I realize that we are all "friends," if we are anything at all.
But you are risking becoming a frienemy of mine if:
1. I get more than 1 blogwhoring email per day.
2. You are blogwhoring me and we are not even aquainted. Aquainted means that I have made a comment in your blog or you have commented in mine. If I have never heard of you and you are blogwhoring my way, you are just spamming me. So stop that. I should not have to ask you directly, so your cute little "take me off if you like!" comment puts the onness on me to do the work for filtering your filthy whoring. That is your job.
3. You whore yourself but do not include a link that I can at least just cut and paste into my browser. If it is just your name and no link, I will not seek it out. So if you are going to be a whore, be a quality whore.
4. Regarding being a quality whore, don't send me a whore-link unless it is actually a "very special episode" of your blog. If I have friended you, I will see your new posts in my blog right hand feed. I read it two or three times a day, and so I will see it. Really.
5. If the only email I ever receive from you is blogwhoring. If you have never made a personal direct email to me about something between just the two of us, or unless we have had a significant conversation in comments, I am not one of your "actual friends" and I probably do not care to receive a mass whore-mail.
Consider that these admonitions would probably work for you from your end as well and so assuage your potentially hurt feelings with the knowledge that I am not asking for unreasonable things and that this is not personal. it is just an issue of seeing the "Yay, I got mail!" number in my inbox and then seeing that I do not really have mail, just some sloppy seconds of a whoretastic utterance.
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
fingerlakeswanderer
zanelle
Are You Talking French?
Greer McVay
bluestocking babe
Brent Troth
Salon.com
Comments
(man...I read this right after I send the only blog whore post I will ever send...)
Thanks for this.
Shhhh. I don't want her to hear me.
I am making a resolution to quit........I wonder if they make a special chewing gum for that.
Seriously..you make good points.
Rated. Nice one!
Rated.
bonus points for excellent graphic.
seasons greetins, Priddy.
I salute you! :D
Pawed!
But seriously, I have lots of real, actual friends here and I really don't mind the whoring. I like to hear from everyone and have gone to some cool posts from whore-links.
I just want some real mail mixed in with the whore-mail. I am friending all of you and ou have my official permission to include me on your lists, but keep it reasonable, eh!
I found the graphic at the credited .com. I am trying to be better about borrowing unattributed graphics. From now on, or at least until I am in an internet graphic frenzy again, all pics on this blog are either mine or I will say where I found them.
Quality whoring rulz!
I have yet to figure how to do a group email -- is it possible to send your whole friends list an email? If you receive mail from me, it is because I think you are interested in that particular subject matter. So, don't feel spammed by me -- feel loved...that goes for you, too, E! :)
Lisa
Love the blatant honesty on here. You have guts and moxie (sp?)
Keep doin' what you do.
-Heidi Fleiss
My guess is that you're generally not in danger of this Elizabeth. : )
I appreciate your consistency in saying what you think and no less.
Love the graphic. But color warnings do not provide service to the blind, nor the colorblind. I suggest an auditory system, so you could hear a warning like this: Today Homeland Security chief Jertoff announced that the security level has been raised from 'Oh My God' to 'Eeeeyah!' ;>)
The only true way to blog-whore with dignity is to be sincere. Also, remove those that never respond, this is a pretty clear indication that they aren't interested or you aren't interesting. Trust me, I should know this.
Great post e - rated for subtleness
good post. i wrote one this morning as well making a little fun of all this blogwhoring.:) there are ways of getting attention other than sending emails out or photos of your ass. :) i gave some tips on how to do this.
do not worry, you will never get an email from me. :)
peace,
mary
It is the stern potter teacher voice that made this harsh, wasn't it?
Come on now. I do read many of the whorified blogposts...just not so many as I am getting. So I actually appreciate the popularity implied by my plight...
Maybe I shouldn't have said anything? Nah...a little scolding is good for the whore...
I've read every post on the subject of blog whoring and take notes to benefit my continuing education. I plead for leniency from the court for my discretions have always been unintentional.
Perhaps if you had added a pic of a hot ceramic teacher sitting at the wheel in nothing but thigh boots, then yeah it would have been a bit harsh . . . LOL
All it takes, as Dr. Amy suggested, is the support of each other on sites like Reddit and Digg. Of course this suggestion only pertains to those of you who'd like to have thousands of readers to write for each day (like I have on my site), rather than just writing for each other all the time, and stressing about how hard it is to get attention from the very small number of people currently browsing OS.
I have had "fame" within my very niche area of life, a tv show, 10's of thousands of students, national recognition with my work and writing in the main professional journal of my trade. I dropped that ball and had a kid and have rediscovered a more layed back approach. Fame is over-rated. It is a tread mill. If I had daily readers, I would have to write something fabulous every day. I have a career, a husband, a 4 year old, and a life. Blogging happens as it happens. And although I am well-received here and well read despite the best efforts of the editors to ignore me, i am not an upscale writer with ambition. I am an artist living in an isolated area that wants to be more social with educated bright people. OS is that for me.
OS can be yet another writing forum on the web for hard-core writers, another revenue stream for Salon, and still be what I need, too.
OS can be a village that others visit, but that some common members inhabit.
Dibs on Idiot!
You've been a friend to me and I aprreciate that. I like the recent comment and I echo your feelings of what OS is for me too, though I am far less productive here. I enjoy your blog and many others.
This post was just fine. It's always fine when you say what you need to say I think.
The Global Idiot
Take care,
Monte
Just sayin...not that a blog named "Lookit Editors!" is indicative of anything or anything. Just a color thing. Kinda freaky, huh?
I love Freaky because she doesn't even need to whore around. She is a Plastic Entity with Pink hair and a Foothole and she is the most popular organic member of OS. The ape should be very proud.
An "organic" member is someone who helps with the heavy lifting, not just cross-posting drive-by posts. That sounded kind of insulting...but then, whatever. As a non-ubiquitous internet presence, I like to keep it neat. I have no delusions that I need to saturate the web with my essence, or musk, as it were. Google, that great bloodhound, finds all of my posts by my business name, and that is sufficient attention from the great void that is strangers on the internet.
I really should expand that thought into a post with nudity. . .
http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=66259
This post is prominently linked in my post.
Thanks,
;-)
Monte
And anyone should feel free to leave long rambling comments. They are the southern way, so go for it. Use words like flounce and y'all. Drink sweet tea while you do it so you are all hepped up! The longer the better...
I just got a package delivered today from The Fudge Factory in Beaufort. I think it's from one of my co-workers, but maybe it's a surprise from you? Also, my daughter's name is Emmy, but we all call her "e". Can I be your friend? For real.
g
My issue has to do with what the word "friend" means and how it works for me on OS.
I wrote a pretty longish reply to the comments on my post and I think that was after your two comments. Please go back and read that because it says where my heart was and is regarding OS, and regarding your post.
Blessings,
Monte
Oh, yes. Almost forgot. You are the first person on OS to ever call me "Sir" in French. Although some have called me other things in slang. That was not pretty!
rated
And Monsieur was referring to Monsieur Chariot, our old and very french friend who has been busy lately but just drops in from time to time.
My french is so weak, but my fondness for Monsieur so great that I keep a French english dictionary near the computer...
So if he gets back on posting...I am ready for him!
I have 13 messages. All whoring.
not one....slow tear. And fade....with sad music.
But tonight, everybody is on it!
It's not so much about fame. People who "blogwhore" just want people to read and enjoy their writing, but they don't know how to accomplish that. They may be interested to learn about ways to attract readers that are more effective than sending messages to ungrateful fellow OS members.
Of course it's everyone's choice whether they want thousands of readers or just a few. I think it's healthy for a writer to want more readership, because there's always an intended audience in mind as they write. Everyone on this site gets so wrapped up in writing for each other that it's limiting them. That's why we see a dozen OS related posts every single day.
A good bit of my interest in Open Salon is specifically in the community, so I'm actually fine writing for just other OSers. I don't have the ambition to have thousands of readers for what I write here. More generally, people sometimes forget that OS is a social networking site, and people who join may have different goals than the most obvious one of becoming writers or gaining a wider audience for their writing. Surprising but true.
I think its VERY healthy for a writer to want thousands of people to read their work. I make art out of clay and I get it out there! I get that. I have sought publicity and exposure. I can do that. But I am not a writer who does it for the writing.
And if I were, private mailing on this site is not going to make that happen. Using reddit and digg and that kind of thing will do that.
But I am not that kind of writer. To me writing is a means to an end of communication. Which is why the editors are not especially interested in my posts. But the rub is this. I am not a writers ' writer, I do not find words "delicious" and would rather slit my wrists than read my writing aloud to people. Writing is a means of expresssion and I am fairly good at using it as a tool to that end. The blog format lets me include lots of graphics, which I am now religiously attributing or generating on my own (see, editors, I can learn form things you say). I am using my own actual name, so what notoriety I gain is actually significant in my real life. Neither of these facts make me cover material designed to increase traffic, but they make people read my blog, not because of the brilliant writing, but because it is interesting stuff as a conglomerate.
*I * and my perspective on life and issues is why my blog gets read and has a strong rate of comments and ratings. But it is never on the cover except in most read, and hasn't been an EP since I questioned the authority of the people doing it.
It doesn't bother me much any more. My stats are more important than the EP or cover.
And as I said, I am into interaction with people, the social network here, not the public venue for writing. Frankly, for that I would look into publishing after generating a body of work, in the same manner that I make art and then put it in appropriate venues.
But this information, that writing is a means to an end and not the goal, shouldn't keep me off the lists and out of the eye of the editors. I, as a contributing commentor and active postor am just as necessary as the "upscale quality writing" that seems to be the choices selected. Because rubbernecking at the interesting comments is precisely half the fun of reading a good piece of writing here, otherwise we would read books instead.
Surprise surprise, I know the difference and understand my spoke in the cogs of OS.
Frankly, if sensational topics and quality writing were what I was looking for, OS wouldn't do it for me, as this forum mainly only caters to short essay formats. Maybe there was a gap in the short essay format arena and that is the goal of the editors. I have about stopped trying to figure it out. And critically, if the cover was the actual content of the site, I would not still be here, as I can get Dr. Amy and personal senstional posts mentioning sex or nudity on about 10,000 other sites. So I am not sure the editors are working in their best interests either. Unless it is all about traffic and numbers, in which case, bring on the soft porn, pseudo Dr Phils, and vulgar pics. (I wrote about Oprah because it was topical and interested me and was good spring board to other seasonal social commentary.)
One of my most rated and commented posts had nudity, but it was for a specific purpose, I don't just throw it in there for a few more hits on the post.
Anyway, as a non-target contributor, that is my take on how things are going here.
If it was the interest of the powers that decide the cover, I would be long gone, it is the people that keep me here.
JTH, I know you bring traffic, but the subject matter and method of satirization of class in america presented in your blog is not accurate in the details for me. I know lots of people and have known lots of people that are the subject of your satire, and I am not offended, I think it is off-base, missing the mark. And I can definitely see the difference between "you" and the posts. I think "you" are a good writer, but your subject is one note and coarse. So I stopped reading it. Dr. Amy got repetitious after two bloviating, pontificating posts (Just because you are a doctor and well read doesn't make you a good resource for medical information, she is a commenatator in everything except her actual specialization, and gynecology only interest me if I am in the stirrups myself).
Here is the rub for those who seek thousands of anonymous readers: you depersonalize your writing and allow for criticism that does not account for any social leniency that I would extend to other writers here. When you just cross post or drop in autofeeds from other blogs, it may increase general traffic, but it contributes nothing to the social network, it is filler, white noise.
Maybe social network and friend are words that the site controllers should reconsider.