Getting Noticed, Getting Ignored

Tired of reading my articles on this cheap-looking blog?

Now you have a chance to read some of my stuff at real Web sites -- "real" as in they have corporate sponsors and are created by companies with full-time employees and actual business models.

WhatTheyThink?, the respected Web site covering the printing industry, has posted "Newspaper Production Enters Colorful, Outsourced Era" on its PrintCeo site. (The original is here.) They even figured out how to put the San Francisco Chronicle's video with the article. And don't those ads from the likes of Kodak and Presstek look much prettier than some of my cheesy-looking Google Adsense ads?

RISI, the leading information provider to the paper industry, has posted "Smackdown: Printed Editions vs. Digital Editions" (the original is here). They even created a neat little logo for Dead Tree Edition, though that tree looks suspiciously alive to me.

WhatTheyThink?'s Going Green site has also recognized the smackdown article with very favorable commentary, followed by insightful reader comments.

It never fails to amaze me which articles get multiple links and five-figure audiences -- and which get ignored.

Last week's article about the possibility of emergency increases in postage rates next year has been cited by numerous Web sites I've never even heard of -- and ignored, as far as I can tell, by every major publication and Web site serving industries that rely on mail.

Unless you count Folio:, the bible of the magazine industry. It posted an article yesterday referencing "speculation" about an exigent rate increase of 2% to 3% or maybe an increase of the First Class stamp to 50 cents. I think those are obvious references to my article (Do you agree?), but the Folio: piece never mentions Dead Tree Edition.

Now about those Google ads. I find it interesting to watch Google try to deliver ads that are "context sensitive" and to see how those ads perform -- or don't perform. And getting a few bucks from Google every once in awhile helps me respond when my roommate/partner asks, "Exactly why are you putting all this time into your blog?"

I think I actually came close to earning minimum wage on one quickly written piece -- "Monkeying Around With Postal Pallets". It was a surprise hit among disgruntled postal workers (Are there any gruntled postal workers?) who had fun comparing the orangutans to certain members of Postal Service management. It got more than 20 times as many "hits" as my piece about Twitter quitters, which I thought was much funnier.

You just never know.