes, they can’t write about whatever they like but must give their audience (which they don’t have yet) quality “content”, and basically told they can’t be themselves, that’s when they start to rethink.
Some will get with the program, emulate their idols, and start down the road to “A-list” blogging, some will discontinue blogging realizing that it’s not a “get rich quick” scheme, and some will stick around and find their own way, and because there’s no mistakes in the universe they’ll be led to someone who will help them, respond to their comments and tag them on a meme
I would guess that these dilemmas are either at your door or on your horizon Bobby and I believe you know exactly what you’ll do.
My life experiences have taught me that I can very easily say what I’ll do, when no one is asking me to do it.
So I can’t say what I’ll do when “A-list blogger” comes to call. I’d like to think that since I had to make my own way without old A-list’s help before that I won’t be swayed by his sweet talk. We will see.
I’m with Brown Baron, this is the longest comment I’ve ever written, I need some water too!
Menopauseprincess: It’s so easy for a new blogger to start into it and become caught up into all the hype. When a new blogger sees how much can actually be made, they start listening to and modeling themselves after their heroes. They are like a bunch of teens dressing up like their favourite sports star!
If I ever make a ton of money from doing this, it will be from my book. Now that I understand what pagerank is all about, I almost don’t want any. It’s insane the way they want you to do things. The truth is, you want 1 way incoming links from any and all blogs. Your outgoing links should only be to high ranking blogs!
It’s like getting a 1000 Christmas presents but only giving out presents to the people who bought you expensive ones. Could you imagine if thats how Christmas was? It’s a common theme in life. It’s like when a rich movie star goes into a restaurant and the owner says,”On the house for rich movie stars like you!”
Why doesn’t that owner give free food to poor people? The rich movie star doesn’t need a free meal!!!!!! Thanks MP! Go get some water, I’ll have a glass with you!!!!!
I’ll tag you from WGM when I get that post up!!!!!!
Hey Bobby!
Its good to be back and read your wonderful posts again. Thanx for such a powerful post as usual. The past few days, my google ads aren’t displayed anymore, even though the code is there on my page. I don’t know how its happening and am trying to rectify it, except I can’t remember which email I used for my Adsense account. lolz. I don’t think I violated any Adsense policy with my content, and I never click on my own links. lolz. I wasn’t even online this past one month.
Anyway, its really good to read your posts again. I too wouldn’t wanna link to such big shots, just for the sake of linking. I now link only Mizo bloggers on my blog (who are just a handful) because my list of non-Mizo blogger friends have become really really huge, and you know how it is, adding one and not adding the other is bad netiquette etc. Hence I bookmark all my blog friends at bloglines instead.
I have indeed received many requests from people I don’t know, asking me to link them since they linked me. I am extremely grateful for those links but politely tell them I don’t link because of my policy. Plus, my blog is article-based, with issues on culture, society, racism, politics etc and occasional humorous posts, hence I don’t do tags/memes either. It is just a couple of people like you, Marzie, Janice (the whole gang) who understands this “strange” peculiarity of mine and still remain a friend. The others just disappear from my radar because they know they are not going to gain anything from me. The ones that remain like you guys, are the ones that are truly worth treasuring.
Sandman: Hi Sandman! It is great to hear from you!!! I ran into the same thing with adsense back before they cancelled my account for life! When you do get it rectified, make sure you write it down!
Now that I really understand Google’s pagerank system, I have no plans on doing anything but helping to change the system as I find it to be ridiculous. I bloglines also! It’s fast and powerful. I think bloglines is the best program of it’s kind. People do take offense when you don’t link back. I see it happen all the time.
You do however, engage in meaningful commentary with us and that’s why we all like you! I appreciate it when you come by as you always leave a memorable comment. So, when are you going to put out a book? You really should! Thanks Sandman, it’s great to have you back!
hi, bobby! u & I know that we wont delete any of these links just to tripled up our money. If Blogger-X insisted that i must do that, then I am sorry. Sayonara to Blogger-X.
I am interested in making money thru blogging, but my friends are more important to me. I need their support to keep me going. Without them, I am nothing! Without you, I wont be where I am now! Thanks, Bobby!
Jean:Well, you know what? ALL of the big blogs do not have links to low ranking sites. I guess that means that I will never be big. You have my kind of attitude! That’s why I like you so much!
Hey Bobby, I am really enjoying the discussion here! I have a comment for something Brown Baron posted though. He wrote:
“If you happen to be one of the lucky ones that have ?made it?, don?t forget that you started out with nothing but a few posts and a lot of dreams. These low traffic, undiscovered blogs are another side of you. They are you, you are them.
There?s enough for everyone. Don?t push them down, give them a ladder to get up. At the end of the day, your worth is judged by the person you are, not the person you pretend to be.”
The truth is, that the top bloggers don’t want other blogs to succeed. They want to keep the competition to a minimum and saw the legs off of every blogger’s ladder that is up and coming. It’s only when a they know that a blog is going to make it that they will concede and try to find a way to capitalize off of that other person’s blog if they can.
Dawn: Thanks, I’ll let BB know! He’ll probably see it before I do. You are right in a way. Another view is that once you start getting a gigantic paycheck, it would be difficult to purposefully lose it. It would be like a star athlete only playing in the games they chose to, thus losing their position and million dollar salary. Isn’t that crazy? I think it is.
Hi Bobby,
Interesting article and a nice debate going on too. I have a blog which has a PR5, but I will also say that it is not monetized in any way. My links have come through other bloggers that I have got to know and trust and vice versa, reasonable post quality, use of specific keywords etc.
I’ve linked to relevant and irrelevant blogs. As for Mr X…he can just drive off into the sunset as I have no intention of changing my ways, I’m quite happy providing free programs, security tools etc etc 
Google is starting to acknowledge the power of blogs with its Google Blog search (Beta).
Google likes to dictate the terms, I couldn’t give a stuff
PS: I?m also just mooching around visiting all those tagged with Santa?s Christmas Meme and ensuring that they are added to my Technorati Fav?s along the way
Have a great week
Colin
Colin: I have come to the conclusion that in order to make any substantial amount of money, you really do have to sell out! I think the highest paid bloggers shouldn’t be called bloggers and should be thought of as sites instead. I have learned that I do not care about Google at all and hope another upcoming search engine dethrones them. I have to delete over 300 technorati faves in order to add a new one. Technorati only allows you to have 200. Thats odd as I have well over 300 yet actually only selected 140!!!!
Thanks so much!
You are an asshole
@Shlomo Parker: You are a truly intelligent schlomo!
Jean: Yummy! Yay…dinner at jeans!
Great discussion all around. Except for one randomly umm nevermind haha.
For Dawn: What you said is unfortunately true for a lot of the biggies. I hope everyone here makes it to change the name of the game. That would be a great day indeed.
What’s funny is that we’re the majority minority haha.
Brown Baron: Ha ha ha…the majority minority!!! LOL! You got me on that one. I almost forgot to tell you in regards to what you said about not forgetting your friends if you make it big. If I can’t have my friends and keep my friends, I don’t want to make it.
I may one day start another site after I learn a lot more. I will do it under a pen name and use a cartoon character icon. I will have all comments turned off and hire an undercover hacker to secretly publish my greed filled posts…LOL!!!
Bobby, I don’t think I could sell out. However, I’m not sure what would happen if the chance came up. My medications cost a lot of money. So does school. I’d like to think that there is no way I would do something so horrible. The only problem is that I don’t know my living/medical situation when Blogger-X is approaching me. If I’m down to my last dime and I need my medicine, I might do it. I’d hate myself for it.
What I like to imagine is that I would say “no way” and then slam my metaphorical blog door in Blogger-X’s face. Honestly, I don’t know if I would recognize an A-List Blogger. I don’t know a lot about blog politics yet. I’ve only been in the blogosphere for less than two months. I don’t think I’ve ever run into a big-time blogger.
I like my blogging buddies. I know all sorts of great people. I’ve noticed that we all have varying numbers of readers. I think you, Joanne, and Rolando have the most readers out of all of my friends. I understand why. All three of you have great blog material (not saying that my other blogging friends don’t). That is why I always come back. I assume that is why other readers come back too.
Sorry I’m not wise to the way the blogosphere works yet. I learn a little more every day. If some creey, extremely rich, and shady blogger ever tries to talk to me (which probably won’t happen) I will be sure to ask you about him/her.
Thanks for this post Bobby! I liked the question and I feel like I learned a lot!
@Erina: It really doesn’t happen quite this way. When I started, I knew nothing about it. I see how it all works and I have changed what my initial goals were. Like many people, I would like to make money. I now see there are the money bloggers and the normal bloggers
When a normal blogger decides they want to make money, they conform to the system and become like Blogger-X. Blogger-X is more of a metaphor for the system, not an individual. When a blogger get attention from the big money blogs, this blogger will become heavily influenced into following the way others make money.
With blogging being so unique, I believe a normal blogger can make money and not conform to Google or any of the low standards most big money bloggers have. I offend people when I write these posts. I have no money bloggers reading anything I write. They aren’t interested..
With an A-list blog, people read them to learn how to be just like them. This being the case, I want to be one because I am unlike all of them. It would be impossible for me to conform. I have never conformed my whole life and don’t intend to start. I like my friends too much!!!!! Thanks so much Erina! It does take time to learn about how things really work. Most personal bloggers don’t want to know. I hope I can help spark at least a little interest.
Bobby, if Google is the problem than why not change the Balance of Power by a Blogger Boycott of Google and ask everyone to use Yahoo? I hope you don’t mind my little levity.
On a serious note, I thought blogging was about sharing our interests and meeting new friends around the globe!
@Debbie Dolphin: I have thought the same thing. No matter what I say or do, no large amount of people will do that. I would be banned from Google if I did and that would completely ruin my chances of having any kind of impact at all.
Blogging could help prevent wars and bring the world closer to true peace. However, people aren’t interested. They simply want to write their blogs and have buddies. That’s great, but I have a higher calling I wish sometimes I didn’t have. I noticed they have done some things on blog catalog to help. It is not enough. It takes money and people to change things. Most people prefer to complain about things but are unwilling to do anything.
Making new friends around the globe is a start! That is the backbone of everything I do. I sincerely thank you for taking the time to come here and leave a short and very meaningful comment! Thanks Debbie!!!
I don’t think the term “blog” should not apply to a money generating site. I would call that a billboard. As far as getting rid of links, I have them there to find my friends, BIG and small. Blogger X can put some ads on my garage.
Eric ?Speedcat?: It is and it won’t change. My goal is to convince anyone who will listen to take a stand for what could be done! With all the things wrong in this world and over 100 million bloggers, there is a lot that could be done! How much would you charge Blogger-X for that great spot on your garage? LOL!!!!!
Omg, I never knew why I missed your site. Everytime see your avatar on Jan’s site and never came over, but I am here now
It’s a wonderful post. I want to earn money on the blog, but I have not earned any so I hope I won’t sell out when the time comes,haha..
Your blog has style and attitude. Keep it up
@Mr fong: Hi Mr. Fong!!!!! Jan is one of the sweetest ladies I know!Thank you so much for the compliment. Any friend of Janice is a friend of mine. It is a pleasure to meet you!
[...] awhile and this one came about in the way they usually do. I was writing up a link to his article - Blogging for Humanity: My Most Important Post and discovered that this blog deserved more than a paragraph of link love. Also, as my readers, I [...]
[...] when I met Hummer-X (the name is an homage to Bobby?s ?Blogger-X?). Hummer-X must have been in a serious hurry to get to campus. Strangely, that hurry must not [...]
Wow. Semi heavy post and crazy long discussion! I’ve always seen your smilin face on plenty of other blog widgets, Bobby, but I picked one heckuva post to introduce myself to your site! I really like the topic and the honest and open back and forth dialogue here.
I haven’t read through everyone’s comments yet, but I have to say that if an A-list blogger approached me and wanted to be my friend and promote me, why would I stop him? If he commented on my blog, I’d treat him like everyone else, I’d reply. And I’d go check out his blog in return, and if I liked what I saw, I’d comment there too. I don’t see why I can’t treat A-list bloggers just like B or C-List ones. (No offense to the Ds). If you’re putting this to extremes though, and saying I MUST remove all links to lower-tiered blogs, and heavily promote this A-list blogger in return for his acceptance/promotion, then sure I agree. I’d pretty much ignore him.
Andrew: Thanks for coming by Andrew! I have left 100’s of meaningful comments on just about every big blog. I have yet to receive a single reply on any of them. When they come here, they take one glance and leave never to return! I get so irritated about that!!
Out of the million bloggers out there, I can say that perhaps more than half of them blog and write not to make money out of it, but to have an outlet for creativity and ideas. And not many of these bloggers know (or care) about their page ranks, but rather, on how many readers they get. Nevertheless, this is still a great advice.
Rachel: There are not a million bloggers. There are way over 100 million bloggers. I’d say 85% don’t blog for money. However, the 85% sit around letting the minority run the show!!!!! I had to remove the link to your blog because it is a medical suppy house and I link to blogs not companies.
Hey Bobby…
Thanks a lot for mentioning us in your post, and the link to our post. Let us work together and make our blogs bring people together as one.
NAFA’s last blog post..Effective Parenting To Ensure Child Safety
You are welcome! What a beautiful plan!!! I love it