Google and Dumbing Down Writing

I dragged myself out of bed Monday morning, after staying up late to watch the healthcare vote in the House, determined to get the first Healthcare Reform article up on Suite 101. It was an unqualified success earning three times more hits in one day––actually in half a day–-than I usually get on all my articles in a month. Of course, the revenue comes from ad clicks not PVs and the Google gods, in their infinite wisdom, filled the page with ads for medical insurance, of course. Bright move, as usual, on the part of our techy friends since this is the dumbest time in the world to buy medical insurance before all the preexisting laws go into effect and four years before you need to pay a penalty for going without coverage. And if any of my readers were in the market for medical insurance, I would be the first person to steer them far, far away from anything they would find through a Google ad.

Google is quickly replacing Wikipedia in my list of Internet irritants, which means I will be mightily irritated all the time as this Goliath practically owns the web. In this case, though, I don't blame Google as much as the writers and bloggers following the star they hope will finally bring fair compensation and assuming, when it doesn't, that it is due to some fault on their part.

I can't tell you how many times I see a post on blogger forums or the forums where writers of pay-per-clicks air their woes, wondering why they aren't making money, let alone a living, from their Adsense and/or Amazon Affiliate ads. I assume someone other than Google is making something from these ads, but I can tell you now, it isn't the general writer.

Now I'm the first one to condemn "writers" looking for get-rich-quick-schemes. These are often the people who have been looking for such schemes in one area or another all their lives. They think they will suddenly start writing on a blog, without ever honing their craft, spewing opinions with little regard to spelling or grammar and watch the ad income roll in. Then there are those who don't even want to do the set-up work but sign up for some site that allows them to write one article a week on whatever topic they choose and expect to make huge sums of money based on minimum effort.

Unfortunately, as I noted in an earlier post, more and more of these sites also attract previously successful freelancers, now torturing their prose into adword phrases in a vain attempt to make what they used to writing quality pieces for the print market. Sometimes they do okay. Many don't, and sometimes they watch writers with half the talent make more because they happen to luck into a topic that attracts good ads and ad clickers. Sadly, for them and for us, rather than focusing their considerable talents on what they used to do best––in depth research and clear presentation of valued subjects––they attempt to improve their adword skills instead, having been convinced that if they aren't one of the site's big earners, they––not the site or Google's lousy marketing strategists––are doing something wrong.

Coming out of the creative sector where $10 feels like a windfall, making $25 or $30 a quarter writing on topics I enjoy is enough for me. Consequently, I continue to work on my writing skills, trying to present complicated matters of politics or history in clear and easily understood terms. I'm willing to focus on SEO (as opposed to adwords), because, while I don't condone high school students automatically trusting the article with top billing, I also know that is what they do. So they may as well read something carefully written and with a list of further resources for them to check out. However, I have no interest in playing the adword game. Then again, I don't have to. My living comes from the business I help my husband run.

It started with Microsoft convincing us that when our PCs froze up due to nasty viruses, it was our fault, not theirs. Since then we've continued to allow the techies to convince us they always know best. For those who do depend on the income, it's not only exploitative to foster dreams of high incomes they will probably never achieve, but it encourages good writers to write about empty subjects with empty words in order to make money. Further adding to the dumbing down of our culture.

Rant over. I promise to find something more uplifting to write about next time.

Networking on the Net

Posting about fellow blogger l. lee lowe's most recent online novel got me thinking what a marvelous boost the Internet has been for networking among writers. Writing has often been called a solitary undertaking, and it can be even more solitary for those of us who labor away in middle class suburbia, where we can go years at a time without making contact with another writer. There are only so many pricey conferences one can attend, and a 45 minute commute on a crowded train is a lot to go through for the privilege of running into someone in a center city coffee shop.

Thanks to the Internet, I am now in touch with other writers just about every day, in forums, on their blogs, or through e-mails where we exchange news and ideas about our work. When a writing friend has a novel published or a new story coming out in a literary publication, I always link to it here on zine writer. And they do the same for me. If I want input on something I'm working on, I always have a few names I can call on.

Then there are the friends who provide ideas and inspiration like Kimberly Davis who writes Kim's Craft Blog. An accomplished writer and instructor, Kim never fails to provide me with food for thought. Of course, the blogs of my friends and former R&T colleagues Angie Ledbetter (Gumbo Writer) and Kat Magendie (Tender Graces) are always a nice place to take a break. There are others I've mentioned often here, and you can find them all in the sidebar of my favorite blogs and favorite sites.

Some of us share other things in common as well as writing. For example, my blogger friend Cashew Elliott at Open the Vein inspired me to start my other blog Cross-Examine on a topic that is extremely important to me both personally and politically––healthcare reform. That and canvassing for signatures has taken up a lot of my time lately and caused me to post less here and neglect visiting some of my friends' blogs. I hope you'll forgive me. I'll be back when this d--d thing is passed. In the mean time, if you live in the US, I hope you'll stop by Cross-Examine. I make a point not to spew empty rhetoric and I know enough about the subject that you just might learn something you are not getting from the media––then, that's not hard to do.Okay, I'm slapping my own face.

Back to the point. The Internet is a great place for writers to self-promote and to promote others. Do unto others benefits us all, so I hope all of you also frequent other writers' blogs or post their successes. You'll get it back three times over.

Blogging for Healthcare: It's Just Too Important

Hello followers & Visitors

I've always said this blog would be devoted to writing and not turn into a political blog. I also bent my rule a couple of times to blog about healthcare reform, an issue I think is just too important to ignore. So, rather than muck up this blog with other things, I've decided to start a new blog, CROSS-EXAMINE where I will be blogging about healthcare reform for the next few weeks or however long it takes.

Even if you think you've already made your decision––especially if you have––you may be surprised at what you read. Before I started writing I spent more than 10 years working in Employee Benefits, first for an insurer and then overseeing employee benefit plans for large employers. I was reviewing claims for just one year when the insurance company I worked for started looking into limiting reimbursements due to overcharging by some healthcare providers. My last position was with a large bank where I was hired to develop a plan that would contain costs while not cutting benefits. That was 20 years ago! The issues are the same, but, unfortunately, a lot of people are out there pretending to know what they are talking about when they don't. The subject is too complex for sound bites and empty but provocative catch words don't get us anywhere.

Like my other posts, my new blog will not be an apology for Obama Care. I think there are a lot of flaws in that plan, but I also think we can't wait around another 60 years and do nothing, and the plans coming out of the House and Senate right now are all we will have to work with.

I'm not abandoning this blog. I just won't be posting as often.

Back to Healthcare

As I noted in an earlier post, I am breaking my rule regarding political posts when it comes to the issue of healthcare reform. As I said in that post, I really believe we need a single payer plan and an overall reform of our entire healthcare system including delivery. I didn't think the mere addition of a public plan would be enough. However, listening to President Obama last night, I became convinced that if cost saving measures can be built into a public option, then costs will come down showing private insurers what they will need to do to stay in business. If they can't compete, well then, voila, instant single payer.

If you support healthcare reform I urge you to go to this website and add your name. Congress needs to know that the numbers are behind reform, because no matter how much money competing interests donate to their campaigns, they can't win without our votes.

http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/hcdeclarations?source=20090723_email