Writing on Line; Tips for Newbies Part Iii
Prologue
Part One of this series gave an overview of writing sites, Part Two focused on Comment Trolls, who exist to discourage, embarrass and chase.
In this part I will deal with other perils of Online Writing for the Newbie.
I composed this series to prevent the neonate from learning the hard way.
Examples of What Was
There is an ever decreasing number of writing sites. Some are better than others.
The Sites listed below no longer exist. I mention them to show you what was and today, is not.
Once Was
TRIOND
Alas, this site is no longer with us. When it existed it had all the best traits.
There were sub-sites. If you wrote about Television it would appear in a different sub site than if you wrote about Sports or Politics.
What made Triond so good is that the rate of earnings was posted.
This subsite paid 1c for every 6 views. That subsite paid 1c for every 25 views.
This meant, that before the first key stroke you knew how much each hit would earn, and could easily track your earnings.
This honesty is extinct today.
Not only did Triond pay for your articles, you could link an Adsense account so you were lpaid twice for one article.
Triond began to descend when an A.I. editor replaced human eyes. A.I. bounced what it considered plagiarism.
If you quoted something or someone to prove your point, your article was rejected for plagiarism.
This kind of fake moderation is still practiced today. Sites will 'claim' work is plagiarized or has 'spammy elements' to avoid publishing.
One of the most significant features of Triond was it's Forum. Here the writers congregated. It was in that forum the 'White House Insider' was invented.
That set of articles became so popular that Triond gave Ulsterman, (the writer) his own subsite, which garnered millions of his, until, in 2015, Triond went down.
Bukisa
Originally, this site challenged Triond. It paid more, and tried to duplicate and correct Triond's faults. It claimed to pay 1c for every 3 hits.
As it floundered, it paid via Adsense and Adsense alone. It never gained the eye of public as frequently as Triond.
It went down and returned as a non-paying blah blah site.
Expertscolumn
This site was trick from start to finish. It pretended to be sophisticated and demanded first rate work.
People joined, posted, and had their work rejected. Thinking it was not up to standard, they tried again.
Expertcolumn never paid. You can stick at something like $4.56 for YEARS as the pay out is $5.00. It existed to suck in writers so it can steal the earnings.
WIKINUT
This was a good site which paid directly. It demanded a lot of work, and had human mods who actually read the work. It ceased paying years ago.
It is still up, but is a non-paying site and almost impossible to join.
BUBBLEWS
This was a scam created to be a Scam. There was no glitch. It existed until the scam was about to be uncovered. Then, it was gone.
What kept it up so long was the use of the basic Ponzi.
Bubblews paid everyone the first time. It only paid specific people the 2nd time. Those in the 3rd World would be paid once, then not again. When there was an outcry, the site paid a handful of 3rd World people to run around and tout the site.
Bubblews had a gang of shills who roped people in, attacked those who complained until the very minute the site went down.
VIRILY
This site was strongly touted and had a policy of claiming to 'Moderate' each post.
Situated in Estonia, Moderate meant delay. Your posts would NOT be published for days to prevent you earning.
There were two groups of users, the 'Verified' who would have their work published immediately, and the Non-Verified average user.
Virily paid user for about a year, then stopped paying.
Today, it is where the most Anti-Semitic posts can be found.
What Happened
What one learns with writing sites which died, is what kept them alive, what caused them to die.
Triond did very well until Google slapped it down as a 'Content Farm', caused hits to decrease geometrically, and by 2015 it just could no longer continue.
Wikinut did well, but again, Google forced it into a corner. The site is still up, but does not pay.
Bubblews was a site created to be a scam. Two MIT graduates invented the site, knowing that it could not pay the users as promised. What it did was use the basic Ponzi.
It would pay everyone the first time, only a percentage the second. It would gain hundreds of thousands of articles, fill the pages with Ads, and collect the money.
Only those who lived in America, those who Shilled for the site would be paid the second time.
Virily was created as a rip off so that the owner could earn. It paid for articles and when it felt it had enough, stopped paying, and confiscated everything posted there.
To Look For
As mentioned above, Triond had it all going on. You knew how much each hit was worth, you knew how many hits you had. There were no dark corners.
There was no threshold. If you earned 53c you got it. If you earned $53.00, you got it.
When there are thresholds, this means a site gets to hold your money, and maybe it goes down before paying, (like Bubblews).
When you can't know how much you earned yesterday, be wary. Sites will cheat you. You may have had 1k hits. But, the site doesn't admit this. You may have made $10. Yet, when you look, earnings are 'pending'.
This should alert you.
