My favorite podcast just finished their final, what they refer to as ordinary episode: LUG Radio . The podcast is hosted by four British blokes (Jono Bacon, Stuart Langridge, Chris Procter, and Adam Sweet) who admittedly swear and joke a lot but also discuss Linux and other open source related topics with very refreshing insights. That's all over now of course. They bailed out. Don't they say that only all good things come to an end? (wink,wink,smile) In that final episode they were discussing whether - in their own words - "Pundits should fuck off". Their definition of a pundit is someone who writes or talks authoritatively about subjects without actually being an authority on that subject. In short: someone who pontificates. Listen to the episode yourself if you want to know what they concluded. One interesting question that came out of this discussion was whether good bloggers are just good at articulating things and not necessarily knowledgable about the subjects they write about. Now I might be venturing on very thin ice here, but I actually like to write about subjects that fascinate me. And I am always fascinated by the things I don't fully understand yet, but am trying to understand. So my blogs are often thoughts that I am saying out loud, hoping I can spark some thoughts in other people's heads too. Does that make me a pundit? I'll leave that up to you (be gentle...). Last week, Eiso Kant posted an entry on his blog with the inviting title: "Is blogging dead?". His point is that "blogs are often no longer about the integrity of the content but the number of backlinks it receives, the number of page views and how high it ranks in Google". I admit, these things matter much to me too, but you actually need to write about someting that is valued by others to achieve all that. That's the beauty of Web 2.0! The thing that triggered me most was a response by Eiso on a comment to this blog entry, where he wrote: "I have been at the head of a project where we hired article writers to populate blogs. When we paid them we didn’t ask for great articles, neither were we looking for the best writers, we were looking for cheap keyword rich content." So if I am understanding correctly, you can rent a ranter for populating blogs. These people actually get paid to provide mediocre content. I have tried www.rent-a-ranter.com but it doesn't exist yet. So here's your chance!
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I couldn't agree more with you, writing value is what achieves the real backlines and trackbacks. Like I am flattered you quoted me in your post. Online advertising though has become a billion dollar business and the quick traffic sollution from Google gives a higher payout then returning visitors.
Let me elaborate; when you write quality content, build a loyal reader base and receive mentions around the blogosphere you will have things like backlinks, comments, pageviews and Google rankings. However these are visitors that stay a long time on your site, they read your content and will return. They are not really enclined to click through on any advertisements you put on. As it is your blog you also want to hold some kind of reputation so you don't make the ads obnixously vissible. I have moved to his platform, writing quality and building a relationship with my readers, it's what I prefer but it will take along time before I can say "I can live of this".
Now on the 'darkside' - content optimized to rank high in Google in specific high traffic niches. A website where the ads come first and the content second. The average users stay on your site for 10 seconds, you have a bounce rate of 99% and an avertisement click through rate (CTR) of above 15%. Now imagine having a content writer who you pay $5 per 500 words. I can tell you the investment is made back in no time. If you're interested more in article writers, look at sites like forums.digitalpoint.com and elance.com you can hire them there however rent-a-ranter.com sounds like a much better name ;-). I personally have moved on to building real value and am working on a search engine which will bring real value to the first result and not this type of content.
I look forward to reading more of your posts. I was surprised to see CapG had a blog.
Eiso Kant
p.s. That will be 3 dollars and 23 cents please
Let me elaborate; when you write quality content, build a loyal reader base and receive mentions around the blogosphere you will have things like backlinks, comments, pageviews and Google rankings. However these are visitors that stay a long time on your site, they read your content and will return. They are not really enclined to click through on any advertisements you put on. As it is your blog you also want to hold some kind of reputation so you don't make the ads obnixously vissible. I have moved to his platform, writing quality and building a relationship with my readers, it's what I prefer but it will take along time before I can say "I can live of this".
Now on the 'darkside' - content optimized to rank high in Google in specific high traffic niches. A website where the ads come first and the content second. The average users stay on your site for 10 seconds, you have a bounce rate of 99% and an avertisement click through rate (CTR) of above 15%. Now imagine having a content writer who you pay $5 per 500 words. I can tell you the investment is made back in no time. If you're interested more in article writers, look at sites like forums.digitalpoint.com and elance.com you can hire them there however rent-a-ranter.com sounds like a much better name ;-). I personally have moved on to building real value and am working on a search engine which will bring real value to the first result and not this type of content.
I look forward to reading more of your posts. I was surprised to see CapG had a blog.
Eiso Kant
p.s. That will be 3 dollars and 23 cents please
@eiso: very interesting statistics. The web is a funny place. Keep us posted on twitter about your search engine.
And by the way, I have royally paid you in "wacks" (web acknowledgements), which is a virtual currency that you can use to boost your authority.
And by the way, I have royally paid you in "wacks" (web acknowledgements), which is a virtual currency that you can use to boost your authority.
This discussion about mediocre versus good content is not only about blogging but about user generated content (UGC). And more than that it is about very nature of internet which makes anybody a publisher. When there are no gatekeepers , editors or so called truth seekers to qualify what is good content and what is not, this was bound to happen. But genie is out of bottle now. The word is not with the Gods anymore.
rent a ranter is already happening..look at instablogs.com . They are a blog network in guise of citizen journalism. They pay to mostly college kids to pick up stories from net and convert them into blog posts in various categories.
rent a ranter is already happening..look at instablogs.com . They are a blog network in guise of citizen journalism. They pay to mostly college kids to pick up stories from net and convert them into blog posts in various categories.
