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tazI have been following some interesting conversation on Queen of Spain and that led me to Single Mom Seeking, and of course I left a comment yesterday on Jessica Knows, and deep down I feel like we are all missing the point.

The point being….why do we care what someone else thinks about what we do with our blog.

Really.

Think about it.

It’s deep. I’ll wait.

We spend a lot of time analyzing if someone knows, cares, or discloses a review and if its paid. We are ALL freaking bloggers. We know damn WELL people are getting free products. Come on. Even the newest, 4 week old blogger is trying to get her hand in the pot of some free products. Its no big national secret. My neighbor didn’t stop by and tell me she bought a stroller that turned out terrible from a blog she read.

A BLOGGER is reading BLOGGER reviews.

You can’t tell me that you went to a site today of a blogger and read about  great brownies and really thought they were not sent to that blogger for free. If your that naive, puhleese just get the hell off the Internet. Did you think Beyonce really used that box of hair color in her bathroom with the little plastic gloves too?

Every blogger in the world could have some page on their site that breaks their policies down and it’s not like people are searching for it before they read.  “Ho Hum, where is the review policy? I can’t read this until I know…la la la. They don’t HAVE ONE? HOLY SHIT. I’M NOT READING THIS CRAPPY BLOG NOW! YOUR OPINION IS WORTHLESS YOU FAKER!!!”

Do you know how many emails I get a day where people ask me to be listed on our site? If someone took two seconds to look around the site for that, they would find the listing information and it doesn’t even go to MY EMAIL.

Every time I get an email from it, I know they didn’t even LOOK. It makes me want to delete them for being that lame. So what makes people think that some fancy disclosure on your site is any different?

PEOPLE ARE LAZY.

The real issue here is that people like to bitch. They like to complain and drag names through the mud for fun. And when they are not dragging names, they are dragging *hints* of names. Why not? It’s easy traffic. It’s great internet! I talk about you, doing what I deem immoral and people come and pat me on the back that I am so right, I get an ego trip, they tell more people, those people come, the people I am talking about get mad and talk to their friends who come to see what I have put out and by the end of the day I have run my banner ads so high that all of you have paid me $50 to talk shit all day.

I love America.

Do I wake up and give a crap if Jessica got a car for a year for buttering up Ford? Hell no. I think she is smart as hell for that. Do I think it sounds cheesy to talk about a car. OK, Yes. But would I do it for a free car? Let me think. Yes. Do I care if you care that I did it? No offense, but not really.

I love y’all, but I would love me driving around in a free car more.Would you stop coming here if you found out that I got one? Probably not.

You didn’t stop coming here when I got a free trip to Washington, D.C. this weekend. In fact, you probably didn’t even think twice about it.  My idea is to make myself so interesting that when I do cheesy, only for me things, you forgive me because I am giving you back something that makes you still want to be here. Hear that Ford, Disney, Lexus……SEND ME SOMETHING. MY AUDIENCE WILL GET OVER IT.

And if they don’t? Trust me, I’ll get over it.

Oh, and let’s chat about the women who stress the hell over putting up ads on their sidebars and even worse, the commenters that COMPLAIN about it. Complain about some ads?  On the Internet? Have you been to any site on the internet lately? My freaking EMAIL has ads in the sidebars.

Listen, I put up ads here. You can see them. Do me a favor and click on them sometimes so I can get paid more for the 1 penny an hour I get paid now. I encourage more bloggers to put ads in their sidebars and stop enslaving themselves to work for free.

If you own a blog you already know how time consuming it is. I have 4 conference calls this week. Probably 15 more articles that have to be published, a blog party we are running every day in May, and I have emails I have yet to answer from 5 days ago. So if someone is going to begrudge me finding a way to compensate myself for that work, you can go get a job at McDonalds and ask them to not pay you for 10 months. In fact, ask McDonalds  to give you free fries as compensation! But be careful to not tell ANYONE you like the fries or you will need to disclose that.

I am worth a lot of money an hour. A Lot. More than I will ever make sitting on this blog. Which should show you that I don’t do it for the money. I know bloggers worth a lot an hour that sit behind a computer and run their blogs and give out free advice, knowledge, and skills all day, every day. I know people worth $100 in hour and feel guilty charging me $5 for their work.

Hey..you. STOP FEELING GUILTY. Figure out what you’re worth and START CHARGING FOR IT .

I think bloggers should unionize.

I have paid my dues. I may be a “new” blogger compared to some bloggers, but I have been in this Internet game for over 10 years.  I was signing posters for the Navy through my website when I was 20 years old.I owned and ran a celebrity website through college, I had my own online community that helped models find photographers, I had a forum account on every major forum community before WebMd had its footing, and I have been building websites and attracting stalkers before I was married.

I have given up about every free amount of advice and help I could muster up over the years and I am just damn tired.

I am TIRED.

So I don’t give a flying two cents if someone knows I got this awesome (and it is) new Sansa ipod thing here loaded with 1000 songs on it so I can rock out with my socks out (you didn’t think I was gonna say THAT did you) and I certainly don’t give a flying two cents if you know I am getting paid for the ads on my sidebars.

The way I think is we spend WAAAAAAAAY too much time analyzing who is getting paid for what and who is doing what online and not enough time worrying about ourselves. If you have time to get up in a tizzy cause your favorite blogger threw an ad on their sidebar, you’re a moron. If you don’t realize a blogger is getting a free product, you’re a moron.

Go read a book or something.

And those of you caring about what other people think about you doing it?

STOP.

Stop giving a crap what other people think. They teach you that in like 8th grade. Or 5th grade. Or when your 3 and someone tells you they wont be your B.F.F. anymore. Put up an ad. Charge for reviews. Open a webcam and strip for a living. I don’t give a crap.

If you are happy and feel complete and true to what YOU are doing, its between you, the IRS, and God. Or Allah. Or Sand people.

Right?
Right.

~Trisha

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