Bloggers everywhere are in revolt over Philadelphia’s “blog tax” controversy. Philadelphia is requiring all bloggers to pay a $50 per year (or $300 lifetime) license fee.
Needless to say, bloggers have more than a little bit to say about this.
Regardless of whether their blogs make money, they are required to pay this tax — the city would like you to call it a “licensing fee” because tax sounds so. . . tax-y — all because a few bloggers made money from ads.
“There’s often a blurry line when someone’s passion becomes their profession,” said Doug Oliver, a spokesman for the Mayor’s office, entirely missing the point of people who try to find their life’s purpose and make a living at doing what they love.
Their argument is that any business that has profit making potential, whether it’s through ads or any other means, must pay the tax licensing fee, even if you only made $3 from your blog.
At the very least, this is a nuisance and one that will be done away with once Philadelphia realizes how stupid it is. A step above that, it’s a First Amendment violation, and it’s going to take someone like the EFF or ACLU to step in and fight this. And worst, Philadelphia is only going to contribute to the brain drain of their city as smart bloggers leave the city in search of a less taxing locale. (Note to Philadelphia bloggers: come to Indianapolis. We’d be happy to have you.)
Other cities have tried requiring licensing fees for organized protesters and those were defeated in the courts under First Amendment grounds, so hopefully Philadelphia will be soundly spanked and other cities will learn the folly of trying to levy a tax against people who barely make any money doing what they do for their passion.
While one could argue that it’s “only” 50 bucks a year, or $4.17 per month, it’s the principle of the thing. Most bloggers spend hours a week on their hobby, often already paying for domain name registration, site hosting, templates. They buy blogging books and attend blogging conferences. They already pay to pursue their hobby, and now Philadelphia wants to get their grubby little fingers into everyone else’s pie.
What’s next for Mayor Michael Nutter’s office? What passion can they suck the life out of with another tax licensing fee? Maybe artists or athletes or people who grow their own vegetables?
What do you think? Is Philadelphia being unfair, or should they charge a licensing fee to bloggers? What’s the upside? What’s the downside? What’s to keep all of Philadelphia’s bloggers from moving out to the suburbs (or Indianapolis) and thumbing their noses at their hometown?
Blogger FINALLY Gets Spam Filter
My biggest frustration with Blogger has been the absolute lack of spam moderation. This has been a problem, because I’ve had my humor blog for five years on Blogspot. And while I have been relatively free of spam, lately I’ve been getting a single spam message by a Chinese spammer on every post I make, which meant I had to delete it every single time.
I tried making people sign in, then made it so only people with a Google account could leave a comment. But this weasel was always a step ahead, and I had to delete message after message.
But Blogger finally caught up with something WordPress has been able to do for years: block spam comments.
Blogger now filters spam comments into a spam folder, just like the one they have in Gmail.
While I thoroughly appreciate the filter and the fact that they’re finally doing something about blog spam, why couldn’t they do this a couple years ago?
Erik is the VP of Creative Services for Professional Blog Service. He has been blogging since 1998, and has been a published writer for more than 22 years. He is a newspaper humor columnist, appearing in 10 papers around Indiana. He has also written numerous business articles, radio theater plays, and stage plays. Erik helped write Twitter Marketing for Dummies, and is currently working on Branding Yourself: How to use social media to invent or reinvent yourself, which will be released in December 2010 by Que Publishing. He is writing a third book on social media and networking. Erik frequently speaks about blogging and social media.
Tags: Blogger, blogging, comments, spam
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Six Secrets to Automating Your Social Media Communication
How can you make your social media communication easier? Are there any tips or tricks to use to reduce some of the heavy lifting you have to do just to get your messages out to the public?
Since I do social media communication, for myself and for clients, I use several shortcuts to automate a lot of what I do. Rather than posting a blog, and then posting the headline and URL to Twitter, then over at Facebook, and again at LinkedIn, I try to do it in one step. Or rather than uploading photos and videos to Flickr, Picasa, and YouTube, and then uploading them to a blog post to share them, I’m able to do it all at once.
I wrote this for Martin Earley, who is the new Inn-Bedded Resorter at The Balsams Grand Resort Hotel in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire. I was one of five finalists, and got to meet Martin during our stay there. I think he was a great choice, and I know he’ll have a good time. But he also has to report what he’s doing via social media, which can be difficult if you’re trying to post content to both your site and a work site, so I offered him some tips to make his work easier. As I started writing them out, I decided it would be just as easy to put it into a blog post.
Here are a few of the tricks and tools I use to make my life a whole lot easier:
WARNING! Do NOT set up Ping.fm to post something TO your blog if you already set up a Twitterfeed-Ping combination FROM your blog. This will create an infinite loop, which will tear a hole in the space-time continuum. This could be bad.
Now, I know Blogger and WordPress both do this, but Posterous does something that the others won’t do: if you upload photos, Posterous will also send them to your Flickr and/or Picasa accounts. Upload a video, and Posterous will send it to your YouTube account.
So, if you take some photos on your cell phone, attach them to an email, and send them to Posterous, you can send them to any special photo accounts, as well as populate your other blog feeds, which are then sent out to your Twitter, Facebook, etc.
While I don’t recommend automating everything you do in social media, like message creating, it’s at least a great way to lighten your load and make your life easier.
Photo credit: genewolf (Flickr)
Erik is the VP of Creative Services for Professional Blog Service. He has been blogging since 1998, and has been a published writer for more than 22 years. He is a newspaper humor columnist, appearing in 10 papers around Indiana. He has also written numerous business articles, radio theater plays, and stage plays. Erik helped write Twitter Marketing for Dummies, and is currently working on Branding Yourself: How to use social media to invent or reinvent yourself, which will be released in December 2010 by Que Publishing. He is writing a third book on social media and networking. Erik frequently speaks about blogging and social media.
Tags: Blogger, blogging, Flickr, Picasa, Posterous, Social Media, WordPress, youtube
Posted in All Posts, Blogging, Marketing, Social Media, Tools, Writing | View Comments
Why Writers Need a Dedicated Website or Blog
Writers are some of the worst self-promoters I know.
“I’m a writer, not a marketer” is the familiar lament.
Writers suffer from the all-too-familiar “if you build it they will come” syndrome. If I write something, publishers should leap out of their chair, shouting that their lifelong search is over, and take the private jet to my house and sign me to a huge book deal. Problem is, it just doesn’t work that way.
Show me a writer who’s not a marketer, and I’ll show you a failed writer.
Fellow humor writer Bruce “8 Simple Rules” Cameron (yeah, those 8 Simple Rules) recently said in an email, “So, despite the fact that nobody can prove to me that a writer needs a dedicated web site, I re-designed and re-launched my writer website last month.”
There are any number of reasons why writers need their own website. First and foremost, it’s a marketing tool. You build awareness with your website, you give this increasingly-online world a place to find you. Before it was easy to build a website, Bruce built an email subscription list of 40,000 people in 52 countries in the late 1990s. That was his marketing tool, and one he used to great effect, but it wasn’t easy to find or join.
Secondly, it’s a publishing tool. If you’re just starting out as a writer, there’s no better way to start publishing and finding readers. Set up a blog, write stuff, and gather readers. Then, keep writing stuff and gathering more readers. Eventually, your writing will be seen by influential people, and you’ll find newer and bigger opportunities.
So to answer Bruce’s question, and in keeping with his writings, I give you…
8 Simple Rules Why Writers Need Their Own Dedicated Website:
You don’t need a dedicated website that cost $5,000 though. Maybe if you want some funky graphics or an ecommerce site, you can spend that much. (I can even put you in touch with the people who can help you.)
Instead you can just get by with a simple WordPress.com or Blogger.com website. Or if you want to get really complex, lease some server space, download WordPress.org to it, and you can have your own look and design, and even add your own plugins. (Our Pro Blog site is made with WordPress.org.)
The great thing about WordPress and Blogger is that they all allow you to add pages. You don’t have to deal with the typical blog look of only having one page. Not only will you have your blog page, you can create additional pages for your bio, contact information, videos of you doing book readings, and useful links.
While you don’t have to sell your soul and become a dedicated marketer, it won’t hurt to start thinking that way. (We’ll give you a good price for it.) If you still don’t want to, don’t worry. There are still thousands of writers — many of whom are worse than you — who are out promoting and marketing themselves online, being found by editors, and having important meetings about special projects. But you can console yourself with the thought that you didn’t resort to marketing (eww!) to promote your work.
You’ll need to when you see their books in the bookstore.
Photo credit: Djuliet (Flickr)
Erik is the VP of Creative Services for Professional Blog Service. He has been blogging since 1998, and has been a published writer for more than 22 years. He is a newspaper humor columnist, appearing in 10 papers around Indiana. He has also written numerous business articles, radio theater plays, and stage plays. Erik helped write Twitter Marketing for Dummies, and is currently working on Branding Yourself: How to use social media to invent or reinvent yourself, which will be released in December 2010 by Que Publishing. He is writing a third book on social media and networking. Erik frequently speaks about blogging and social media.
Tags: blog, Blogger, humor writing, WordPress, writing
Posted in Blogging, Communication, Marketing, Tools, Writing | View Comments