Bad jokes and bloggers: Don't be an April fool

Coming home from a nice vacation always feels a bit weird. Among the reasons to be bummed is the inevitable avalanche of unopened email.

Most of us have spent hours wading through these aging e-messages. I go overseas for a month now and then, and upon return always set aside at least a day to sort it all out. This time, we were gone for only a week up in Big Sur -- but the email queues still were plenty scary.

I get a lot of SEO-related email, as requested from the top bloggers in that business. RSS is OK, but I do prefer email, perhaps just out of habit. I use a Yahoo email account for those subscriptions.

What struck me this time out was the amount of time-wasting material that flowed in from these "pro" bloggers. Taken day-to-day it's no big deal, but in a lump you can really get annoyed.

Our road trip coincided with April Fool's Day. Five days later, all that "fun" prank copy stunk like the beached dead fish we tried not to squash while hiking the coast.

Yeah, I'm a grouch and, yeah, everyone means well, but I'm not a big fan of wasting your readers' time.

One blogger devoted something like three screens' worth of copy to telling readers how to get along with Google. Stuff like, phoning the search engine engineers directly, stuffing a blog with keywords, linking out to bad neighborhoods and buying links in bulk. Readers got the joke in graf 2.

Goodwill goes a long way, of course. Shoemoney, the popular Net marketing guru, writes about wrestling now and then (yawn), and regularly posts pictures of himself wearing some company's T-shirts. I'm not complaining -- the guy gives away a lot of decent content. I do think off-topic posts are bad news when they're the blog's only entries of the day, though.

If you're writing for the public, be respectful of people's time, especially in the business arena. Injecting personality into a pro blog helps build audience loyalty -- lord knows I could use some more flare here -- but always keep in mind that goodwill is a finite resource.

That's this post's message, but if you have some time to kill, read on ...

Back to April Fool's Day: One clown decided to blog that Darren Rowse, who writes the excellent ProBlogger, had gone bankrupt and never had made more than $1,000 a month from blogging. Rowse then saw the libelous content on the Wikipedia page about him. An employee wanted to know if he'd be paid; a lot of people were confused. To make matters worse, the bogus post was time-stamped March 31.

Rowse reluctantly wrote about the incident today, also addressing spoofs in general:

"While it might be blatantly obvious to you and 99% of your readers that you’re not serious - you will fool someone. Perhaps they just read the title, perhaps the skim the post and don’t see the clues or perhaps they just believe it without question. As a result I tend to only play jokes that use my own name or reputation -- or would advise that if you’re going to involve someone else that you might want to check with them first."

Rowse isn't suing, apparently, making one joker a very lucky man. Also burned by this thing was fellow pro blogger Jeremy Shoemoney, who was falsely reported as arrested for riding a bike while intoxicated. Hic.

Rowse, for the record, has never wasted my time. Read him and learn.

And by the way ... thanks for your time.

Blogging at home: Don't feed the morlocks

I've been meaning to blog about what it's like to blog as an occupation. I do other things -- consulting, writing for other media, managing web sites, L.A. lunch-taking, running my NCAA 08 team -- but most of my time is spent butt in chair, in my home office. Blogging. Or futzing with my blogs.

So I'm busier than when I worked for Corporate World Inc. Fortunately, another blogger has a head start on this topic. The post is called "Cons of Being a Problogger." Here is some selected wisdom of David Peralty at the blog xfep.com (Extra for Every Person):

Most people wouldn’t expect working from home to be an item on the cons list, but it is. There are a lot more distractions at home from telemarketers, family and friends, and objects you own. I have found days wasted in front of the television, or on the phone, when I should have been getting work done instead. ...

When working as a problogger, you will spend an inordinate amount of time on a computer. So much so that you will have to become an expert at using one. ... (Your) computer(s) will stop working at the worst time, so you best get good at repairing them or know someone that can. ...

There is something about problogging that requires a strange personality. One that can deal with being alone for long periods of time, and yet that same person also has to be able to network, and be interesting to be around. This type of personality is rare, and also a bit odd. ...

Between the high amount of focus and concentration, and the near zero amount physical activity, blogging can really wear you down.

Not sure these are all negatives, but they are true in my experience.

I was surprised to experience what David talks about in the last item, about blogging taking a physical toll. When you go to a bricks-and-mortar workplace, you expend energy all day long just moving from one place to another, getting gas, picking up dry cleaning, walking down hallways, dodging the boss, wandering off to lunch. Even if you sit on your rear all day at work, you're burning calories with supplemental activities. So you're going from sedentary to, um, blob.

If you're home all day, and "going to work" means moving from one room to another, nothing is burned off. Even if your exercise routine and diet stay the same, you're soon in a hole and the extra pounds start adding up. (My official excuse: My trainer moved to London. Bad timing, mate!)

So if blogging full-time is in your future, budget another hour or so a day for hiking, swimming, whatever.

Any form of "getting out of the house" takes extra time out of the workday.

Some other quick thoughts: Your presence at home means more mess, more shopping, more domestic projects. ... Email, IM are just as bad as phone calls in the distraction dept. ... Blogging advice is everywhere and it's tempting to read it all, seeking that one terrific tip that'll turn it all around for your projects. You can chase links and read all day long. ... It is easy to lose control of your schedule. When I get on a roll with writing, I sometimes go until dawn. Argh. Being a morlock sucks. Resist the siren call of the night shift.

(Hat tip to copyblogger)