Regarding Paid Posts / Cybersquatting Claims
I apologize for this post being a bit late — I was away yesterday and came back to negative comments regarding what I said about Domainers.org and cybersquatting.
Just to clarify my position:
1 - I was not paid for this post or any post ever made on this blog. Furthermore, I have no interest in ever accepting money for posts made on this blog — If I don’t support something, it won’t be posted on or at least not in a positive light. No amount of money will change that stance. If I decide I want to make money off this blog at some point, there are many ways to do so without selling out my credibility (eg. banner ads). I have ran this blog since November 2008 and my previous blog on 4 letter .coms at 4letternoob.wordpress.com and BQB.com before then, beginning in November 2007. I have not made 1 cent up to date off of anything other than domain purchases/sales and domain broker offers that came my way courtesy of this blog. Even the ads I put on this blog in the past were merely to support people in this industry I respect. I tried one affiliate ad for Parked.com for a week — didn’t get me any referrals and I haven’t bothered looking for a way to monetize this blog since.
2 - Nothing I wrote in that post was my opinion or Francois’ opinion — I was quoting what someone said to him. If you still want to unsubscribe, go right ahead - less bandwidth for me to pay for. Like I said, I make nothing off of this blog so I couldn’t care less if being honest about what I think costs me some traffic.
3 - I agree with Jeff + Chef Patrick that posting a picture is best. I’m usually fairly sleep deprived, so posting a pic of me with purple bags under my eyes might make me look more like a junkie than a domainer.
4 - Kevin Ohashi, I don’t know what the hell your problem is. You come off as a real prick here and elsewhere I’ve read your posts.
I appreciate everyone taking time out of their day to comment on this post and others. Hopefully this cleared things up.
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July 18th, 2009 at 5:41 am
Francois has been good to you therefore you were doing a favor by promoting his site. That’s how business works and anyone who doesn’t know it should just be ignored. Secondly, I agree that a real picture should be put up. It’s pretty easy to come up with a 48 X 48 picture and mine looks like hell but it’s a picture. (Full version on Twitter @ShaneCultra for all the ladies). And finally, you are getting too mad, its a blog and there will always be haters. Have fun with them or simply ignore them. The bigger your blog gets the more you’ll have to learn to deal with them.
July 18th, 2009 at 9:57 am
Not too long ago I wrote that one thing I liked about domainers — despite not being one myself, I just own a few domain names — is that while heated arguments do arise, they don’t turn into the napalm wars I’ve suffered through in fan forums. The recent reactions to your posts remind me that people in any profession, hobby, trade or sphere will sometimes clash.
Actually, I was going to defend you for not putting a real photo of yourself. You are a reputable businessman and a consummate professional who is providing valuable information to anyone who visits your blog for free. Given your history, you have no need to put a picture of yourself on-line to establish credibility. If you choose to, that’s fine, and I can understand the argument that it would be more professional, but you shouldn’t be persecuted for not doing so. As someone who uses a pseudonym for several reasons and who is adverse to having a photo of herself associated with said pseudonym, I am disturbed how quickly people judge those who don’t put up photos. Maybe we don’t photograph well. Maybe we don’t like being judged based on appearance. Maybe we know that 10 or 20 years down the road, when we have established ourselves someone will use that image against us. But that’s the poster’s business. Are we going to browbeat everyone who has an on-line presence to reveal their “secret identities?”
It seems you’re able to defend yourself quite capably, though. Even though I’m an outsider in all of this, I trust you, Reece Berg.
July 18th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
Thanks Shane and Destina - much appreciated
July 18th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
@Reece
I think it’s fair to say that no one likes a fat, ugly, hairy pussy - perhaps its time to change your pic …
July 18th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
Haha, thanks Richard
I’ll try and get something better up sometime soon.
July 19th, 2009 at 11:43 am
Haters are the price of success methinks. Let the haters hate, the lovers love and the world will unfold as it should.
Seriously, I didn’t think you were shilling for Francois, and you weren’t
July 19th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I agree with the positive remarks as well. I could care less if you’re a 4 foot man or a 600 pound man. Your picture really makes no difference to most people. Some people might feel like they know you better with a picture. Others might think you should be like everyone else. As long as your business ethic and sales status is superb, it makes do difference to me.
No need for the whiners to bash you. As far as I’m concerned you can post gibberish about 10 letter domains and I will still find it a good read. I actually find it humorous that you snapped back so quickly. Your regular readers know where your stance is with most topics anyways, or they wouldn’t come back every week.
July 19th, 2009 at 10:46 pm
Thanks guys — appreciate it
Now I need to make an intelligent post on 10 letter domains (kidding!)
July 20th, 2009 at 6:38 am
I was rather surprised at some of the comments as well, especially the one who said your first strike was misleading him about LLLL domains. I mean, the only guy who can absolutely predict the future is God, and as far as I know, he’s not blogging yet.
Just goes to say, even the nicest guys have their detractors. Or I should say, the nicest guys especially get detractors. I notice the “in your face” bloggers have all their readers too scared to whine. Maybe that’s why they do it.
July 21st, 2009 at 7:45 am
Thanks Bill.
If God ever starts blogging about domains, I’ll be the first person to 301 redirect my blog to his