Last time I raved about Twitter, the latest hot thing in the Web 2.0 world (okay, it’s been up for quite a while now, but it’s only now that its popularity is taking off). But not everyone is happy with Twitter. And they do have their reasons. One such person is Abe Olandres, erstwhile editor of the Blog Herald, and my problogger compatriot. He cites five reasons why we won’t see him on Twitter.

1. It’s so like blogging in 1999 all over again.
2. I’m always invisible (or offline) in all my Instant Messengers. Why would I want to be visible on Twitter?
3. I don’t like to be watched.
4. I don’t have enough time.
5. Imagine Twittering on your phone. It could get really expensive.
   

I’m aware Abe is usually busy with a lot of business and personal undertakings, and being on Twitter is just like telling everyone you’re open to chat. But I think he misses the point when it comes to the microblogging aspect of Twitter. Sure, it’s like 1999 all over again, with micro updates and super-short entries. But then for me, Twitter isn’t meant to replace my regular blog/s. Twitter is meant to compliment my regular blogs, where I would rather post meatier and more substantial material.

Twitter is not for everyone, especially those who value their privacy much (to the point of being paranoid?). But for me, you don’t necessarily have to answer the question what are you doing right now (in 140 characters or less). Some use Twitter as a CB radio of sorts—to broadcast messages to their network of friends (and the public as well, whomever might be listening in).

If you’re not much for Twitter, what are your reasons?

I’ve been an avid blogger for a couple of years now. Sometimes I just get the urge to micro-blog, or live-blog. That means I want to post just snippets of text or code about what I’m currently into, or what I’m currently thinking. Full-fledged posts sometimes take the wind out of me because I have to think what to write, look for links (if ever I need to cite any info), or even worry about my grammar and spelling. There have been times when I’ve posted one-liners!

But when I re-conceptualized my blog, I thought of focusing more on substantial posts. After all, it’s a waste of online real estate to just post one-liners. They’re not very good for SEO, and readers might think I’m a lazy poster (sometimes I am!). And nobody really reads those one-liners, much less post on the comment threads. After all, you can’t respond to a one-liner post much. Same goes if it’s just one short paragraph.

But when I started a Twitter account, I just got hooked. I enjoyed being able to post those one-line messages somewhere. And what’s even better is that people actually respond to my “tweets,” no matter how nonsensical or trivial they are.

My short (and very inconclusive) analysis: it’s because of the network aspect of Twitter that gives it so much interaction. Blogs sure are interactive, but your “friends” in blogging are loosely-defined—there are the blogrolls, in-post links, and such. But with Twitter and other more social systems, your friends are defined, and they get automagically updated whenever you post something. Hey, you can also post from IM or even through your mobile phone via SMS.

Sure, you also get these on other social networks that bundle in blogging services, like MySpace, Friendster, and even Multiply. But Twitter makes it so cool, in that you don’t even have to give much effort in what you write. After all, you’re limited to 140 words. And it’s mostly just to answer the question “what are you doing right now?”

So, what are you doing right now? Here’s what I’ve been up to lately.

I’m a huge fan of word of mouth marketing (WOMM). I dabbled in WOMM a bit while I was working for a tech company—we were selling enterprise blog solutions back then, and we used our own consumer-oriented blogging service to demonstrate the strong points of the software. And now that I write on and manage blogs for a living, word of mouth—or rather word of blog—marketing is still the game.

However, WOMM may not be as powerful a weapon if the wielder doesn’t know how to use it. It’s like a double edged sword. Use it properly and you have an efficient tool. If you don’t know how to work it, you might end up cutting yourself.

Last week, a local PR firm contact a handful of bloggers, which included myself. They were inviting everyone for a free breakfast Monday morning to celebrate the launching of the Power Breakfast line of Max’s restaurant. I gladly obliged—I got a couple of dozen free breakfast passes, which were shared among friends and family. We were regular Max’s patrons, anyway, so we were excited to be part of the marketing blitz. We planned to review the food and the experience on our blogs.

But when the day came, we were quite disappointed because the service sucked. At the branch we visited, we felt discriminated upon because we used free coupons. We saw paying clients served pronto, while we had to wait an hour just to get our food—and that was after we complained to the manager.

Apparently, it was only in the branch we visited where those of us who ate for free were given low priority. Someone’s going to be in hot water for that.

We did blog about our experiences, and boy did we give a bad review. Now people—or at least those who know and trust me and my blogger mom—would probably think twice about eating at that particular Max’s branch. Talk about word of blog marketing backfiring.

It is said, the bigger they are the harder they fall. And this is just what happens in the world of social media. The bigger one site gets to be, it’s also a bigger target, and there are more threats than if it’s just one piddling site or blog that doesn’t really matter.

Here’s a threat faced by Wikipedia. They’re probably relying too much on traffic from the search engines. Google, after all, is probably considered to be the research tool of today. And Wikipedia, meanwhile, is the resource and reference of today. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t trust everything that Google and Wikipedia tell me. But fact is, Wikipedia is already the top external domain that Google directs users to from its search page.

And this could be over with a flick of a switch, so to speak. Google may as well be holding Wikipedia hostage.

With the flick of a switch over at the Googleplex Wikipedia’s traffic could be impacted with an absolute killer-blow. Given Google’s absolute dominance in the search space, such referrals cannot easily be replaced from another source, and Wikipedia may well be a sitting duck.

Compounding this is the belief that Google is applying additional weight to Wikipedia’s domain over and above what would normally be expected.

This all beggars the question ‘why?’.

What does Google plan for Wikipedia?

Then again, Google probably has everyone hostage. In my personal experience, about 70% to 80% of traffic on my personal blogs come from Google. I can probably say the same for most other blogs and sites out there. But my blogs aren’t as big as Wikipedia, and I don’t run the risk of losing a relatively large amount of traffic (and maybe money) if I suddenly disappear from Google.

Or perhaps Google has plans for eventually gobbling up Wikipedia, too, sometime soon. It’s always a possibility, especially given that Wikipedia seems to be looking for a more sustainable business model.

Andy Merrett asks over at the Blog Herald whether super-short posts are good for one’s blog. He argues that a lot of A-listers do it (a.k.a. the speedlinks). He cites some informal studies that say soundbites of about 150 words or less per post are more easily indexed by search engines and likewise easily digested by readers, too.

How’s that for great writing?

Well, in my opinion, it’s not really in the length of a post (or lack thereof) that makes your writing effective. It’s in how your writing gets your point across that matters. So you can write a thousand word essay and not make any sense at all. Two well thought-of, excellently-worded sentences might be all it takes to cinch that deal.

Then again, somewhere in the middle might be the most convincing.

Here’s a good example. AhmedF has a case study at TechSoapbox. He rambles and rambles, and 15 minutes after, he edits his ramblings and came up with a shorter (although not significantly so) article, but a better read at that!

Here’s where 229 words are greater than 326.

His conclusion. Those who write the lengthier posts are lazier than those who write the shorter ones. Or rather, those who edit their posts for brevity, clarity, and ease-of-reading deserve to be called great writers. It’s all about the editing.

Sure, blogs are mostly for rambling. But while you’re at it, why not make your ramblings more readable and understandable? You can even probably earn better from it (if you’re monetizing).

Remember the elevator pitch? You get 30 seconds to pitch your idea to an investor, your CEO, or anyone in power to help make things happen. That 30-second pitch should be brief, but well-thought of.

Be straight to the point, but do remember to include the essential details. Keep it short and simple.

The other day I gave a talk at a forum hosted by a nearby university’s Mass Communications department. It was about social news, and how it’s changing the media landscape. At the start of the talk, I was asking who had been using social news sites such as DIGG and the like. I was a bit surprised to learn that out of the dozens who attended, only a couple were familiar with DIGG. Of course, most were familiar with social networking sites such as Friendster (which was part of the discussion, actually).

So this gets me thinking. Is social news ever going to become popular here in my country? I would say there are structural and cultural reasons that keep social media from being popular here. For one, the strong presence of the mainstream media would probably be one big hindrance to that. We are a country with two dominant players in the broadcast industry, and they span various media—from television, to cable, to radio. And we are a country with a relatively low Internet penetration rate. Most of those who have Internet access usually have to do so using public terminals, at ‘net cafes and libraries.

So how could people give a damn about social news, if they don’t feel the need to be part of the new media landscape? Social news is about the users being prosumers of information, after all (that is Toffler-speak for being a producer and consumer at the same time). But without the infrastructure, how could people contribute, then? And if you cannot expect your audience to be able to access your contributions to the big picture, then what’s the point?

I would not lose hope, though. Social news, after all, is only beginning to transform how information is shared and consumed around the world. And while I will probably be unable to influence my compatriots to suddenly adopt social media rather than stick to the old media, I would say we can still consider social news very useful. Our audience, after all, transcends geography and even culture. While social news is about the society, the Web has broken down the barriers set by geographic distance. My contributions can be consumed from faraway lands. My audience is not limited to whom I am physically close.

Is social news meant for the masses? Perhaps not today. But that’s not really a problem, is it?

Duncan Riley writes over at 901am that Wikipedia has expressed financial difficulties unless it gets more funding real soon. I agree with Duncan that this smells of an attempt, indeed, to get sympathy from the general public.

In a rather extraordinary example of begging for money, Florence Devouard, Chairwoman of the Wikimedia foundation has told an audience at the Lift07 conference that Wikipedia has the financial resources to run its servers for another 3-4 months, and that without further funding Wikipedia “might disappear”.

Does Wikipedia really need money to keep on running? Probably, yes. It is one of the most visited destinations online (I’d say 30% of my daily surfing is on Wikipedia—checking out episode recaps of my favorite shows). And that amount of traffic requires a ton of processing power, bandwidth and people to make sure nothing screws up. But should Wikipedia really have difficulty sourcing funds? I think not.

After all, as I just said a few sentences ago, Wikipedia is one of the most visited destinations online. and it’s only reasonable for a site of Wikipedia’s stature to be able to raise funds easily.

However, it may not be that easy for Wikipedia to find a good business model. First and foremost, it’s seen by the public as a trustworthy and authoritative source of facts and information. Wikipedia practically controls the truth. Now any monetization activities might just taint that reputation. If Wikipedia starts to get corporate sponsorship, then there is a risk that the site gets branded as a sell-off (possibly biased towards the interests of the advertisers). If Wikipedia gets acquired/bought by another company (say any one of the biggies like Google, Microsoft, News Corp, etc.), then there is also a high likelihood that the site might be seen as serving the interests of its new owners.

Is it really that difficult to make a business out of Wikipedia? Well, in the first place, I would say something of Wikipedia’s status in the community is really difficult to turn into a business in the first place, if it intends to keep the trust value high. When money is involved, there will inevitably a general perception of self-serving interests being catered to.

But Wikipedia has to keep afloat. It would be useless if they choose principle over money but end up closing shop.

Here’s one question to you: Would you feel comfortable having ads served on Wikipedia pages?

In my years of blogging I’ve encountered numerous requests to cite my posts and even to syndicate my blog’s content through RSS. By this I mean actually re-publishing the content I made on other sites (sometimes just the summary from the feed). And most of the time I’ve agreed. Actually, my stuff is already published under Creative Commons by attribution licenses. So people are free to use it as long as it’s for non-commercial purposes. And what do you know, the CC license even states that if explicit permission is granted, users may be free to use the content as they please, as long as this is within the agreement with the creator.

Makes me think about something previously posted here by Franky about why not to use Flickr images on your blog.

Back to flickr. No matter if you link back, credit the photo or rely on Fair Use, sooner or later D’Artagnan, or was it Don Quichote, will show up and create a whole drama in your comments.
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Imagine the photographer suddenly decides to change the license into “no rights”.

Now those are good points. Licenses can be changed anytime and you might find yourself in hot water for pics that are suddenly illegally used.

I think there’s nothing that cannot be solved by some good ol’ fashioned diplomacy. I’d say go ahead and use Flickr images. To be sure, don’t forget to use the search for CC licensed images that allow republishing, modifications, or even commercial use. But it would be best to both link to the original site, and also to ask permission from the owner of the photo, even if it’s explicitly stated that you may already use the image. For one, you get to have new online contacts. And then you’re assured that the person is allowing you to use his or her content, even if the license changes in the future. Emails make for good paper trail.

You get to cover your arse and make new friends at the same time.

And so it happens. I remember awhile back predicting that Google is bound to get a lot of legal flak for stuff on its most recent big acquisition—YouTube. So a good number of stuff on YouTube is copyrighted material. Not everyone is complaining, though. Some have even banked on getting more popular because of their material on YouTube. Fox doesn’t think so, though. The Blog Herald cites reports that Fox is subpoenaing Google for a YouTuber’s ID.

It looks like Google’s dedication to the privacy of its users will tested once again. Twentyth Century Fox has filed a subpoena against the search engine king in order to reveal the identity of a certain YouTuber who uploaded a certain episode of the show 24 online.

(Digital Bulletin) The subpoena, which was filed by a judge in California on January 18, could spark a heavyweight media collision between 20th Century Fox and Google, which acquired social media site YouTube for $1.65bn last year. It was also issued to lesser-known video-sharing site LiveDigital. […]

The new episodes of ‘24′, which stars Kiefer Sutherland and Elisha Cuthbert, appeared on YouTube on January 8, six days prior to its official January 14 premiere on News Corp-owned broadcaster Fox.

Google has currently suspended the account of the account of the YouTuber, who went by the name of ECOtotal. Google (as usual) has provided no comment over the subpoena, although this latest incident makes one wonder whether or not the search engine king is actually enforcing its copyright policy, something they vowed to do last year in October.

Well, surely that sucks for Fox—to have your material shown on the Internet days before the actual airing! But then again, to some, seeing Elisha Cuthbert makes it all worth it! Long live YouTube!

Entrepreneur’s Journey has an excellent analysis of whether problogging is a sustainable endeavor. Yaro Starak writes:

Even those professional bloggers who do realize full time income from blogging and enjoy the independence of the occupation, eventually realize that rather than creating a business with a sustainable income model they have created a job for themselves. Essentially professional bloggers are like freelance journalists, dependent on their ability to perpetually type day after day in order to keep the content = traffic = income equation functioning.

Yaro argues that while content + traffic = money (yes, the math’s a bit off, but you get the picture: good content and good amount of traffic translate to revenues, assuming you do monetize your site), for most people earning from their blogs, it becomes a job. True enough, you have to write, you have to research, you have to give attention to your blog or blogs if you intend to earn good money.

Not that there’s anything bad about that. But Yaro is approaching the concept of problogging from an entrepreneur’s perspective. And to an entrepreneur, having something that you would have to continuously work on to get returns is not the ideal situation. The ideal is to pour your heart out starting something so that after some time you can simply reap the rewards even when you’re not actively working on that endeavor. In short: passive income!

Yaro then gives examples of how you can be assured of passive income. It won’t come easy, though. For one, you might have to be really popular before this can happen.

Steve Pavlina is perhaps one of the best examples of a blogger who could stop writing and currently doesn’t write every day (although he does write some nasty sized articles) and can expect reasonable income – very high income compared to most bloggers and salary workers – for many months and even years to come thanks to his blog archives.

The conclusion?

Professional Blogging Is Not A Sustainable Business Model

As far as I can tell there is no way to create a sustainable business model if you are the only person doing the work as a professional blogger. The best result you can hope for is a very well paying scenario of self employment.

Probloggers can explore other possibilities, though. Start a blog network! Or, build up blogs to sell afterwards! I know of a couple of people who follow these business models.

Of course, being a self-employed problogger can be a good start.