Let ‘Em All Make Money

Tagged as: Internet, Money, Review Jun 22

Trying out a ReviewMe to see how I feel about it. I like ReviewMe’s set up because even though they offer to pay you for reviews, they are in no way forcing your hand in what you say. So good or bad, that’s how they roll.

One thing that’s pretty big (okay huge in some places) nowadays is making money off of the Internet. Qoo Forum is an approach to the issue that (as far as I know) is pretty unique. They are trying to start a forum where people can talk about anything they want to. Where does the money making come in? They propose that if you attain a certain point (currently 50 posts) then they will allow you to have a chance to have ads from your Google AdSense Publisher account be placed on the forum itself.

As I described in Inconsiderate Internet Browsing, advertisements work just as they do for other media. Advertisers get to show whatever they want and in turn they pay for that right. Specifically for the Internet, this means that you can get paid for views or you can get paid for the number of clicks on your advertisements.

The look of the site is nice and clean that is easy on the eyes, even if it does seem a little cartoonish because everything on the site has their edges rounded.

As you can somewhat see, they are trying to reach out to as many categories as they possibly can. There are forums within the Qoo forum ranging from music to gadgets to making money to sports! I think that this might be a problem for them in the future. Granted it allows for growth in any which way. However, just like other things with no purpose, it might fall flat on its face just because it does not have a single intention. I know that I have gone to forums simply because they were forums that were much more centered around a main topic. That might have been software or cars, but I went to that forum because there were people there that knew more than I did.

I’m not sure that’s the kind of people that will be attracted to this site. It seems as if the people that will post here are simply people that are in it to get money for themselves. It’s hard to attract the stable reliable posters that are able to answer people’s questions with that kind of mindset. The reason is that those people who frequent forums to help others do so out of the goodness in their hearts. They like helping others. They are not people who are out to make a quick buck.

However, it does seem like they might have something if my thoughts on people is off. The advertisements in each thread are pretty well placed. They blend well with their styling, but they are slightly off-putting because there are just so many of them.

So if you can get an advertisement there, you do seem to have a reasonable chance of making some money. I’m sure that Qoo will also be having much of their own advertisements placed in the site as well (of course they’re revenue sharing, not revenue giving).

This is all of the “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” mentality. And that’s not too bad of an idea because it seems like it was easy to set up with existing tools. They’re utilizing vBulletin for their forum software, they had to think of an interesting domain, they need the hardware to host it all, and then they can utilize Google’s existing ad network!

Some things that I saw while looking around where that I wasn’t actually sure how likely you are to get your advertisements on the threads that you start once you hit that magic 50 post level. In the FAQ it says in one place “Currently, you are entitled to 50% chance of showing your ad code within the threads that are started by you” whereas in a similar section it says “Once you have reached that level, your ad code will be applied to all the threads started by you.” That’s confusing to say the least. Additionally I noticed some grammatical errors along the lines of some of the items that I mentioned in Learn Some English (Part 1). They should get someone to give it a good read through and through to give it a more professional feel to it.

All in all, I think that the Qoo Forum has an intriguing idea that might turn out to pan out for lots of people. However, seeing as how they are brand spanking new, I’m not sure how well they will actually do. They are working off of people’s greed, and seeing as how that is very apparent in many people, they just might do alright.

Give It Back!

Tagged as: Money, Rant, Seen-Around Jun 21

I went to go get gasoline yesterday on the way home from work. Of course I dreaded it. At least it’s on the way down right now. But when I got out of my automobile to start pumping the liquid into my vehicle and my money into the machine, I saw something that took me aback. There, above the very machine that was essentially taking my money was a television! It was complete with sound and a fairly sharp display!

Technology is amazing. They are able to put a television in a gas station!

But then I thought for another second and realized that they must have used some of my money in order to install all of these televisions! Sure it’s nice to watch the television for about 2 minutes, but I’d much rather have the money that they used back! Just goes to show you that those gas station owners sure aren’t on hard times.

Budgeteeer vs Budget

Tagged as: Geek, Money, Programming May 21

Well I suppose that there aren’t too many original ideas out there. Nevertheless, when I happened upon a piece of software called Budget
while I was reading through my feed reader this morning, I had to take a second look. Why? Well because I wrote (and am in current development of) The Budgeteeer!

There were notable differences, obviously. Comparing the two programs, here is what I noticed:

1. Budget deposits absolute amounts into each sub-account (represented as envelopes) whereas the Budgeteeer deposits percentages into each sub-account. I recently thought about this difference actually. It would be nice to have options to do both/either. My original approach of percentages allows for things such as taking 10% off the top for tithe, but it has pitfalls such as having to specify a percentage for each sub-account. Granted of course you can play around with them over time such that they will approach what you actually need/want/use.
2. Budget is much prettier. Both their Windows and Mac executables look better than my Python GUI. Granted, I haven’t been trying to make it beautiful or anything. And it is essentially the same functionality (clicking on different buttons, etc). Nevertheless, that is a plus that Budget has.
3. Obviously Budget is production software that is being sold whereas the Budgeteeer is something that I wrote up in a week and have since played with only a little bit. Budget also costs 30 bucks, and (when the time comes) the Budgeteeer will not.
4. The Budgeteeer has a cooler name.

All in all, I would like to think that Budget and the Budgeteeer are similar. However, I must concede that they are not even close to similar. Budget is much more polished, and I am now more determined to develop the Budgeteeer!

Music Piracy Makes People Stupid

Tagged as: Entertainment, Humor, Life, Money, Rant, Read-It, Ridiculous, Tip-For-Life May 14

In an article at Yahoo! about cracking down on college music pirates, I read about one Sarah Barg, a sophomore from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. It portrayed her as a girl who was just taking part in what everyone else was doing. The article wanted to put her in the role of one who is definitely not the worst (I mean she only downloaded 381 songs when others were downloading thousands!). In response to it all, Barg says

Obviously I knew it was illegal, but no one got in trouble for it

Now, I know that all higher education is not equal. And I know that maybe not all of them are as good as the University of California, San Diego, but that does not allow for such ridiculous thoughts. I think that ignorance is not a good excuse for doing wrong. The onus is on you to do what’s right. However, I think that actually knowing that something is wrong and yet still doing it speaks of some darker black.

In any case, I don’t think that it’s a matter of intelligence. I think it’s a sign of the times.

Piracy does not just affect music as I wrote in Even Worse Than At First Glance, Cheain’ Chinese, and (in regards to cheating in general) Cheaters 4 Life. Wow I did not realize that I had so many entries devoted to ranting about cheaters! But I digress.

Reasons why you shouldn’t be a (music) pirate:

1. You can afford the music (or whatever it is that you’re pirating).
• If you can’t afford it, you don’t need it.
• If you really can’t afford it, you have things that you should be doing other than listening to music anyways.
2. You can support and encourage the artists that you like to keep making music. It’s kind of like writing a blog and getting encouraged by people leaving comments. Except for them it’s people giving them money. I’m applying my energy to the wrong thing.
3. You know it’s morally wrong.
4. It’s actually against the law.

Now I admit that I’m not perfect, but I would like to think that once I knew the truth then I would change my behavior to match what I know. Not everyone is like this. But they should be. It just makes sense to have your behavior in line with your opinions, does it not? Don’t be the person who gets laughed at for coming off as stupid. Nobody wants 15 minutes of infamy.

Making Money By Blogging

Tagged as: Internet, Money, Review May 13

So I’m not sure how many of you are aware of how often people actually make money off of blogging. Many of my readers probably are not very acquainted with the idea. They’re accustomed to doing things for free and because they like it. That’s fine and well, but there is in fact a market for actually making money simply by blogging. Amazing isn’t it?

Well now you might be wondering whether blogging is even worth it as a venture to make money. Let me point your attention to a site that teaches you how you can make money online. Even though right now I’m participating in a contest to review his site to get a backlink from his site, this really is a site that I have been subscribing to in my RSS reader.

To start off with, John Chow is a Canadian resident (whom none of you probably actually know personally) who started trying to turn his blog into a money-maker less than a year ago. He writes articles about how he is making money as well as ideas and tips for other people who would want to do the same. He uses his own site as a case study in how money can be made. In every month since he started his blog, he has enjoyed increased revenue. He is a proponent of a lot of different advertisements and partner deals (including the ubiquitous AdSense which I am using). With the combined revenue from all of his sources, he made a bit under $12,000 in the month of April. It’s pretty amazing to see what someone can do with just a blog! Of course the caveat to this for all of you is that his blog is less of a personal one and more of a targeted one. Nevertheless it’s impressive.

Although I generally read all of the articles, I think that the main downside that I see to what he is writing about is that he sometimes hits a ceiling in terms of content. Often (simply by the mere subject matter) there will be repetition in his advice so I can see how this blog will be very interesting initially but could lose interest for readers after they have read it for awhile.

Anyways, I have enjoyed reading about different ideas and methods that he’s used, and I suggest that anyone interested in the topic should take a look at it. This is especially useful for those that are hosting (or paying for hosting) of their own site as there is some cost to running the site.