Comments on: Blogging for dough

Blogging for dough

caddis — Thu, 05 May 2005 12:41:25 -0800

Can blogging ever become big business? Some people appear to be making a good living at blogging. There is even a blog devoted to the business of blogging. Jason is trying it.

By: Mayor Curley

Mayor Curley — Thu, 05 May 2005 12:57:00 -0800

Can blogging ever become big business? Jesus, I hope not. That will further encourage people to do it. And the world doesn't need anymore published WinAmp playlists, photo essays of Park Slope or stories about meeting Judd Nelson at Arby's.

By: orthogonality

orthogonality — Thu, 05 May 2005 12:57:25 -0800

If you enjoy orthogonality's comments, or even if you hate them, please donate using thePayPal link on my user page.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Thu, 05 May 2005 13:07:18 -0800

fuck jason.

By: jsavimbi

jsavimbi — Thu, 05 May 2005 13:19:34 -0800

At least he doesn't steal his links from Fark.

By: keswick

keswick — Thu, 05 May 2005 13:29:57 -0800

no, just waxy.

By: MaxVonCretin

MaxVonCretin — Thu, 05 May 2005 13:35:10 -0800

Blahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhg. Please please please - enough with the blogs already.

By: PinkStainlessTail

PinkStainlessTail — Thu, 05 May 2005 13:38:18 -0800

Here MaxVonCretin, I've fixed it, using the new meme that all the cool kids are down with: Can citizenjournaling ever become big business? Some people appear to be making a good living at citizenjournaling. There is even a citizenjournal devoted to the business of citizenjournaling. Jason is trying it. Better?

By: furtive

furtive — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:04:19 -0800

In other news, people get paid to advertise! Coming up next: apparently some folks are willing to give a bit of money for what they believe to be a good cause, but nobody likes a mooch.

By: troutfishing

troutfishing — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:05:13 -0800

Here's a good business model : Get in tight with Bill Frist and the theocratic right, and - after the "nuclear option" is shoved down America's throat - find theocratic patrons in the House and Senate to sponsor bills reintroducing slavery. In this way you can smack down that smarmy Jason Kottke by making him one of your personal army of blog slaves. They'll slave away typing and linking, chained to hot CRT's, making you rich while you sip mint juleps with buxom starlets out on the veranda. Ha! All you have to do to get there is give a few plo chops and hustle a little ass. Also, you might want to shell out some franklins for a Jeff Guckert consultation first. Jeff's got some magic oval office mojo, I hear.

By: Divine_Wino

Divine_Wino — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:06:44 -0800

or stories about meeting Judd Nelson at Arby's. Judd used to frequent the diner near my high school, he didn't get no regard, someone from our table always made a point of telling him he was a "Hairy Monster" for reasons that are now too obscure to recall. That will be $47.50 please.

By: Smedleyman

Smedleyman — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:12:42 -0800

Oh, so they have internet on computers now.

By: kirkaracha

kirkaracha — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:22:24 -0800

Just this morning the San Francisco Chroncile said that blogs are small business.

By: angry modem

angry modem — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:34:54 -0800

Yet another attempt by the blogging non-industry to prop itself up while it remains the largely unimportant soon to be short-lived phenomenon that it is.

By: monju_bosatsu

monju_bosatsu — Thu, 05 May 2005 14:35:14 -0800

Why, I just might have to write about this in my Citizen Journal^TM.

By: chaz

chaz — Thu, 05 May 2005 15:03:58 -0800

Asking if you can make money "blogging" is like asking if you can make money on the internet, or better yet in publishing. Of course you can. But that doesn't mean it's easy. And anyway, what is a blog? This question got asked a lot at the birth of the medium, and it now that blogs are mainstream, it's time to ask it again. I would say, it's hard to make money online without a "blog", in other words, if you don't update every day, or at least regularly, you won't prosper.

By: spilon

spilon — Thu, 05 May 2005 15:10:46 -0800

That Drudge Report fella seems to do pretty well for himself. Unfortunately.

By: drezdn

drezdn — Thu, 05 May 2005 16:23:21 -0800

Does this count as blogging about bloggers who blog about bloggers? Now it's metametafilter.

By: runkelfinker

runkelfinker — Thu, 05 May 2005 16:36:12 -0800

Who's Jason and why should I care?

By: Jimbob

Jimbob — Thu, 05 May 2005 17:19:22 -0800

And anyway, what is a blog? Dontchaknow a weblog encompasses everything from a teenage Live Journal filled with sappy longings for the boy who sits by the window in Geography class, to racist talk-radio-esque punditry to, you know, actual logs of web links. And now apparently a website with top-level links to articles, no reverse-chronological order posting visible at all can be called a "blog" too. And I fucking concur.

By: anildash

anildash — Thu, 05 May 2005 17:59:36 -0800

Actually, the world does need more ways to communicate better, Curley, or do you feel that email shouldn't be used for trivial matters like Winamp playlists and personal anecdotes, either? Yet another attempt by the blogging non-industry to prop itself up while it remains the largely unimportant soon to be short-lived phenomenon that it is. Derek, wanna job? I still dunno what all of you have against Jason. It seems the criticism is either that you feel you can do a better job of creating content, presenting it, and promoting it (if so, please do!) or you feel that nobody should be able to ask others to pay for their work unless they meet your personal preferences. Which, while admirably ambitious, seems like a recipe for being frustrated with, well, pretty much all of capitalism. And sorry to veer back to the thread at hand, but blogging already *is* a big business, and not just for those of us who make blogging tools. There are business opportunities for individual publishers (like Rafat Ali of PaidContent) to make money off their sites, there's the well-known blog networks like Gawker Media or the NYTimes' About.com, and then there's people who'll put small commerce/tipjar/ad displays on their sites and make enough to cover their hosting costs or to pay for their hobby. Combined together with the use of blogs by businesses ranging from mom-and-pops to some of the biggest companies in the world, there's a lot of proof already that blogs are a big business opportunity for people publishing them, organizations who want to use them, and those who provide services or tools for the community of bloggers. There's also people like most of the contributors in this thread, who want to benefit from blogs like MetaFilter but will insult any attempt for people to make a living doing so. Fortunately, they're a tiny number and the percentage of the blog community made up by them is shrinking every day.

By: cedar

cedar — Thu, 05 May 2005 18:26:08 -0800

What's with Kottke hating? I don't know the guy but he reads likable enough. Lord knows, if you can get paid for doing what you enjoy, more power to you. It's not like he's hurting anyone. If you want do the same, invest a few years into creating a steady output of decent content and slap a button on your site. If you don't think it's good content, don't read it. This really isn't complicated. I don't see any reason to slag a guy in public for doing what he enjoys -- at least he's straighforward about it.

By: dhartung

dhartung — Thu, 05 May 2005 21:00:34 -0800

It's a good thing this site owes nothing to blogging.

By: Tlogmer

Tlogmer — Thu, 05 May 2005 21:44:58 -0800

Stop hating on the Kottke™

By: troutfishing

troutfishing — Tue, 17 May 2005 20:20:46 -0800

What is "blogging" ? Please define. Does this activity have anything to do with a less-than-optimal logging process ?