The In-Between Days

In some parts of the world, today is "Boxing Day."

Although I lived in the "English" part of the world for a while, most of my memories of December 26th come from my years in retail where the day after Christmas typically was a day of returns-- a day where we prayed that we wouldn't end up "upside down" for the day.

But these are memories.

These days, December 26th marks the beginning of "the in-between days;" that brief period between Christmas and the New Year where I typically sit down and "take stock" of life and think about things I want to accomplish during the coming year.

As I look at the past year in review, I increasingly have become aware that writing has pretty much become a "guilty pleasure" for me. 2015 will mark the 4th consecutive year where writing earned me less than the year before... and I am reaching the point where even considering my writing to be "a business" of any sort of pretty much a joke. Sadly, that's not a trend I see reversing anytime soon... unless I'm willing to return to technical writing, which I am not.

As I observe life on a macro level, it seems that "pure" writers are gradually becoming a part of history, and that writing (if you're trying to make a living) is increasingly reduced to being an adjunct to offering workshops, lectures, retreats and teaching.

As smartphones and mobile devices become the mainstay of Internet access and more and more people use ad blockers on all their devices, the "advertising based model" is becoming obsolete, so the idea of getting rewarded for your own content is falling by the wayside. This year, I watched several revenue sharing web sites shut down, a couple start and fail, and none start and stay strong. So that's no longer part of the mix.

Meanwhile, the old standards for independent writers-- Amazon Associates and Google's Adsense-- also seem to be taking it in the shorts. In a sense, we seem to be returning to the original Internet, which was all about free information-- not about products or selling.

These days, I also find myself contemplating the idea of writing books... and what it means to write books in the digital age,

Writing a book takes a huge investment of time and effort for which you absolutely do NOT get compensated, and then it's pretty chancy whether you'll eventually get a small reward, post publication. I remember a good friend's commentary from earlier in 2015 when he finally published his long-awaited book... in the first week after it was released, he sold a couple of copies and had several dozen requests for "free downloads." Kind of makes me wonder what the whole point is.

Of course, there are those of the persuasion that "writing for money" is a sort of "selling out."

Maybe that's true, and maybe I'd agree... IF I happened to be a "trust fund baby" or otherwise independently wealthy, but as it happens, I must allocate my time wisely because groceries and electricity cost money.

Writing, Politics and the Loss of Alternative Income

In recent months, I have been watching the slow but steady decline of income from my online writing efforts.

Amazon pays less than it ever has, Google Adsense pays less than it ever has, my "revenue sharing" venues are paying less than they ever have. For the first month in many years, I might actually make less than $10. I used think that as long as I "made enough for a dinner out" I could justify spending some time writing every day.

The decline not because readership is down. In fact, readership is fairly broadly up, across my writing venues. The decline is the result of any given page view having less value than ever.

Meanwhile, the "Political Circus" is ramping up as the US Presidential elections of next year draw closer. Various candidates are trying to "establish position" and lots of viewpoints are being tossed around. Conspiracy theorists (at least some of them) would have us all believe that we are powerless anyway... and "nothing short of anarchy" can change our system.

To me, there is little doubt that most politicians are-- to some degree-- little more than sock puppets for business interests. It's one of the great weaknesses of the US political system: Government is ultimately run by those who stand to profit from government.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, by any stretch of the imagination.

What I do see, however-- purely as a keen observer of the human condition-- is that the ever-growing chasm between the "haves" and "have-nots" seems partially fueled by the fact that our ability to create "alternative" income streams is closing... that is, it gets harder and harder to be "outside the system."

Well.

Not harder to BE outside the system, but to LIVE outside the system. You can BE outside the system to your heart's content, you just can't make a living there, anymore. Or it's a lot more work than it used to be.

Again, not being a conspiracy theorist here... just postulating that just like the income earned by minimum wage (and most hourly) workers hasn't increased at the same rare as the life expenses of those people, similarly the income increases of the self-employed (most of us) haven't kept up with increasing costs to do business, and simply to live.

It's 2015, and I make about the same as I did in 2006. "Product X" or "Service Y" from a small contributor like me sells for about the same then and now. And if I have "the nerve" to up my prices, I will just lose overall business. When it comes to writing and getting paid... the "per word" rates are largely unchanged.

The math behind that simply doesn't work, from a functional perspective. And this, many feel increasing pressure to "comply" and just go get a mainstream job that fits "in the establishment" somewhere, and serves the "machine" we have been trying to operate independently of.

I feel sad for those writers who actually depend on this gig for paying their electric bills...

A Little Bit Disgusted

In recent weeks, I have been growing increasingly disgusted with the whole writing business.

Seems to me that the time may have come where I-- and many of my fellow online writers who have been using the method for years-- simply need to quit and throw in the towel on the whole idea of being able to make a few dollars from "micropayments" from their writing.

As I watch what goes on-- and read between the proverbial "lines"-- it seems more and more evident that it is getting all but impossible to gain any income from revenue sharing sites and ad revenue.

Web users increasingly use "ad blockers" and "collective publishing" web sites (like HubPages) increasingly get downgraded as "too spammy" by search engines... meaning that their web traffic and search engine traffic is caught in a cycle of decline.

Meanwhile-- if you are a web site owner or blogger who uses something like Adsense, or even the popular Amazon Associates to monetize your web properties-- it seems like the "revenue per page view" is in an eternal downward spiral with no logical end in site.

I recently looked at my own personal site stats from September and observed that with more (and "current") content than ever before, my Amazon commissions had actually declined to less than one dollar for the month for the second month is a row... compared to $15-20 a month, just a couple of years ago. Meanwhile my AdSense revenues had shrunk by almost 50%, while my site visits were up almost 50%, for the same period.

I suppose the good news is that my content attracts readers... I just no longer have a way to be commercially rewarded for that. Reminds me of "old days" as a writer where "compensation" was sometimes offered in the form of "yeah, but it will look good on your resumé!" Nice. Try using that to pay for your groceries, next time you're at Safeway!

The more I look at this, the more it feels like we are returning to some version of the "Free Web" that existed in pre-advertising days.

But something does not compute-- because the web is NOT "free." Billions of dollars have to be spent on servers, content maintenance and infrastructure... and that has to come from somewhere.

Unfortunately, it seems like it increasingly comes from "deceptive practices," in the form of those "other suggested content" listings now so prominent on many web sites. "Content," that is, that actually isn't even "content," but advertising or links to some kind of malware that will eternally insist that you need to defrag your hard drive in order to "improve performance," while serving you a barrage of ads for gambling or porn web sites.

Feels like the web has learned nothing at all.

Also feels like the average writer's avenues for the pursuit of an honestly begotten dollar or two are being closed off. So much for making a few bucks to pay their electric bill...

Forging While the Iron is Hot

What I have increasingly learned about writing is that I need to “just do it” when the idea strikes.

The “problem” I have always had is that I am seldom in a position to act on my ideas when I have them.

I have spent virtually all my adult life being in a position where “I have to get my work done” took the front seat in my experience of life. Not because I was greedy or trying to amass wealth, but because I had to deal with the reality of shut-off notices and bill collectors… as I have never been employed at doing anything that earned me more than basic “scraping by.”

Ironic, considering that I have a college degree from a highly accredited University. Problem is, I never had the kind of ambition to pursue a conventional career… and the things I did have an inclination to pursue were never well compensated—if they were compensated at all.

So I have made reams and reams of in-the-moment-notes of the ideas I have had, all with the intention of "coming back someday" to develop said ideas into articles, blog posts and even books.

The problem is always the same: "Someday" never arrives... because I can't afford them to.

Often, I find myself waiting for the "perfect day" to sit down and start writing. Of course, there is no such thing as perfection... so that's not going to happen. Then I tell myself that I just "need to get organized." Well, I did that back in spring when we spent a few days in Joshua Tree... then I did some more of it while we were in Denmark for three weeks. Aside from that, two articles were actually written... in spite of the fact that I have notes enough for about 1200.

In the end, it increasingly seems like I just need to sit down and write when the mood strikes me.

When I view that in the context of "I can't AFFORD that," the net result is that I have pretty much become a non-writer.

And that makes me feel sad.

Of writing, eggs and baskets and all that good stuff...

So... a few days ago, I managed to transfer all my content from (now defunct) Zujava to my two HubPages accounts.

I am glad that I managed to get it done... on the other hand, it was a reminder of just how much work it is to "do things properly," as well as a (sortof) reminder of why most people do not do things "properly:" It is just too damn much work.

I am never going to be a particularly prolific writer because of this particular aspect of my personality. I found myself in a discussion on a writers' forum a while back, and soon realized that my "process" for writing any given article seems 100x more laborious than any of my peers'.

Perfectionistic tendencies are a bitch...

In any case, the shutdown of Zujava and having to my my content to HubPages brought me face to face with the reality that I now have all my writing "eggs" in one basket-- at least as far as "revenue sharing" sites go. Although Bubblews has recently been revamped and "re-launched," I am not sure whether the site can effectively be counted as "revenue sharing" at this point.

Meanwhile, the rest of my "writing eggs" are in my personal web sites, which need some work since they bear more and more "weight" as a material part of my writing.

Meanwhile, it is summer which has always been a somewhat "slow" time for me, as a writer... but I am hoping to take some of the ideas from our Denmark trip and turn them into "something."

Zujava Shuts Down: The Annoyance of "Old" vs "New" work

The annoying thing about writing for external content sites-- as opposed to merely writing for your own blogs and web sites-- is the general lack of control.

A while back, I wrote about another content (and revenue) sharing site-- Zujava-- closing down. Whereas it is both sad and annoying to lose another online venue, there's also a secondary annoyance associated with this news: Now everyone has to scramble-- and waste a lot of time and creative energy-- to retrieve, revise and republish their content from that site in a new location.

The "annoyance factor" lies largely in the fact that such closures and moves means that writers have to "back burner" all new work for a period of days to months to deal with "old" work... or simply face losing lots of previously created content; watching effort and creativity head down the tubes.

Revenue sharing sites that actually pay contributors for their content seem like a great idea-- on paper-- but very few turn out to have the staying power to be "in the game" for more that a couple of years or three, and often a lot less than that... many get started with great promises and fold within a year.

This always leaves me asking myself the same old question: Is it even worth the effort to try to contribute to third party sites that "pretend" to offer compensation? Or are we actually better off just contributing minimally to curated sites that are a good match for our content... and not worrying about "the money;" instead focusing on those sites being like beacons of "promotional vehicles" for the bulk of our content, which we keep on our own sites, that we control and manage?

Either way, "getting something" for your writing on the web seems like an extreme long-term proposition. The only web site/blog combo I own that generates reliable traffic does so because I have been posting to it consistently since 2002 and it has gradually developed a following... and that's a really long time to way for a paycheck. And even so, it's just a few dollars. Is it "worth" it?

In the end, I suppose I have to confess that even having $20 is better than "not having $20," and that's why I still contribute... even though I also have to confess that these words-- and my many others-- have nothing to do with money, and everything to do with a love for writing.

In the meantime, I need to go move some content from yet another defunct site...

Monthly Report: May 2015

It's that time of the month again, as I recap another "exciting" month in the life of this lazy online writer. These are just the "true facts," folks... not some inflated nonsense designed to "impress" people with how amazing the life of an online writer can be...

May ended up being pretty much a "non-month" for me, from a writing perspective, as most of my efforts were directed at non-writing endeavors, ahead of our planned 3-week trip to Denmark, in June. On the other hand, there is a slight sense of hope in that-- namely that three weeks of being on authentic "holiday" will surely offer up some opportunities to sit quietly and write.

On the upside for May, my "organizational efforts" started while we spent a few days in Joshua Tree are starting to pay off... with a distinct uptick in AdSense views, as a result of "cleaning up" several blogs and writing venues.

Without further ado, here's the final breakdown:

$4.38 from AdSense (4208 page views)-- the money is pretty minimal, but the number of page views is up 50+% from the past 3-month average.
$6.43 from Amazon Associates (9 orders/118 clicks)-- remains well below historical average, but slow improvement, at least.
$5.66 from my original "Denmarkguy" HubPages account (20 articles)-- this still sits extremely far below my historical average; hoping to boost with new content when we are in Denmark next month.
$3.89 from my "HSP Connections" HubPages account (8 articles)-- still establishing a trend there; this account is (so far) dependent mainly on a few Amazon sales.

That adds up to a grand total of $20.36 for May-- still feebly low, but at least it's a $20 bill, and a small improvement over April.

Feeling good about the prospects for June, given that I will have a full three weeks of being on holiday... and the only thing I can really "do" on a rainy day will be to write. Which is what I like to do when I have "downtime," anyway. Of course, "hopes" often far exceed reality, once the proverbial "fat lady" sings...

A "Writing Retreat"

In about two weeks, we are heading to Denmark.

That's where I am originally from, and my family still has a summerhouse there, which now functions as a "family timeshare," of sorts.

People have been going to this house for generations (it was built in the 1930s) to "get away" from daily life, and often to express their creativity.

When my grandparents were still alive, a lot of painters would come and spend weeks-- or entire summers-- in this place, working on their art. My grandfather was a big supporter of up and coming artists-- as an art collector, many of the pieces hanging on the walls of the (long gone) "ancestral home" were painted by artists he personally knew.

The house would also be a summer gathering place for writers and philosophers, who used the quiet and the "slowing of time" to get in touch with their inner muses.

Even in 2015, this remains possible... although now surrounded by developments, there are still 24 untouched acres of land immediately surrounding the house. And when you arrive, it is as if time slows down... or "ceases to exist," altogether.

I have often dreamed of using some time at this place to simply sit and write. We have gone in the past, but it seems like there has always been "something" to get in the way... from family gatherings to needing to act as "tour guide." This time, we are going with the intention of "just sitting," because we have not had a (real) vacation in four years.

That's my intention.

Of course, "even the best laid plans...." and yadda, yadda.

Stay tuned....

Another One Bites the Dust... well, TWO actually

The online writing business continues to be "not much of anything."

One-time (and short-lived) Bubblews "alternative" CGP Gallery has shut down. Or maybe been shut down by WordPress for deceptive practices. Or maybe they didn't pay their bills... not surprising, either way. The site reeked of "making promises we can't keep," so the demise was almost inevitable.

Meanwhile, one of the "serious" writing sites-- Zujava-- has announced that it will be closing down in July. I always liked Zujava-- it had a nice clean interface, and would only accept "real" writers who put up quality content.

Unfortunately, the wheels sort of fell off when Zujava ran into trouble with Amazon Associates and lost their affiliate account, meaning that contributors were left without one of the primary ways they could earn income from the site. Things never quite recovered, and the flow of new content more or less stopped.

Whereas I never really got very deep into publishing on the site, I was able to "triangulate" from my four published articles that the entire site was barely taking in $200-300 a month in ad revenues... to be divided up among 4000-odd articles. Basically, a handful of change. There's a limit to just how much "serious" writers are willing to create content and get nothing in return.

At this point, I am sort of "soured" on the whole writing online for money experience. I will continue to add some content on HubPages, and I will probably transfer my Zujava content there... but that's about the extent of it. I am somewhat worried that HubPages is now pretty much "the only came in town," and especially as it relates to better quality content. That's a bit scary.

I definitely need to make sure I have backup copies of all my articles there.

Monthly Report: April 2015

Time for another monthly recap from the wonderful world of The Lazy Online Writer.

April was a rather dull month, although I actually started getting more active with writing again-- however, that activity will not be reflected in current income.

Getting organized while we were in Joshua Tree will turn into a benefit, but I don't expect that to manifest financially till July or August.

Lost more ground in April, mostly due to my Amazon Associates sales dropping off the map.

Here's the final breakdown:

$3.53 from AdSense (2,132 page views)-- remains well below historical average
$3.30 from Amazon Associates (7 orders/89 clicks)-- also well below historical average
$5.83 from my "original" HubPages account (20 articles)-- remains below average
$5.26 from my "Squid" HubPages account (8 articles)-- still establishing a trend there

That adds up to a grand total of $17.92 for April-- lowest in several years.

Little disturbed by the trend here-- the AdSense page views was the lowest since April 2012.

Not counting any other venues as none are producing measurable or reliable income I think I will ever see. Bubblews is pretty much dead in the water, CGP Gallery is a joke, Seekyt is pretty much a spam farm and Zujava seems to (sadly!) be dying a slow death. I am staying away from "promising" new sites, because they are usually full of shit.

The only "possible" on the horizon is "Tsu," which is a Facebook-ish (rather than writing) venue that claims to pay contributors. I think it's true-- based on what I have read-- but I also think you have to be a semi-celebrity with thousands of followers to have any chance to reach the $100 payout threshold. I've dabbled there a bit... which has earned me the princely sum of 15 cents.

Desert Ponderings

I decided to take a bunch of my "loose notes" with me to Joshua Tree, as I figured I would be spending a good bit of time by myself while Sarah was spending time taking care of her mom.

These were the thousands of loose scraps of paper onto which I have scribbled ideas, over the years, in the hope of "eventually turning them into a useful article or blog post."

Maybe it's profoundly self-involved of me to think that all these fleeting ideas are actually "good enough" to become a worthy piece of writing. As I am revisiting them now, many of them seem rather nonsensical... and it makes me wonder whether I am just wasting a bunch of time by trying to "capture" ideas when they happen, because I harbor hopes of "saving them" for some time when I actually have the time to turn them into "something."

I am, in so many ways, a "frustrated writer." Mostly, I am frustrated because I have to spend all my daily energy on making a living, and it leaves no time over for writing... and I can't afford to simply say "today I am going to write!" because doing so is likely going to result in the electricity being cut off.

Which would suck.

It makes me sad that "creative types" are typically "underemployed," from a financial compensation perspective.

At age 54, I have never been employed at anything that allowed me any more than to merely "scrape by." Which sounds kind of stupid, because I have a college degree (with high honors, no less) in Finance that I have never used for anything. But the financial field never held any appeal... I merely completed the degree to satisfy parental and family pressures.

Sometimes this whole dilemma makes me sit and ponder what we "value" in society, and how rarely those things that "pay well" are in creative fields... and how (sadly) often they are in fields that involve destruction and deception. That doesn't speak very highly of us, as human beings.

Anyway, here I am, trying to sort all these pieces of paper with "great ideas" sketched on them-- and i feel very overwhelmed.

Revisiting Zujava

I was visiting Zujava again, this morning.

The thing I like about Zujava is that it genuinely is a "serious" site for writers, even if it is set up with all the same "sales related tools" other revenue sharing sites have. The pre-qualification requirement for new writer-members is such that most of the "Get Rich Quick Morons" have little interest in applying there.

Of course, it is a pretty "tiny" site, with pretty tiny traffic. You have to be willing to bring your own traffic, or at least create some content that is search friendly, or your work will never be seen.

I am still not sure how much effort I am willing to put into Zujava, on account of their no longer having an Amazon Associates connection. Without that, the only compensation I get is ad revenue share, and that is pretty paltry-- so far.

However, the ad revenue payments have been steady and "on time," since I qualified to receive them, during the middle of 2014. Still, $0.22 to $0.28 a month isn't exactly a way to get rich.