Life Lesson #22

Open tonic water and soda water bottles very, very slowly.

I have no explanation for why these products are so highly carbonated, but you will take a shower if you twist the cap straight off. Ah, just open them over the sink to be safe.

Strange, I don’t feel funny.

I feel as though a decision is coming. Continue at Associated Content or just use this blog or set up my own site. Help me weigh the pros and cons, would you?

Pro AC: It’s a much wider audience. It comes with a “built in” readership and has 40k+ members that will potentially be exposed to my work.

Con AC: It seems that as the membership grows the average mentally shrinks. It has turned into a pay-to-blog site only without one important component, pay. If you want page views write fluff for no money. If you want money, write “how to” and “product reviews” that will slip away to obscurity. Those really aren’t my writing strengths.

Pro AC: For all its faults and bugs, I like the site and concept. And maybe it’s the help desk analyst in me, but until lately, I enjoyed the forums. Answering questions and interacting with fun people was a nice diversion.

Con AC: Lately the forums have become a pain. It seems like everyone has a chip on their shoulder. No one has a sense of humor. People have started playing childish games like creating fake accounts just to stir up trouble and hash out questions that have been addressed 100 times. I’ve seen it before on other sites. It is the harbinger of doom.

Pro AC: Most of the people there are good folks. I’ve met and keep up with some good writers and sharp minds.

Con AC: Nothing says I can’t still keep up with those folks from a far. For some reason the level of writing is on the decline. There are so many pop-topic pieces being published that it’s like reading People or The Star. I’m just waiting for something like the Bat Boy series to pop up as an Editor’s Pick. I guess that sells, but it sure doesn’t pay.

I recently posed a question to AC’s forum “moderator” that went unanswered. “If AC pays me that’s a win-win. If AC doesn’t offer me money, why not just set up my own site and reap the AdSense revenue?” However small, it would be more than AC offered.

More and more it looks like if you don’t produce articles that will get 10k+ hits per month, AC doesn’t care if you stay or go. The problem is they don’t pay for the kind of topics that will garner 10k+ hits.

I just submitted an interview with a little-known band. Then I find out that AC is offering prime dollars for exactly what I already submitted. I wonder where they got the idea to run a special offer for local bands? Now instead of being a stand-out article, it’s going to look like I jumped on the special-offer band wagon. Timing is everything.

Donna was just saying “Internet drama is so 1998!” Boy did she hit the nail on the head. I’m getting too old for this. I guess that’s why nice guys always finish last. The trouble is, I really am a nice guy. I guess that doesn’t come across the wire.

So how do you feel about it? To AC or not to AC? That is the question.

Annoying and Dangerous Driving Habits

Annoying and Dangerous Driving Habits
A soon-to-be-released study by a major think-tank explains why people are bad drivers and how dangerous they really are. Maybe you fit in one of these categories. Are you one? Read the rest. It’s the best »

Cold Sunshine

It was a hard, cold morning and once my hands could touch the steering wheel, the drive to work worked out just fine. Despite the cold, the sky was clear and the sun reigned down. No visor for me today.

Having the sun on my face was exactly what was needed. I didn’t care that I had to squint. The days are getting longer. The rays are getting stronger. I’m just grateful to look up and absorb them. Sometimes you just have to turn your face to the sun, close your eyes, and drink it in.

Goodbye Bernice

You loved without expectation. You gave without thought of return. Matriarch. Mother. Grandmother. Great-grandmother. Woman of compassion. Woman of strength. Child of God.

My wife called me just after I got to work this morning. She said simply, “I hear the angels singing.” She needed to say nothing more. I knew the song was a welcome for her grandmother.

For the last few days, her failing heart had deprived her brain of oxygen and cause a mild delirium. This tiny, 92 year old woman was calling for her mother like a child in pain. Her mother heard her child’s cries and came for her about 9am this morning. Peacefully showing her the way home to her true Father.

The tears begin, but thankfully, the song remains.

Life Lesson #58

I have a finite amount of time to deal with your sorry ass so get to the point.

Life Lesson #1

You are never too poor to buy the good toilet paper.

Even if you just keep an emergency pack in the closest for the day you get a stomach flu, you’ll thank me for this advice.

Associated Content Makes Good on Its Promise

After months of promises, AC finally installed the Beta version of their page reporter. Sounds like a simple web site feature, but since it was a retro-fit, an after-thought so to speak, for AC, it took a while. Members, AKA Content Producers, now have access to the page view count of their individual articles. Until now, they’ve only had a nebulous “clout” indicator. Clout was defined as the combined page views of all a CP’s articles with a little bonus thrown in for quantity. Clout was never a very accurate measure of what was really being read.

With each article broken out, it is easier for a CP to see what is getting hit and what has the potential to garner higher monetary offers from AC. Several factors come into play when analyzing page views.

1. Longevity: If an article has been floating around on the web for a while and it has a good, focused, searchable title/content, it’s going to have a very high PV.

2. Popularity: Whether it’s the topic or the CP, popularity is a key factor. Pop-topics are going to get high PV then peter out. CP with a following are going to get decent PV on most of their articles regardless. After all, we all have our favorite authors. It works the same in the book store. Stumped for something to buy? Buy who you like.

3. Promotion: If an article gets picked up by a blogger or other web site, it’s going to drive hits. I’ve seen this effect personally and can testify that my articles that were tagged by other sites have significantly higher PV than my other stock.

So now the big reveal. Which of my articles has the highest page views? No surprise to me, it’s My Top 8 Reasons for Hating MySpace. Published in Oct 2006, it still receives hysterical comments to this day. It’s a popular topic. It’s easily searchable. It’s gotten some decent promotion. My only regret is that I gave it to AC for free. DOAH! But the trade-off is, AC has paid me for articles that received less than 1/5th the views.

The best part of this story is that AC may have taken their own sweet time making this change, but end the end, they made good on their promise. They may be slow, but they’re consistent.

I envy iPod toting slothful hippie punks

I really love music. I have a ton of vinyl (yes I’m that old) which is impossible to carry around. I’ve got a few CDs, but just haven’t kept up to speed on buying the latest. I ripped everything I own onto my computer which is handy but the speakers, like all laptop speakers, suck.

I sat down tonight to make a first pass at a new CD that a friend sent me to review. I slapped it in the laptop and my wife said, “Do you have headphones because I’m going to bed.” Well turns out I do have some headphones. Who knew? I sat down did a little work and then the CD ended.

The ripped library was staring me in the face. I picked a few favorites and started poking around my neglected play list…through headphones!

This made me realize three things:
1. The sound was great in these headphones.
2. You can’t dance with a laptop. (No. It wasn’t pretty. Thanks for asking.)
3. I now envy all the slackers walking around with iPods and such.

Having the ability to plug Queens of the Stone Age in to my head when work gets me blurry eyed would be a great coffee substitute. Plugging Trouble Hubble into my brain while my boss bitches at me for something I didn’t do would be the ultimate. The Ramones could really change my computer code. I’m not sure if for the better, but it would have an impact.

I need more music in my life. Someone once said, “Life is what happens while the music plays.” Maybe it was just a commercial I remember, but it is true. Without music pulsing in my ears, I tend to make my own. Believe me no one wants that!

Life Lesson #77

When buying peanut butter crackers from a vending machine always have the foresight to purchase a beverage.