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Another internet lowlife

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TaoPhoenix:
So give them to me!

One way to vet these kinds of things is by playing a MetaGame with them. If the offer comes back from *Another Domain* and they don't care (or don't notice!) then that is your answer. But hey, They're sponsoring, right? I'll take it if it's real money, and if it's not I get to craft a blog article about it. I have experimented with the "Zork Blog" concept, by which I mean that you can take similar stock pages and craft different link structures for different audiences. For the Teal Deer (TL DR aka "I can't be bothered to read real words"), then you tuck stuff behind "More Info" links, but for the quality readers, it's visible, etc.

I'm also a good content adapter - I can salvage an essay out of almost anything short of raw enztye-clone ads. So do like the Zen Masters sometimes did, when a poor/petty burglar tried to swipe a bit of silverware (aka nothing serious), the Zen Master would make a big show of inviting them in, having dinner, giving them the rest of the knife and spoon to go with the fork, and a scroll including instructions on where to sell the scroll to make enough to buy a loaf of bread. The whole production would be so over the top preposterious that the would-be thief would collapse in confusion, give back the stolen fork, and sometimes become a student.

So send them my way!  I have a shielded email system built especially for this kind of thing.

Edit: I just re-read the initial post: "...connect bloggers with advertising partners. I currently have clients that are interested in sponsoring a few posts." So from my interest in Free Speech vs Influences, I'd be interested to see whether they will accept a "hard line" from the blogger for veto rights, etc.

tranglos:
I don't see anything wrong with that email. You can't blame someone from maximizing their income in this tough economy and the email was at least polite and respectful.

If you had encountered a true 'turd' you wouldn't have received an email from them at all & instead they'd have a bot responding to every one of your blog posts with a thinly veiled sales pitch for their products.

I hate unsolicited advertising in my email as much as the next guy, but in this situation I think they took the high road.
-Innuendo (February 23, 2012, 03:00 PM)
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I don't mind the spam (so much). I mind their business model. A "sponsored blog post" is a pack of bs thrown on unsuspecting readers.(*) If their business model is working - let's imagine that it is - that implies there are who knows how many "sponsored posts" out there, everywhere. This is not about unsolicited advertising. This is about advertising that tries to sneak in into your head without you seeing it for what it is. Exactly the kind of thing that would get anyone kicked out of DC before they could click Submit.

(*) I know, I know... And Eóin is right too. But there have to be places like here where you can leave your cynicism at the door, otherwise why bother? These people are stomping out what soul and integrity is left out there.

No, this does not surprise me, nor was I born this morning. I still hate it, because it kills the single most important thing we have as people: the ability to trust another one of us. And I know what I'm talking about - in all studies, my country consistently ranks near the very bottom in "social trust" or "interpersonal trust" indicators.

We don't trust our neighbors, our shopkeepers, our police, our doctors, our local and central governments, our bureaucrats (and they've all done plenty to deserve it). We don't trust our laws, and the only thing we barely (barely!) trust is the institutions of the European Union, because we don't believe they are quite as corrupt as we think ours are.

The point is, living in a place like this can be really distressing and sad. And fatal if your life or well-being ever happens to depend on a stranger throwing you this one little lifeline, like maybe give you a ride or call for an ambulance. This total absence of trust is the longest lasting, most destructive legacy of (what passed for) communism, and all the earlier turbulence of history.

When I read about how the people of Iceland got together, kicked out their government, kicked out the banksters and sat down and wrote their own new constitution from scratch, I thin of them as angels from a fairy tale. That takes trust in the folks around you.

Innuendo: do you trust the reviews you read on DC? If you do, does that have any value to you? I do, and it does. The people who take it away from me by deception deserve worse then calling them a bad name.

/rant!

tranglos:
So give them to me!
-TaoPhoenix (February 23, 2012, 03:26 PM)
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Thanks, Tao, I will keep that in mind! I'm not into playing games like this myself, but I'd be happy to watch from the sidelines.

(No link at hand, but there was a story once about how someone actually got money from a Nigerian scammer. They essentially turned the tables: when the "Nigerians" started asking for money, their intended victim said yeah, sure, but I need (a token amount of US dollars) first to trust you're acting in good faith or some such. Maybe they did the PayPal thing - send me 2 USD from your account so that I know you exist. That was fun, but in the end doesn't change the fact that the Nigerian scam is still running high.)

tranglos:
Why the !@#$% is it so easy to be evil?
-tranglos (February 23, 2012, 02:00 PM)
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I refer you to two quotes:

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

"Power without responsibility — the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages."
-wraith808 (February 23, 2012, 03:15 PM)
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I buy the argument about law doing more harm than good in this case - but only partly. Commercial speech is not free speech. You can't sell me tap water in an opaque bottle and say it's premium whiskey. That's not free speech.

Other than that, I agree. I've been known to quote the Voltaire to exhaustion :-)

tranglos:
Oh, one more thing.

You can't blame someone from maximizing their income in this tough economy-Innuendo (February 23, 2012, 03:00 PM)
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Please tell me you are trolling me! This is exactly what spammers used to say. The original spammers, back in the day. "Can't blame us for trying to make a living, we're entrepreneurs just like you!" They were laughed out of court on many occasions, but more importantly, of course I can blame them  for their grossly unethical business model. All analogies are brittle and all that, but this is very much like running a garbage disposal company where you take people's money and dump their garbage in a local river. Customers are happy (garbage gone cheaply), you are happy (money coming in), and everybody suffers.

Come on, I can't believe you were serious there.

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