Helium's New Experiment - Worth Watching

1. 84

   Marisa Wrightposted 11 years ago

   The rev-sharing site Helium is changing its whole structure.  It's splitting up into individual sites, each on a broad topic area.   
   
   http://blog.helium.com/heliums-re-launc … he-corner/
   
   I assume this is an attempt to recover from poor traffic, and it will be worth watching to see how it goes.  A pity Helium is so secretive about its traffic, which makes it harder to judge the result.  However, if it does work it could be instructive for the HubPages team.
   
   By the way, I also discovered their minimum word count is going up to 500 words and they've been deleting short articles wholesale.  I discovered a whole stack of my articles were deleted - which I'm not complaining about, because at long last it means I can use them elsewhere!  If you had articles on Helium, it may be worth checking to see what's happened to them.

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      stanwshuraposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      I'm noticing a lot of shenanigans, as well.  Not sure I like or completely understand their explanations either.  My stuff on there is pretty good, and I've gotten a slew of "Helium has deleted one of your articles.  E regret that this..." blah blah blah.  These pieces have been on there for years.  If they were subpar, why only now have they decided thus.  It makes me very insecure about continuing my affiliatilon with/writing on their site.

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   2. 74

      AMFredenburgposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      I've never liked Helium's comparative rating procedure. I've seen excellent articles on a topic ranked way below articles that were poorly written and poorly organized. I'll be glad to see my few articles deleted so I can put them elsehwere.

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   3. 77

      TIMETRAVELER2posted 11 years agoin reply to this

      When I left Yahoo Voices I was stuck with 82 articles that were just sitting and could not be used on HP.  I put them on Bubblews and made $200 with them.  You guys may want to consider this for your old Helium articles.  Just a thought.

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         psycheskinnerposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         I think the problem is that Helium still has the rights to them.

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            galleryofgraceposted 11 years agoin reply to this

            If I remember correctly they (Helium)  have rights of "1 Year" only. After that you can remove them.

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            1. 84

               Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               No, I'm afraid that's not the case.   After one year, they will allow you to post your articles elsewhere, but you can't delete them from Helium.
               
               Of course, the snag is trying to find somewhere that will accept articles which are already published!!

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            2. 86

               Jean Bakulaposted 11 years agoin reply to this

               I have about 15 things on Helium from 2 years ago. A few of them were complicated articles about the Kabballah that I would love to get back. One was a--I don't want to say spell as I'm not Wiccan--but a way to have a personal ceremony to start your New Year off right. I didn't like to rate the other people's pieces, and disliked how difficult it was to fix or change one thing in a piece that you already posted. I haven't checked over there in ages.

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               1. 84

                  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                  If you haven't been dropping in once a month and rating ten or twelve articles, then you won't have earned anything.   The good news is that it appears the rating requirement is being dropped on the new site, so your articles may start earning again.  Anyway, it would be worth logging in to see if any of them have been deleted in the meantime, if so you can use them elsewhere.

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                  1. 74

                     AMFredenburgposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                     That's good; it always seemed kind of dumb and exploitative to set writers off against each other. I've only got five articles active right now; most of the others have been deleted. Thanks for the head's up; I'm going to see if any of the deleted articles are still relevant and may post them elsewhere.

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                     1. 86

                        Jean Bakulaposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                        I checked on Helium and it looks like my stuff is all there. One woman seemed to win every contest, and I beat her on one when I was only on Helium for a few weeks. I got the feeling I wasn't liked. Then I wrote a piece about meditating on your goals for the New Year, and somebody "warned" me that Wiccan articles were not welcome there. It had nothing to do with being Wiccan, I'm not. A few of my pieces are still rated 1st, and the others were fluff, so I think I'll leave it alone for now. It is good they got rid of that ratings thing. Sometimes people had to rewrite and only change a word or two, so it was hard to see which one was better, when the reason they rewrote was to fix a typo or two.

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                        1. 69

                           brakel2posted 11 years agoin reply to this

                           Helium has done some strange things. I had a number 1 article they decided to delete after many months, as it was inappropriate for the category. In the beginning, I was not aware they had the rights to articles. I was so naive, and I wish I was never on that site. I still have a few number 1s and others not so good. I think they are all over 500 words, so don't know if any of my 15 will be deleted. I wish they would delete all, so I could still use them. Maybe they are still working on deletions. I guess we all had problems at Helium. Good luck and may we have lots of deletions.

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                           1. 84

                              Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                              If you go to your Articles page, you can do a search for deleted articles only.

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                        2. 84

                           Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                           Update:  I just discovered that rating hasn't disappeared completely. 
                           
                           If you're not writing articles on Helium, then you need to rate at least one article every 90 days to stay "active".  Otherwise you don't earn a cent.
                           
                           If you don't rate for 12 months, your account is deactivated and you lose any money you've earned.  They keep your articles, though.
                           
                           Considering it will take about 5 seconds to rate an article, it's well worth doing!

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2. 82

   BradyBonesposted 11 years ago

   I really wish I would have kept certain pieces of my work away from their grubby hands. Hopefully those pieces have been removed by now!

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3. 83

   WriteAngledposted 11 years ago

   I found this statement on the forums:
   "To prepare for this relaunch, we at Helium must make some decisions on what users will be migrated over to the new site. Recently, we concluded that members who have not written an article for the website AND who joined prior to sixty days from the launch date will not carry over onto the new site and will have their accounts deleted."
   
   I am so glad I left that place several years ago! Luckily, I only have a couple of articles on there that mean anything to me. Since they are on very obscure topics, I'm hoping they won't make it through the revamp!

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   1. 84

      Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Yippee!  That means I get ALL my articles back.   On the downside, it means I'm going to have to do some fast copying and pasting.

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         aa liteposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         I've heard that firefox gives you a very simple option to save websites, you just have to set it from the home page.  Don't know if you know about it.  Sorry I can't provide more details, I keep meaning to do it for my content, but keep getting distracted. 
         
         I think I've seen it on bubblews, and also might have been mentioned by the poisonous ones.  Might save you some work.

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      2. 83

         WriteAngledposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         That was my first understanding, Marisa. I think though it applies to people who joined and have never been active, not to people who gave them content at any time ever

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   2. 87

      andyozposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Oh that is good news, I have hundreds of old articles there that I earn nothing off as I gave up rating on the site. Glad they won't be earning Helium money any more.

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      1. 84

         Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

         Unfortunately I asked the question and that post is misleading.  They're only going to delete "inactive" members - i.e. members with no active articles. If you have even one active article of any age, your account stays.
         
         However, the good news is that the rating system is changing and it looks as though you won't need a rating star to earn income.   I know they don't earn much, but if no rating is required then it is truly passive income. 
         
         it's worth checking your account because they did a wholesale deletion of "short" articles last January and didn't notify anyone (except in the forums).   I found a whole pile of mine had been deleted, which is nice because they're the perfect length to re-use at Bubblews.

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4. 84

   NateB11posted 11 years ago

   I hope they delete my articles. I made the mistake of writing on that site when I first started out then couldn't do anything with the articles because they keep hold of them.

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5. 86

   Stacie Lposted 11 years ago

   I haven't received an email about deleting my articles so maybe I'll go over there and check.
   I would like to use them elsewhere too.
   

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6. 69

   brakel2posted 11 years ago

   I have some good articles there. I wish I could have them. If they are deleted, do you think we could use them if we still have copies?. I haven't received any emails.

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7. 91

   Cardisaposted 11 years ago

   My poems are still there which hurts especially one of my favorites which I cannot delete. Can I make good money over there? Maybe I should try writing some articles and see what happens.

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   1. 84

      Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

      Anything you write there becomes their property, effectively.  They can put it in anthologies and ebooks without any further payment to you.

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8. 69

   brakel2posted 11 years ago

   They deleted one article in past, and it is on HubPages. I am going over there to check it out. Thanks for info.

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9. 69

   brakel2posted 11 years ago

   I only have about 15 articles at Helium. None show a prospect of deletion. Darn.  Their SEO person recommended all articles be from 500 to 2000 words. Sounds familiar. I want my articles back. I know Helium has the rights. They are putting all articles in categories, I just remembered. Sounds like eHow.

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10. 83

    WriteAngledposted 11 years ago

    I've decided I am just going to republish whatever I want to reuse from Helium. Not much they can do about it and as a content mill they will probably rank below whatever site I use for the articles.

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    1. 86

       Jean Bakulaposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       That's true. If we check on Google our articles could be on Page 100 or something like that. I only have a few worth getting back and posting, and they've been there for over a year. I have been inactive for more than the year too.

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    2. 84

       Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       As an experiment, I spent the last week republishing my Helium articles on Bubblews.   Their rules prohibit plagiarism but I couldn't find anything against duplicates. 
       
       They earned me enough to hit the Redeem button.   I'm not going to lose too much sleep if they decide it was against the rules - I've had the satisfaction of reposting them.  Considering the popularity of Bubblews vs Helium right now, it's more than likely the Bubblews versions will be prioritised by Google which will be another slap in the face for Helium.

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          WryLiltposted 11 years agoin reply to this

          Interested to see how you go with duplicates on Bubblews. Please update when you find out!

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             Lisa HWposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             I was wondering about that matter of re-publishing stuff (on B's) that's somewhere else online, so first I asked "the general public" and got - like - 10 different answers.  Then I e.mailed the site and got no answer.     So here I am....    not being sure.  Their TOS pretty much strings the comment about "no copying" and "copying is plagiarism" right after "nothing you didn't write yourself", so one can't feel 100% about what he should be assuming (or not assuming).
             
             My concern with posting duplicates on there is that they probably don't have the resources to sort out what's a "legitimate" duplicate and what's been written by someone else and stolen.

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             1. 84

                Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                I agree, I doubt whether they check for plagiarism actively.   As HubPages found, it's just too expensive for the volume of articles they get. 
                
                I've been paid for my Helium articles that I posted on Bubblews.

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             Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

             Got paid!

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             1. 86

                Jean Bakulaposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                Thanks for sharing your findings about Helium Marisa. I have decided it's worth it to stay on Bubblews. It takes 2 wks. to get the $25 payout anyway, so it's just a matter of writing a little bit more and getting $50 instead. I like that. I found if I thought of good topics and kept to the fifty characters (very hard for me as you know) I can reach the $25 with as little as 19 or 20 posts.
                
                I need to spend about a half hour a day connecting and commenting and liking, but it's such BS, nobody is reading the stuff anyway. But I can play their game if there's money in it for me. I've had 5 payouts so far without problems. And I had a few short, cute things that would make good Bubbles. I doubt Google is worrying about Helium.
                
                I'm finishing up 7 more tarot card meanings on my blog, and then don't know what to do with it. I never planned on doing a whole tarot tutorial, but sometimes explained tarot cards when I needed material. I always contrasted the card with one from another deck, I have so many.That first year all I did was write. I believe I am paid up with my domain name until February 2014. I was trying to make a moving carousel of six of my more interesting pieces, but really messed up the top picture and it took me a while to fix it. If you recall it was hard to find a wide template. People have such short attention spans nobody seems to read the pages where I discuss readings, or they are playing dumb and pretending they don't think they need to pay for them! I am unsure if I need to do something with the archives, and was considering re-titling many of the pieces to get more readers. The 500-600 a day went down to 200 or so, but I believe that's the holiday season.
                
                The weather has been icy and snowy here so I'm way behind with shopping, I had a little accident in a parking lot (nobody got hurt) and today found out a family friend passed on, so am emotionally all over the place. I don't want to make any other writing decisions besides the Bubblews one until next month.

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                1. 84

                   Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

                   I suggest you go and do ONE rate on Helium (if you still know your password!), just so your Helium articles can start earning a few cents again.   Make a note to do it again in three months.   They may not earn much but for a few minutes effort, even pennies would be worth it. 
                   
                   Personally, I still think $25 for 19 or 20 posts is a bit sad - it's not much more than $1 a post.  But if it works for you, that's fine.   
                   
                   It's a great pity the blog hasn't produced better income.  The landscape has changed so much, and it's very hard to make money with a blog from advertising income these days.  You really need skills to sell, and although you're qualified to do so, it seems there are just too many cheap alternatives out there for people to be willing to pay for the real thing!
                   
                   You could do what I've done - I no longer write on some of my blogs but I haven't deleted them.  They still get traffic.  You could also consider putting some of the material into ebooks - not the way you did before, with a publisher, but by yourself on Smashwords or Kindle.  There are people who'll do the formatting for you cheaply.  My flamenco book - which is just my blog posts repackaged - has made me a few hundred dollars without any promotion other than links in my Hubs.

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    3. 62

       Lisa HWposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       As far as Helium goes, I think they've got the site looking really good (appearance-wise, I mean).   When I went to look at the site and see what was going on (or not going on) with my stuff there I did figure I may as well do a few ratings, just to keep the account active (for some reason - I don't know why, but I did put in quite a bit of time there years ago).  The 30/40 a month I was getting from there wasn't worth rating.  I'd gotten so that the only thing I could possibly force myself to rate were the poems - mostly because the bad ones generally don't require a lot of thought to recognize them as "bad".
       
       When I decided, though, that I just absolutely couldn't bare to rate one more of "those things" on that site, I duplicated the heck out of my stuff on there.  I didn't care if the duplicates earned anything (and some did).  I just figured that since I wasn't going to be getting earnings from my stuff "Good luck to them" as far as any other earnings might go.   This was all before that one-year thing they eventually put in place.
       
       There had been a time I didn't care if they didn't let people delete their stuff.  I just didn't care about that stuff anyway.  When I decided that I might care a little more about it once I would no longer be paid that was another matter.

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11. 89

    jponiatoposted 11 years ago

    The main reason I stopped using Helium was that broken rating model.  Now that the requirement has been lifted, I will be revisiting Helium.  Who knows?  Maybe I'll even try publishing there again.  I just took a look, guess they're keeping my dozen or so articles there on-line.

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       Jean Bakulaposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       Hi Marisa,
       I'll go to Helium, I think I remember my password.
       
       I have considered the e-book thing, but can't decide. Depending on how it goes with my husband losing his job in the summer, I may have to get a real job anyway.
       
       It is sad about readings. I see on many of the sites that the information is wrong, and I did that computer generated reading for you that showed you how awful it was. It's the economy too, people just don't have money. I have done the best with tarot readings, which I was reluctant to do without the person by me, but have done enough that I feel comfortable with it now. But as far a money making, my life is pretty much up in the air.
       
       I do realize that Bubblews seems easy, but essentially it is more time consuming than we think and we are netting about $1.00 an hour. Nothing is easy!

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       Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this

       No, don't.   Their earnings rate is pathetic and has been even worse since the relaunch.

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    Dawn Denmar1posted 11 years ago

    I don't know if they still do the assignments for writers they credential as journalists and others but the earnings for those pieces were supposed to be ok.
    
    Residuals off their site were always rubbish for me. I have one article that has earned $25 in total over a few years and all the rest have netted less than $2 I think.
    
    I think if any articles were posted to the site before they made their changes writers can duplicate them anywhere, but then again plagiarists have already taken their toll on the articles they like and posted them all over the net anyway!

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13. 52

    shaffer40posted 11 years ago

    I, too, discovered that they deleted one of my articles that had been sitting on there for a couple years. Upon inquiring as to why, I was given "it might be this and it might be that" and no real explanation. I am totallly unable to follow their new website arrangement, so I guess I won't be posting anything else; not sure I would have anyway.

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