problems Archives - Page 3 of 7

Bloggy Question 44: Stay Out of My Life!

April 15, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

Worse than a Scraper

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life question. . .

You know the problem of people stealing your content. You’ve even handled that before. Every time you found a blog with your content, you’ve managed to sleuth enough to get an address or phone number, some sort of contact where could knock the door. Then you’ve made it clear that the content question MUST come down or you will alert the authorities of the theft. And lucky you, it’s gone your way every time.

But this time it’s different, because the content is totally rewritten. Only it mirrors what you write. Even the title of the blog is Echo Your Blog. Now they’ve started picking up the same stock images and sometime even the occasional family photo or photo of you and your friends.

It’s not only creepy. It’s begun to feel like you have a stalker not a fan.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Bloggy Question 43: Love or Money?

April 8, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

I Don’t Like You

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life question. . .

Someone has approached you about buying your blog. He wants all of it, lock, stock, and barrel. Well, that is, you can remove — delete any personal references. All other content, deisgn, widgets, and every other little bit will go to the new owner.

The new owner is . . . a guy you just can’t stand. He runs about 4 other blogs that you think are ugly, poorly kept, badly written, and inaccuate when they don’t seem to have copy you suspect is scraped.

The price offered is US$15,000. He’s ready to wire it to your bank account.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Bloggy Question 42: Responding to Comments

April 1, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

Who Are Comments About?

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life question. . .

This really happened.

I was talking to another blogger this week about comments and conversations. Our dialogue turned to the topic of interesting and noteworthy comments we’ve received on our blogs. My friend spoke of one comment that we found both curious and worthy of discussion.

The commenter was explaining the rights of a blog publisher to turn off comments when a post gets older, because “the comments on my blog are about me.”

My friend, the blogger, is interested in how you would answer that comment.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Bloggy Question 41: The Junior High Sleep Over

March 25, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

Save Me From Teenage Children. . .

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life question. . .

This afternoon you pass your son’s room. He has two boys from his 8th grade class over. All three 13-year-old boys are gathered around his computer. When you pass, they go red in the face and get totally silent.

The silence is a dead giveaway that you need to check on what they’ve been doing.

You’re too fast. You make it there before they realize your intent to check the computer. You find them on a flickr page of a 13-year-old girls’ sleepover. All of the girls are nearly naked. All of the girls are posed quite provactively. All of the girls are in your son’s class at school.

Your son immediately begins accusing you of invading his privacy.

After you send the other boys home, you son begs you not to ruin his life.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Bloggy Question 40: Um er . . . Your Enthusiasm Is Killing Our Ebook

March 11, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

This Wasn’t Part of Our Winning Strategy

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life hypothetical question. . . .

You and a close friend each started a blog a on the same day. Friends since childhood, you’ve always enjoyed exploring new things together. Together you built a strategy for making a blog with influence. Your strategy was built on having a clean-coded, SEO-friendly template, quality, targeted, relevant content, ample link love for other bloggers in your respective niches. Each of you has begun to show up when people name the top blogs in the areas you serve.

About two months ago. you and your friend developed a resource — a phenomenal ebook for new bloggers that basically outlines the strategy you had developed together. Both of your names are on it and you share in the meager income it produces. One side effect that you had not counted on, but now enjoy is that the resource has increased your visibility and people have started turning to you and your friend as blogging experts. The Wall Street Journal called to include you both in an article they wrote last week.

But lately, your friend has become somewhat obsessed with the ebook. He can’t seem to write a blog post without flogging its benefits. He starts with a brilliant teasing introduction and then starts selling the ebook again. You’ve noticed his comment count is going down and you suspect his subscriber numbers are as well.

It’s hard enough to watch your friend lose track of his readers and your original strategy, but it’s even worse that your name is also on that ebook.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Bloggy Question 38: You’ve Just Won a New Design!

February 25, 2007 by Liz Leave a Comment

And You Said You Never Win Anything

For those who come looking for a short, thoughtful read, a blogging life discussion, or a way to gradually ease back into the week. I offer this bloggy life hypothetical question. . . .

At the grand opening of a social network, they gave away prizes. By some stroke of luck you won the grandest prize of all. It’s a $10K blog vacation on an island in a luxury private home for two weeks while your blog gets a $10K makeover by a famous blog designer.

You were excited, bought the sunscreen, made the plans. Then you met with the famous designer. He didn’t listen to a thought you had. Even worse, his favors a color — one that you absolutely cannot stand.

You’re getting a bad feeling.

The rules are that the vacation and blog design are one package. As part of the prize you get to live with new blog design for one year or you happily get to pay the designer.

It’s time for you to accept the prize by signing your permission and releases.

How do you respond?

–ME “Liz” Strauss