realweenie

Akismet Hates Me

Ah yes I love it when I have time to write on my bad old blog cleverly disguised as a hot dog stand.

If you have not been seeing my comments on your blog it is becasue you have a WordPress blog and have installed "akismet" to block the large volume of spam that goes to WordPress bloggers.  Akismet is smarter than most and has decided that I am bad and I am banned from commenting on all WordPress blogs.

I have been commenting in recent days, I just leave my domain name off and sometimes just use one of the 10 or 12 other domain names that go to my blog.  On the one hand there is such an easy work around that I think akismet is not so smart.  On the other hand I have freinds out there who  like to see my  comments on their blogs, but they never will.    They can't control akismet.

Typepad works differently.  I get little spam and I have a lot more control.  People have gotten banned by the software, but I can fix it or have it fixed so they can comment again.  So I say to akismet users, do you have that kind of control?  If so I would like to leave comments on your blogs using my regular domain name. 

If you don't have that kind of control, which other domain names are being blocked?  Are you ticking someone off without knowing it?  Isn't web 2.0 about having a two way conversation?  When software makes decisions about who to include and who to exclude does it always make the same decision a human would?

It would be easy for me to ban all wordpress bloggers from commenting on my blogs, but I would never do that.  I leave comments on blogs becasue I have something to say, not for a link back to my own blog, so I will keep commenting.  It will affect my ratings to have fewer links to my blog but it will be gradual and I won't feel the impact for many months, and who knows by then maybe I won't be banned any more. . . but maybe I will be. Who knows, it is in the hands of a machine somewhere and I am just a bunch of 1's and 0's.

Bullies on the Internet

Yes, hard as it is to imagine there are bullies on the internet. 

When a blog is read and if it is successful the bullies will come, just like the spam and the telemarketers.  Why? Simple, they are jealous.  You know you have made it when you have a couple of bullies, and assorted hecklers hanging out on your blog.

Bullies come onto our blogs for a couple of reasons.  They are jealous and they crave attention, they want to be a part of the conversation.  Keep in mind that blogs that do not get read, don't attract bullies either.

When we engage them we are letting them take over our conversation and giving them power.  When we ignore them they go away, because they are not getting what they want.  We don't have to act as gracious hosts to every conversation that happens on our blogs, we can choose not to participate.   

It is easy to ignore bullies but it seems to be easier for most to engage them and try to win.  You really can't win, you just end up looking as bad as they do.  The stuff we write on the internet stays there forever. I smile when I think of some of the things I have read that were written by some of the arrogant asses out there.  I wonder what their grandchildren will think of them when they find it, or a future employer.  Does their mom know they talk like that?

What we put out there is what we get back.  Take comfort in that thought.  We don't need to fight with bullies, they are doing a fine job of self destructing on their own.

Overcoming Objections

I get calls from people selling stuff.  They find me through my blogs, and call me while I am in my car.  Yesterday this guy called while I was in my car.  He wanted to sell me a sales course on DVD about over coming objections.  Since the caller is also in sales I asked him if he ever took the course and he said he had.  Guess I had a little extra time becasue I was stuck on the freeway and maybe I was in an evil mood.

I let him pitch his product and listened without interrupting  even though it almost killed me . . no it didn't almost kill me it was the semi that decided to switch to my lane but wanted to be where I was instead of ahead of me or behind me.

When he finished his pitch, I started raising my objections.  I asked him why I would want to overcome objections.  He didn't have an answer for me so I asked him how much the DVD's cost.  He said $199.00, I said well I guess for a dollar and 99 cents I could take a chance.  He said that he meant one hundred and ninety nine dollars.  I said you have to be kidding, I buy DVD's all the time and get 50 or so for less that $20.00. 

I told him i didn't want to pay that much for a DVD, I even used the words "I object".  He told me that the $199 is a one time discount price.  I said you have got to be kidding, you mean you charge more than that for a single DVD?  I told him that I need the $199 to pay my cell phone bill because of all the telemarketers.  He didn't know what to say.  I suggested that the training course must not work very well because he was not able to over come any of my objections.  Usually I am the one who hangs up when sales people cold call, but he beat me to it and hung up first.

Yes I am also in sales but I don't cold call.  I know I should care if this total stranger who calls me while I am in my car has a job or not but I don't.   I am still laughing. 

Brain Found

Todd Carpenter found my brain and is selling it on ebay. It is nice the way Todd is always there for me. I have to give him credit for his creativity and entrepreneurial spirit.  I am sure that in a future post I will tell you what I really think.  I can't do that right now because of the missing brain and all. 

See Todd's ad on Ebay.

In Memory of my mind

I lost my mind.  All the words are gone.  I have scattered them all over the internet and I can't get them back.  I have uploaded the contents of my brain and now it is empty.  I  lose things all the time and I didn't think I would miss my mind but I do.  If you find it please send it back.