Helium is shutting down.

1. 93

   habeeposted 10 years ago

   I just got an email from Helium. They're shutting down on 12/15. If you have earnings there, request them now!
   
   I'm not surprised H is coming to an end. It's a shame, though, because it was the first place I wrote online. When their Marketplace was up and running, I did very well there. I was making about $1,000 a month by selling articles to publishers.

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      jansharesposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I'm just glad that in the midst of these revelations about problems with other writing sites, HubPages seems to remain stable.

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         habeeposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         Ditto on that!

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   2. 91

      Cardisaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I was just about to announce it here! For me that's good news. I can finally get my articles back. Their policies on not deleting articles you own was really pissing me off.
      It was the first place I published as well but not being able to delete my articles was may main concern.

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   3. 85

      B. Leekleyposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Helium  is new to me. I just took a look at their site. At heliumDOTcom there is a notice that that old helium site is being replaced by a new one at heliumnetworkDOTcom.  The notice says if you are a member, register again.

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      1. 84

         Dallas Matierposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         That change has already happened. The Helium Network was an experiment to try to improve traffic, and get things back on track. But, it looks like it failed, so it's the Helium Network that's shutting down, now.

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   4. 86

      Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I may be misunderstanding the announcement, but my understanding is that articles will go on earning until December 2014.
      
      So personally I will be waiting until then to cash out.

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      brakel2posted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I never received an email from Helium and I had articles there. A few were number 1s. Anyway, I logged in today successfully and had trouble navigating. They are according to subject, and I found one article. When I went to the forum to ask where my articles might be, they said my username did not exist. I wondered if they are not giving me back my articles. Is anything weird going on there,. Habee or anybody? I know that tomorrow is the day you can get them.

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      1. 63

         Lisa HWposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         When I saw your post I went and looked at what's on my Helium account now.  I had no trouble logging in (did get that original email others have mentioned), and saw that they say that tomorrow people can remove and/or download copies of their stuff.    I already have copies of my stuff, so I don't know if I'll bother downloading anything (although having them all in one, handy, download might be good if that's how it will be done).  It looks to me like I'm - like - a dollar- twenty-four away from the twenty-five dollar mark there, but I gave up on rating there ages ago. 
         
         From what I saw it's the Helium "Network/300 thing" that's shutting down - so I don't even know about the other sections.  Worst case, stuff is (as far as I understand) going to read-only on there until December).  I've already been paid for old stuff that I either sold outright or sold license to, so the "300" stuff is probably the only stuff I have there.  Maybe that makes some difference.   I don't know if any of this sheds any light on anything for you (brakel2).  I'm just wondering if a) you've different types of articles there and/or b) the site is just to bogged down today by "everyone" going there that it's not working right...   
         
         (I imagine you already know this, but for anyone who doesn't..   The stuff that was sold outright isn't stuff that's going to be on there any longer; and license-for-use terms varied - at least when I was involved there - depending on the type of license.)

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            Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

            You can remove/download copies FROM  tomorrow. You have until mid-December to do so.
            
            Rating is no longer necessary or possible, so your articles should go on earning until December.  It would be worth checking at the end of November to see if you have enough to cash out, before the site closes.

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      2. 86

         Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         The forum has probably changed since you were last there - it's not the same login as your Helium login. 
         
         This post explains how to download your articles.  Log in to Heliumnetwork.com (you can't log in at Helium.com any more) and follow these instructions:
         
         http://www.heliumnetwork.com/downloadin … m-network/
         
         Your articles will go on earning until the site shuts down on 15 December, so you may not want to remove them before then - unless you have another use for them.  However, do beware - you must remove them before the shut down date, because you'll have NO access to the site after 15 December.

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            Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

            Audrey,
            Did you keep hard copies or put any of what you wrote on Helium on a flash drive? I have stuff I want back from there too, but when I first began writing online kept hard copies of everything. I finally began getting rid of them recently, but have most important stuff on my flash drive. I have an article I want about the Kabballah that is relevant to a course I'm taking now, and I'm thinking of trying to get it published in a New Age Magazine, rather than have it plagiarized online. The stuff Helium sold we won't ever see again, that bothered me so much, they sold several of my pieces.

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2. 70

   Dawn Denmar1posted 10 years ago

   It's only possible to claim payout if you've reached the minimum, which is always a struggle for me on Helium
   Think for me the most important thing to do before May 21 is to remove content and rehome it somewhere else.

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      habeeposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, I think the pmt amount has to be at least $25.

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3. 79

   starme77posted 10 years ago

   I wrote there a few times, Never really got to into that site, I likes it here better.

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4. 70

   WriteAngledposted 10 years ago

   I pulled out of there very fast long ago because I found the system highly objectionable and the forums full of really nasty people.
   
   It has finally and deservedly been poisoned by the brown stuff that always used to float up to its surface, despite Helium always going on about it being quality that rises, LOL!.

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      starme77posted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I sure do hope those nasty people dont come over here and clog up our forums

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5. 68

   Angela Blairposted 10 years ago

   Helium was one of the first places I wrote -- and tired of it. Now, I'm just trying to get on the site to rescue my stuff -- old password so asked for new one and so far four tries have failed while using Helium's directions. Wonder if my stuff is destined to stay there????? As to the "new" site -- it's going to go away, too according to the messages I've received -- obviously, can't say for sure.

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6. 84

   Dallas Matierposted 10 years ago

   It's a shame. I've got work on there, as well as here, and I get about the same traffic, and made about as much money, from both (not a lot, but still...).
   
   I've always had problems with the way Helium worked, but it was still a site that had employees and an established community, just like HubPages (though, I've never been anymore active in the community over there than I am here), so I'm not going to act like I'm happy that it's shutting down.
   
   On the other hand, there's stuff of mine over there that I'd love to be able to get back, polish a bit, and submit elsewhere. I'd just prefer not to have to see the site die so that I could do that.

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7. 72

   MattWritesStuffposted 10 years ago

   I used to write for Helium constantly. Made some decent coin and became a channel manager. The ratings system irritated me, but I made do. Then they started to tinker with their formula, and each year it got a little worse. Was still making a decent chunk of change each month off of my articles 'til they divided into the Helium Network. Views tanked, earnings waned, and I stopped caring.
   
   A small part of me will mourn its passing, but Helium dug its own grave in a lot of ways.

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8. 81

   Felisa Daskeoposted 10 years ago

   I also got an email but i am not anymore an active writer there. I used to earn from the site in 2008-2009 but stopped

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9. 87

   Stacie Lposted 10 years ago

   The announcement page stated that anyone can log in and download their articles on May 21..

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      Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Oh, good to know. I have several articles there that I really liked, now I can use them somewhere else.

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10. 77

    Uninvited Writerposted 10 years ago

    Yes, I had about $24.75 and it's now gone. Of course, haven't been on the site for over a year.

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    1. 86

       Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       Are you sure it's gone?   It should still be there unless your account was deemed inactive.   Your articles will still be there, and were transferred to the new microsites.  It would be worth checking if your old login still works so you can download and delete your articles. 
       
       Just go to Helium.com, use the Login at the top right hand corner of the screen and you'll be directed to the new dashboard.

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       1. 77

          Uninvited Writerposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          I guess I was classified as inactive. I didn't know the money would disappear if I was.

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11. 70

    Alex Addamsposted 10 years ago

    I think the better question is...
    
    Why isn't HubPages releasing more news about innovation and new product developments? And should the lack thereof be of any concern to writers?
    
    Jacob

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       Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       What does that have to do with the subject of this thread?

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          Alex Addamsposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          They are similar products, and HP has been somewhat stagnate on the innovation front--as seen by the lack of press and new announcements on the blog. Does make me wonder if something could be going on at HP?

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          1. 86

             Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

             Helium and HubPages are both revenue-sharing sites, as are Squidoo, Wizzley, Zujava, Seekyt and many others.  That's about where the similarity ends.
             
             I started my online writing career on Helium but left about five years ago (yes, five!) when it became obvious that the earnings potential on HubPages was higher.  Over a hundredfold higher!    At its peak pre-Panda (2010), I was earning $350 a month on HubPages and barely $25 a month on Helium, for about the same number of articles.
             
             While other rev-share sites have made strenuous attempts to recover from Panda, Helium did very little for a long time.  It was sold to a company, RR Donnelly, who really wanted Helium for its content sales business, and the rev-share side was just a bonus.  Eventually they decided the rev-share side was a basket case, and decided to try a drastic solution which would either cure it or kill it.  It killed it.
             
             If you look back over the time since 2011, by comparison HubPages has made many, many changes and innovations in that time.

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             Cardisaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

             I agree with Marisa, Jacob. Hubpages has made huge changes since I've been here. You've only been here five months so maybe you haven't seen the changes. I've been here three years and Marisa six years, so we have had to change to be here through the good and bad. HP tried several things post Panda and Penguin. What they did seemed to have worked, Plus there were changes to the site's interface.

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12. 93

    melbelposted 10 years ago

    I'm really not surprised. One of the first places I ever wrote, but it was a real stain on the Internet. Worst TOS of any writing platform I'd ever used.

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13. 83

    Dorsiposted 10 years ago

    Helium was the first place I wrote at also - probably a good 6-7 years ago. Posted my first article ever there and got scared away by the feel of the place though. Ironically I saw an ad for HubPages there and hopped over here and never looked back. I didn't even think I may have earned anything there so I'll have to pop over to the site and see if I have any earnings. I was probably deemed inactive along time ago though.

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14. 71

    brakel2posted 10 years ago

    Lisa HW. I tried again to get on.  I can log in and find my profile. When I wrote for the site, I found out later they owned my articles. Then later they said I could claim one article. I picked my best and never heard another word  Thanks for the great reply. I will check back with site tomorrow. Your efforts sure are appreciated.

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15. 77

    Uninvited Writerposted 10 years ago

    I downloaded 3 articles that were worth it. The rest really were crap

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16. 71

    brakel2posted 10 years ago

    @Marisa and Jean I still cannot find my articles, and I last wrote on Helium in 2010. If I was classified inactive, maybe they are gone or sold. I believe I may have them on an external hard drive that I started just before my current computer was hacked. It just dawned on me that they were saved once and transferred to my new computer, then put on a hard drive before the hacking.. This does give me hope. Thanks..  .

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       Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       Maybe you can retrieve them then. I've lost so many things due to Dell computers, I don't know why I continue to buy them. At least with flash drives you don't lose all your stuff, but I've lost a lot of good pictures and my resume, which was no fun to recreate after all these years.

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          brakel2posted 10 years agoin reply to this

          I used to use Dell computers, because I thought they were the best  I agree now that they are not as good as others. I use Hewlett Packard now. Jean, good to talk to you. I need to stop by your hubs.

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       Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       Yes you probably are inactive, in which case you can't access your articles or earn any income.  The good news is that they will all disappear from the internet in December without you doing anything. 
       
       I do hope you're able to track down the orignals so you can re-use them after that.

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17. 59

    paradigmsearchposted 10 years ago

    Seems to be a lot of people throwing parties because of Helium's demise. Reminds me of how I feel about a certain couple of other websites. Both who, in my opinion, rob/robbed their writers blind.

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    1. 96

       Dean Traylorposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       Helium was fine when I started. In fact, there was a point I was averaging a hundred or more $ per month. But the constant tinkering and bad moves eroded many people's trust. The last six months were awful. Many people's monthly $ dropped as much as 90%; articles placed in the new format didn't always translate; and all the promoting everyone did (in some cases people bought programs with monthly fees) fell apart.
       On top of that, many of their best components such as the contests and opinion topics, were removed when the new (and last) format was implemented.
       I'm saddened mostly due to the loss of a good writing community. However, Helium's time had come and gone. There's nothing to do but to collect your articles and find another home.

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18. 71

    brakel2posted 10 years ago

    Thanks Marisa for your help and encouragement. Helium was never a good writing site for me. It had many popups that interfered with the content at one time. It aggravated my friends who tried to read articles.

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19. 99

    alexadryposted 10 years ago

    I too joined Helium and have been a "Heliumite" since the site opened. I took care of the dog training and behavior channels for many years. I did see the website flourish and then abruptly decline over the years. There were good times there, and that's where my writing started. I am not surprised it is closing down. The big issue now is that I have over 1,500 articles there! It's going to be a tedious job to download each and every one of them and publish them elsewhere, on top of that, many of my articles there were copied from other sites and I must find a way to prove after Helium closes down that I was the original author. Anybody have a solution for that?  I think I will take screenshots of the publishing date from Helium, one-by-one as proof, but perhaps there's a better way! Filing hundreds of DMCA's is another option, but wow, such a tedious one!

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       brakel2posted 10 years agoin reply to this

       Wow, so many articles. If you have the originals on a flash drive or somewhere, that would help. Do all your articles show up, and can you get them now, or are they still earning until December? I hope mine are on my external hard drive, as some were good articles. Good luck.

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       Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       In your shoes, I wouldn't bother removing the articles at all - they will all disappear when Helium closes in December anyway.  And who knows, you might even get another payout before then if you leave them up!   Once December is past, give it another month or two so they clear the Google cache all on their own, then you can start thinking about republishing them.  What's the rush?
       
       Are you sure you need to download them anyway?   Looking at my Helium account, I won't be downloading many of mine:
       
       1.  There are some articles I wouldn't put my name to these days - I've changed a lot as a writer in the last seven years!   So that's a bundle I won't bother to download. 
       
       2.  There's a bunch of articles which have never earned a cent.   If an article has been published for years and hasn't earned anything, what are the chances of it doing well elsewhere?  Probably zero, so they're not worth the effort.
       
       3. The third set are articles I wrote for contests etc, on subjects in which I have absolutely no interest. They're too short for sites like HubPages as they are, and I'm not knowledgeable enough to beef them up.   I've already used those on Bubblews (they don't have to be deleted from Helium first). 
       
       As for those copies - why do you need to prove you're the original author?  If it's to file a DMCA some time in the future, why not file the DMCA's now, and save yourself all that extra work taking snapshots?

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          alexadryposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          I don't feel there is rush, but it will take time to copy all 1,500 of them (I know, you should always keep a copy of all your articles somewhere just in case!  I had them on my computer but it crashed and my bad I didn't take the time to store them safely somewhere else). On May 21st, Helium published a guide on how to download them one-by-one. It can be found on the forum. I have had articles published to Helium that never earned a cent, that once published elsewhere made 5 times the amount on Helium!  I really think Helium's traffic ranking was always awful, the lack of pictures, boring looking articles may have played a role.
          Why do I need to prove I am the original author? Because the articles on Helium have a time stamp on them, once Helium closes down, that proof is gone forever, so if I publish the article somewhere else, say in December 2014, it will looks as if I have copied the articles from those who instead have copied mine Filing DMCA may seem easy, but sadly over 7 years so many unscrupulous people have copied them. I started with one article and found already 7 websites that copied it. It's so overwhelming, don't know where to start.

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             Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

             That's why I moved to HubPages years ago - pre-Panda, my earnings per article here were about 100 times the rate on Helium!   Though Helium earnings were always poor, I was assuming that if an article couldn't even earn a cent, it probably wouldn't survive elsewhere either - maybe I'm wrong.
             
             
             
             Where would you be thinking of publishing them?  I don't know of a single worthwhile rev-sharing site which accept articles already published elsewhere, whether you can prove you're the owner or not.  You could put them on Yahoo! Voices or Bubblews, but that's about it - and you can do that now if you want, because they don't care how many copies are out there, so you don't need the time-stamp.  The only rule with Bubblews is that your username needs to be the same as on Helium.
             
             The only way you're going to be able to republish those articles is to get the copies taken down, which means you have to file all those DMCA's - either now or later.

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                alexadryposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                I was thinking to put some on a website I am building, some of the really good ones on my business website, some others perhaps on Yahoo Voices, Suite 101, Examiner and the real crappy, short ones on Bubblews. After  Helium closes down though, after a while once they are dropped off the search engines, wouldn't these articles be original again? If so, I could put a few here as well.
                Filing DMCA's is tough! Sometimes articles that are copied do not show up all the time. For instance, I could Google the first sentences of an article and nothing may show up, just because Google search is sometimes messed up, then if I use Plagium it actually  finds copied articles, and sometimes what Plagium doesn't find, Google finds. I feel it's easy to miss many copied articles on blogs, etc. Unless somebody knows of a plagiarism tool that is 100 percent effective in completely finding all the copies. So far, if I use different plagiarism tools, I have noticed some miss some, some find others. Then there are those copied articles that people change the words around just to make them be missed from plagiarism tools.

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                   Marisa Wrightposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                   You can put the short ones on Bubblews now - provided your Bubblews username is the same as your Helium pen name. Mine wasn't, but I solved that by changing my Helium one to match Bubblews and it worked.   So I'd be saying, identify which articles you can use on Bubblews and don't delete them - the matching usernames is enough for Bubblews to accept you're the original author.  Which is mad when you think about it, but it suits us in this instance!  Do the Bubblews ones now, while Helium is still "up" so they can check.    Bubblews doesn't rely on Google for its traffic, so the copied content issue is irrelevant there. 
                   
                   I would do Yahoo! Voices too.  I know a couple of Heliumites who have posted all their articles on both YV and Helium and have never had a problem, even though they're bound to have some stolen articles in there. I suspect YV doesn't even check!  Yes, you may have an issue with Google considering the stolen versions as original - but if the stolen ones are on rubbish websites, Google is likely to pick YV as the authority version anyway, it's not all about date.
                   
                   I know that doesn't solve the whole problem but that would account for a big chunk of your articles, then you might find the rest  a bit less overwhelming.   
                   
                   Another way to make DMCA less tough - don't search for your first line.  That will pick up all the websites that have quoted your Hub.  You don't mind those, so seeing them makes the situation seem far worse than it really is!  You want to find people who have used the whole (or most of) the article.    I'm not familiar with Plagium but looking at it, I'd be pasting in the text of the whole article and setting the Relevancy bar near the 'strong' end.  I see they have a URL search which would be easier, but you may have to pay for that.

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                      WryLiltposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                      I rely on Google traffic for my Bubblews views!

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                         Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                         Since on Helium a lot of the choices of things you could write about were sort of odd, there's a lot I wrote there I wouldn't want back anyway. Usually it was some topic I just happened to know something about, or they wanted a review of a book I just read. The bulk of what I wrote there was off the top of my head and although I was literate, I didn't knock myself out over it or put my heart into it. There are only one or two pieces I'd like back. And as Marisa said, as the years go on, your writing style and point of view changes somewhat anyway.
                         
                         I was writing on Bubblews until I felt most of the stuff on there was so embarrassingly bad I wasn't sure I wanted to be associated with it. I still go on sometimes, but see Bubbles that don't even make sense that have hundreds of views and many comments. I write something normal and get about 2 comments and 20 views, so it takes too long to make $50.00 now. I haven't kept up too much on my blog, but my life has changed a lot in the last few months.
                         
                         I am unsure where I want to write seriously now. I'm attending classes at a new metaphysical center, and they have a hard cover magazine I may write a few pieces for. I am also hearing about sites where you offer courses to teach, like I did with some of my astrology ones here, but once you catch on, you can charge for a course. I'm taking a lot of new courses now, one in developing intuition and clairvoyance, one in past life regression, so I have a lot of new things I'm learning. I can already teach the clairvoyant stuff, I'm certified, the other things I wouldn't feel ready to teach, but could write my own impressions of what it's about.

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