How to make bloggers hate you

by Grace on May 9th, 2007

Ok, so this is a blog on Philippine cultures, but we do post about blogging and bloggers sometimes. So I’d like to take this liberty and participate in Problogger’s Group Writing Project “Top Five”, by following Darren’s advice on writing a post on blogging. My contribution?

How to make bloggers hate you: My top Five

1. Insult their craft. “You mean bloggers call themselves journalists?!” Yes, most bloggers do, and some circles in traditional media will deny that to death. According to them, bloggers are NOT journalists - they have no training, no diploma, do not adhere to any standards, and lack accountability. Bloggers are “not legitimate members of the press” (so says Apple) and therefore are not protected under the Fifth Amendment. If you want bloggers to hate you, dump these on them. (If you want them to love you, pass this into law.)

2. Splog. Scrape. Steal. Don’t even link back to the original post. Just feed it into your site. It’s a fast way to earn some buck without the work. What can the blogger do? Take this case, for example. Would you email the splogger if there’s no real address? Will you link to that splog site so you can raise your co-bloggers’ attention toward it? What would you do?

3. ~~Correct~~ Insult their errors in grammar and spelling. Oh yeah. Most bloggers have a good command of English (the universal blogging language), but sometimes in the haste to put up a post, mistakes happen. Like this case. The post title was corrected AFTER mistakes have been pointed out, but alas, the URL carries that mistake to this day. The author (ok I admit this is me), doesn’t mind being corrected at all. Mistakes do happen. But having a comment that goes, “I pray for you people that you learn to spell and/or proof read.” OUCH. Well now, the commenter might be hating me for splashing that comment on THIS blog.

4. Hack the blog’s server. Hack with unwanted sites and links. Even Darren wasn’t immune to this. Well, maybe his blog is a target because of how influential it is. Pop-ups are a nuisance, but hacking…

5. Write a post like this one. “UGH… should have thought of this one before she did!” *evil laugh*. Ok, I’ll get into trouble for this post. I’m a blogger too, so before you throw rotten tomatoes my way (which you’ll have to do toward your screen so better think twice), hey I only took the lessons I learned reading Day 2 of the GWP. (You have to read all the way to the end for the ‘lessons learned’).

Disclaimer - Just to make myself clear, In no way do I hate bloggers. I am not even an expert blogger nor am known in the inner-blogging circles. I have no knowledge on how to hack or splog, scrape or steal content. I do not insult others about their grammar or their craft, and would value correction and recognition as a journalist. I just thought this was a controversial post (or maybe not). So please, don’t hate me.

And I sure would like to read a counter, a rebuttal or a solution.

Tags: blogging. blogs, journalism, journalist, Problogger

Number 3 is my particular bane, so much so that any comment that had “would have” (I usually say “would of”) would send an email back to the author saying “piss off and leave me alone”. Eventually over time I got used to saying “would have”, then my readers saying “who are you, and what have you done with Rhys?”

The example I use is from former pro wrestler turned author Mick Foley. He was writing about The Fonz from Happy Days, and he asked which conveys more meaning of his catchphrase: the gramatically correct “Hey”, or the incorrect “ayyyyyyyyyyyyy!”

Rules are there to be broken ;)

Top Five Group Writing Project: Day 3 Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 6:05 am

Eli James Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 9:14 am

Bloggers are NOT journalists! They aren’t! They’re something completely new, completely different.

There you go! An alternative! ;P

Mjuboy Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 9:37 am

Omg, I hate you!!

Haha, j/k :)

Group Writing Project - Top 5 Day 3 | Techie Buzz Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 9:58 am

Grace Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 10:22 am

Rhys, I don’t mind being corrected but some are just plain disrespectful. Wait till they hear my accent.. then what?

Mjuboy - I think I can handle that :-)
Eli - now that’s a food for thought. Did you take a look at the bill in Congress? It’s worth passing into law I think. We may not be called traditional journalists but give us the respect of protection. And maybe having the same responsibilities that journalists have to follow aren’t too bad either.

Group Writing Project - Top 5 Day 3 : WinonBet.org Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 11:36 am

ear sucker » Blog Archive » Group Writing Project Day Three Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 12:10 pm

Travis Eneix » Some Pyramid Schemes are Nice Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 3:22 pm

Tammy Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 4:56 pm

Excellent post. Someone just sent me this URL too:

http://www.splogreporter.com/

Everyday Randomness » Group Writing Project Update Says:
May 10th, 2007 at 8:51 pm

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May 11th, 2007 at 12:44 pm

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May 11th, 2007 at 8:30 pm

[…] How to make bloggers hate you […]

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May 12th, 2007 at 12:55 am

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