I know I have been posting a lot about Entrecard recently, so I apologize to the nerds who come here seeking green info or anything about the recent Star Trek movie.
Anyway, this is mostly a rant about Entrecard. Alright, so it is about members of Entrecard or rather, ex-members who are obsessed about the service.
These ex-members are obsessed with Entrecard. Why? Because they enjoyed it-even if they don’t wish to admit it. Many of these ex-members left Entrecard because they were banned. They were banned for spamming, for spreading false rumors about the system, or for simply speaking ill will against the program in a non-constructive way.
Now that these bloggers are no longer to be part of the community, they instead spread speech about Entrecard in order to 1) continue receiving EC traffic or 2) try to get others to quit the program. This is either done through other social networking sites such as Twitter (don’t know what I’m talking about? Search Twitter for ‘Entrecard’ and you will see someone who talks about EC *all day long* and hasn’t been a member in a very, very long time), through other forums, or simply by posting content on their own blog.
Here are some recent “news” spread about Entrecard:
- Graham is an Asian woman.
- Graham is racist.
- Entrecard is a Nazi regime.
- Entrecard allows porn ads.
- Entrecard is going to die by June.
Graham is an Asian woman. This was started by an ex-member who wouldn’t give up his source nor would he give a screenshot of the IP addresses as evidence.
Regardless of whether or not he is right, he did not offer any evidence other than hearsay. Graham is innocent until proven guilty.
Graham is racist. Someone stating there are scammers and spammers in Asia and Africa is not racist. There are scammers and spammers in every country, but the majority actually do come from poorer countries and those two continents sadly include a large majority of them.
Ever heard of the Nigerian scammers? Case closed. Saying Nigerian scammer is not racist. It is simply a fact that the scammer is Nigerian.
This was another job done by the person above. This person was banned from Entrecard a while back and will say anything to get people to read his blog and move to his advertising program.
Entrecard is a Nazi regime. Saying silly crap like this has been going on for a long time. And although most of it is said in jest, there are seriously people out there who believe this. If you are one of those people, you are wrong, and it is an outrage that you can even string those words together without thinking out ridiculous and idiotic it makes you sound.
Here’s a few reasons why Entrecard is not a Nazi regime:
- The leader does not make great speeches.
- Entrecard does not have a military.
- Entrecard has not yet invaded Poland.
- Entrecard has not killed any Jews (that we know about).
- Entrecard exercises its right as a capitalist corporation.
Number 5 is the kicker. As a capitalist corporation Entrecard reserves the right to offer their service to anyone they please as long as they are not prejudice due to skin color, gender, or sexual orientation.
That means they can kick you out whenever they please and they can simply not accept your blog if they don’t see it fit for their service, so long as the reason for kicking you/not accepting you has nothing to do with skin color, gender, or sexual orientation.
So in reality, Entrecard is the exact opposite of a Nazi regime because they exercise their rights as a capitalist corporation.
Entrecard allows porn ads. Again, no evidence was given. There have been three accusations of this happening, with the most recent coming this past Monday.
So what ad was being pointed out as pornography? A diet ad. Yes. A woman with a toned body (with clothes on) was mistaken for pornography.
So what were the other two ads? 1) A dating website. Again, it was a woman who was wearing clothing. 2) An ad which linked to a blog with women wearing bikinis.
Is this really what the world has come to? I mean, seriously? So a woman can’t wear a bikini without being called a porn actress? I guess these people have never set foot on a beach or else they would think they stepped foot onto a porno scene.
Yes, I understand some Entrecarders are dropping cards with their children around. And to them I say: so what? Your son and daughter aren’t allowed to go to the beach? They aren’t allowed to watch commercials? They aren’t allowed to go to the public swimming pool? Their sexual education classes? Their biology classes? Their A&P classes?
Sorry, but even if you did wish to keep your children away from those areas you are in for some hard times ahead. Humans (yes, children are human) are naturally curious. What you don’t let them see they will want to see even more and the moment you turn your head they will be searching online for it (and yes, school libraries have computers and a large percent of children know how to get around filters, and if they don’t their friends do).
I don’t know about you, but I would rather have my son see a bikini when I’m around in a non-sexual or frightening environment than them crouched in the corner at a friends house searching for ‘hot girls’ to figure out what the hell a ‘hot girl’ actually is. And yes, I am saying this because a friends seven year old child did this exact thing. Did he know exactly what he was looking at? No. Did he think it was sexual? Probably not. Was he curious? Definitely yes.
I’m not telling you to let your children watch porn. No, no no… definitely not. I’m just saying that keeping non-sexual pictures away ‘for their own good’ is actually doing them more harm (and will cause you more harm as a parent later on).
Entrecard is going to die by June.Alright, so last October I said Entrecard would be gone by the end of 2008 (unless it made major changes-which technically it has, just a little later than I thought). And honestly, I’m happy I was wrong. I am also happy EC made some of the changes I suggested. What are the changes? 1) EC is finally paying out for credits. 2) We know exactly how much credits are worth. 3) Graham is learning on the job. Yes, no matter what the ex-members say, he is learning.
In conclusion
Ex-members generally have no clue what is going on in the community except by going by what others say. Since this information is always second-hand (well, third-hand by the time you hear it) something is bound to go wrong. The first person who started the rumor may have lied, the second person may have lied. Even if this person has been trustful in the past does not mean they have nothing to gain from spreading false information. Nor does it mean they should be allowed to make accusations without offering evidence other than hearsay.
As well, these ex-members are generally out to get something. Whether it be to gain affiliate commissions (by getting you to join their new ad program) or by getting back at the program which banned them. Don’t blindly read without first asking the question, ‘where is the evidence?’ And always, always take what they say with a grain of salt. Question what they say and use critical thinking. Don’t let others do your thinking for you.
Hell, even this post I want you to think critically. Do I make sense? Do I make good arguments? Should I be believed?
Ask yourself those questions.
Written: May 5, 2009
Chinaren
May 6, 2009 @ 1:36 am
I agree people should ignore these rather bad-taste rumors.
I’m showing paid ads on my blog (and advertising on blogs with paid ads using EC credits), but I do think there’s no smoke without fire.
EC has done things in a silly way, such as the forum ‘ban’ (which they’ve now reversed of course).
Most of the people you talk of have over-reacted IMO, but EC needs to learn to think before they jump.
It doesn’t take much, just look at Adgitise. They are still a new company, smaller than EC I believe, but they’ve done things in such a way that people are pleased with them and their service.
Anyway, EC is working for me. I’ve not seen any drop in traffic or advertisers since paid ads started, and it brings in a goodly amount of traffic, plus now I can earn a bit of cash from it! (I didn’t even join it to earn cash!)
So what’s to complain about?
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 2:00 am
I think everyone has the right to complain. I just think we should have a reason to. Most of the people doing the complaining though are EX-members. Most of these people haven’t been members for months and months, it is ridiculous.
If people want to complain about the paid ads, fine. I don’t agree with them 100%, but at least they have a decent reason to complain. People who are members and locked out of the forum, fine, complain. But people who aren’t members of EC and simply wanted to bash EC in the forums are doing a lot of it and that is silly.
But about the whole paid ads thing, I find it ridiculous that 90% of the blogs who claim to be ‘100% paid ads free’ actually mean they don’t have EC paid ads. Nonetheless, they are perfectly fine having paid ads elsewhere on their site. So all of the sudden EC is an evil empire simply because they want to make money, right.
I don’t mean to offend those of you who do claim to be ‘100% paid ads free’, but if you are going to say that don’t have paid ads at all. Otherwise you are simply trying to make money off a service you do not want to support fully. EC is paying money for you to get traffic, yet you can’t display an ad 50% of the time in the exact same spot an ad would be anyway? Funny.
Of course, bloggers can do what they want with their site. But frankly, I wish EC would take 50% of the ad impressions no matter what. That way the ones who do accept paid ads aren’t hurt.
me
May 6, 2009 @ 3:28 am
Each has a view and yes it should be your own, as for the views on the forum per say it is heavily censored and mere propaganda now, some mods are rude and posts not fitting any propaganda or favored slant are deleted before your eyes.
as for promoting other networks, it’s simple as a advertiser you can get 100% get better value else where, have the ability to control the amount spent and not have ad views taken by droppers collecting points with that many will not stay long if at all, this makes the payout unlikely to happen for any level
for traffic there are also other low cost alternatives that are providing better returns without having to try and drop for hours on a system that is slower than my grandma at times
as publisher other networks offer real payouts for real service not a blind chook raffle
the people being paid i have never heard of but there is probably nothing in that except they all seem to have scripted thanker’s
like you said look for yourself judge for yourself and those findings are mine
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 11:38 am
I agree with you on an advertisers point of view. I have criticized them before here for that, but as long as people are willing to pay the price, why not charge it?
As for the people being paid being ’scripted thankers’, they aren’t. I have been paid and I know others who have as well. I think how they are going about it is flawed, but we are getting paid nontheless.
You might want to read my article: Entrecard Paid Advertising: Is It Worth It?
sheila sultani
May 6, 2009 @ 7:26 am
I used to actually feel sorry for some of these guys. But they need to cut the umbilical cord, move on. If you search twitter unsing “#entrecard” you get even more crap than if you just search for “entrecard” there is one ex-member who makes snide comments about ec all day every day – ridiculous.
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 11:40 am
Yeah, thanks for mentioning the hash tag, I hardly ever search them anymore. This particular person is pretty ridiculous. She loves to spread false rumors about the service. She hasn’t been a member in quite some time but still does this daily. It is pretty sad and almost to the point where she should seek some help if it is bothering her that much. And no, I am not even joking.
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 11:55 am
And… I just check Twitter and I am being called a ’sock puppet’. Nice. I wonder if these people even know what a sock puppet is.
John | English Wilderness
May 6, 2009 @ 8:50 am
Hi,
I hope you’ll let me respond here, as I don’t agree with some of your points. I think most of the ex-members who have a grudge feel Entrecard has treated them unfairly.
I personally feel unfairly treated. I used to be an active member of the forums until they were locked. I never bashed Entrecard, but occasionally posted polite criticism.
After the forum was locked, I was denied access. I politely asked if all of my posts could be removed from the forum since I could no longer access them. I didn’t get a response and no action was take apart from to delete the request, so I posted it again.
Funnily enough on the day the forum reopened my IP and User ID was banned, even though the thing I’d objected to had been resolved due to “public demand”. I still don’t know what I did that warranted a ban. I think that gives me good reason to complain.
Apparently someone at Entrecard suspects I’m ToP, not sure if that’s true or not! Then again if you listen to silly rumors its even more confusing, apparently Graham is also ToP
I think the ex-members you’re referring to might object to being called spammers who spread false rumors, but I’ll let them speak for themselves.
As for your other points:
Graham posing as Adele – agreed, innocent until proven guilty. Adele is a bit of a mystery. Who is she? Where’s her blog? Where is she now? Until we see independent verification, Graham is innocent. ToP is also innocent of spreading false rumors until someone proves him guilty. There’s one other possibility, ToP’s information was bad.
Graham is a racist – just curious, did anyone from Asia / Africa take offense?
Entrecard is a Nazi regime – okay, there are 3 sites. Two of them use a swastika in the Entrecard logo and discuss the problems with Entrecard. The other is called Nazicard and doesn’t mention Entrecard at all. You’re forgetting Entrecard is only 18 months old, they’re not due to invade Poland for another 16 years.
Porn ads – I didn’t see any for myself. However, I can say for definite that some of the paid ads are misleading. I followed an ad for an educational CD and it took me to a free lottery site that asked for my personal details.
Gone by June – I’ve no idea where that came from! Entrecard will still be around. Also I saw something about Graham being chased by creditors. Whoever started that needs to be careful, unless they’ve got facts to back it up.
To be honest everyone should look at the evidence, verify the facts and judge whether or not something is true before going off on a rant. This includes Entrecard supporters as well as detractors.
Entrecard isn’t always right – remember all the fuss about the number of blogs on Entrecard?
As for paid ads I’m not against them, but how about reducing the rate of tax for blogs which accept them from 75% to 37.5%?
Cheers,
John (a.k.a. flybywire2, a.k.a. impomatic)
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 11:49 am
John, I know what you are talking about with the banned and deleted posts thing. I saw all of it and thought it was pretty silly. But here’s the thing, the deleted posts were done by one mod and the forums were opened by another. I think it was a coincidence that it happened this way and the fact that you posted several times about it probably made them think you didn’t want to be there anyway.
I know it is a poor excuse, but when you have a staff that doesn’t get all of its information on what is going on there are problems. That is definitely a fault of EC in my eyes.
But really, EC has the right to do what they please on banning members. We can disagree with it all we want, but it is their service just like this is my blog and your blog is your blog. If someone says something we don’t like, we can delete the comment. If there is a person consistent on spreading rumors on me, I can ban their IP address. Actually, I am well within my rights to ban any IP address I want.
Does that suck for the people who are banned? Sure. But that doesn’t make me a “Nazi” or whatever else people want to say. That just means I like to exercise my right as a blog. Would it make me insensitive and possibly over-reactive? Sure.
People who are banned should just move on. I have nothing against people who say their piece about EC after leaving, some of them are quite interesting and make good points. However, if you have been banned for 4+ months and you are *still* talking about Entrecard and how they banned you, well, go seek some help.
FishHawk
May 6, 2009 @ 10:30 am
Methinks that many may be suffering from acute turnip poisoning (if you know what I mean). I don’t know if it from the greens or the vegetable itself, but severe cramping is most definitely occurring.
On the other hand, could you please define just what speaking ill will against the program in a non-constructive way means? For by a very strict interpretation, your previous article about why Google AdWord was a much more cost-effective means of advertising in comparison to the current Entrecard offer was rather rank.
Of course, I suppose that answers the question to a certain extent. For if Entrecard could forgive that, it must take something really outrageous to get banned for speaking one’s mind freely or is it the location of where an opinion is posted that matters?
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 12:08 pm
The EC advertising article did give an example of how the service would be useful to those who are members of EC. And although it wasn’t constructive necessarily towards Entrecard, it was meant as an article towards potential advertisers and a hope EC would change the policy by lowering the price or trying to make it more worth our while.
If you think it was nonconstructive and ‘rank’, I apologize. For the most part by nonconstructive I was speaking about those who spread the rumor that EC is nazi, racist, etc.
FishHawk
May 6, 2009 @ 4:30 pm
I get the impression that you considered my previous comment as being an attack upon you, and it was not meant to be as such in way, shape or form. Please forgive me for choosing my words poorly.
What I was getting at is that what you said in your previous article was not very favorable towards the current form of Entrecard advertising, and I have read about many who got banned from forums, and even Entrecard altogether, for much less. Granted, they may have been greatly overstating (or understating) what actually went down, but with paranoia running rampant amongst the powers that be at Entrecard now, I can see where even something that is meant as constructive criticism can get you banned.
Gary R. Hess
May 6, 2009 @ 6:05 pm
The cases I do know about (what I have read about on other blogs or seen first hand) were all called for, IMO. I even understand why John was banned and I’m sure if he asked he could be unbanned, although with the way their support is it would probably take a couple weeks.
Acadia’s ban, well, he knew exactly what was going on. He had to have known he would be banned if he continued advertising his forum on EC’s board as a place to talk about Entrecard. He isn’t that stupid. Actually, Acadia is a pretty intelligent man.
As for ToP, he got away with a ton of pooh when he was a member.
GG, well, she caused tons of problems in the forums way back when as did a ton of other members.
Of course, I don’t know specifically whom you are referring to, but most cases are pretty fair or at the very least hold true to their policies or policies most forums/websites have.
I’m not giving them a pass on this, I just haven’t heard of any events occurring which were completely outrageous and uncalled for.
I will say this, Graham and other mods on occasion have said and done things which were odd and resulted in deleted post.
Fool
May 6, 2009 @ 9:46 pm
I got 3 words for ya.
traffic traffic traffic
sendaiphotoblog
May 7, 2009 @ 2:45 am
I got banned from the forums with no explanation. And you’re right, who cares anyway? The forums are dead now. But their own rules are the the first offense is a warning so why not give a warning?
http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss281/sixmats/2009-05-rules.png
Gary R. Hess
May 7, 2009 @ 2:54 am
From everything you said in the forum, you really can’t be surprised you’re banned, can you?
Yes, it may be silly that they state they give a warning,but all situations are different.
Look at it this way:
If I come over to your house and take a shit on your sofa, would you give me a warning not to do it again or would you just throw me out of your house?
sendaiphotoblog
May 7, 2009 @ 3:59 am
No, and they have every right to ban me. But it’s silly to have these posted rules and go back on them. It reminds me of Graham’s bullying rule that only applies to anyone saying negative things about him.
John makes a very good point about the Adele incident.
Gilang Ramadhan
May 7, 2009 @ 5:32 am
Me just newcomer on Entrecard community, so far the services they provide are good enough. I seems to be addicted with their services for getting more credits by browsing a blog which has entrecard enabled. Oh it was funny and interesting for me.
Tina T
May 7, 2009 @ 8:21 am
I’m new to entrecard, but I like it very much so far. I haven’t heard any grumbling, except from members that don’t like the paid ads. I would love to offer a paid ad widget and a regular widget so that it would be fairer to everyone. Are there any rumors that this will happen? I guess positive rumors aren’t any fun so probably not.
Gary R. Hess
May 7, 2009 @ 12:54 pm
Graham actually said something about this. I don’t really like it at all. Look at it this way: if you are an advertiser, would you want your ad to show in a place which people look every single day or somewhere that is rarely looked? And let me remind you, you are paying per impression.
I don’t mind the idea when we are talking about pay-per-click, but EC doesn’t offer that. I would step nowhere near the advertising program if they offered separate widgets with CPM only.
FishHawk
May 7, 2009 @ 1:07 pm
Surely they are not considering SEPARATE ad widgets. For their biggest selling point is that people look for Entrecard on blogs, and to separate third-party ads from regular membership adverts would be to work against that. Therefore, a double-sided widget would be the best way to appease everyone.
Gary R. Hess
May 7, 2009 @ 1:39 pm
For the advertisers who simply want clicks (which seem to be a large percent since still many of the advertisers are members of EC), they will receive many less.
Right now the amount of clicks isn’t worth paying for. Once you cut those down, it definitely isn’t worth it and shouldn’t be touched with a 10-foot pole. Many of the clicks now are coming from people who are widget hopping (simply clicking on the widget to find another EC blog). Take those away and the amount of clicks on paid widgets are next to none. (I believe right now it is around 0.5%. Once you take away the clicks then it will be down to around 0.1% or less I would imagine).
Now, if they did this and had a pay-per-click system, then it would be fine. But EC would earn a lot less money, so that won’t happen.
So as of right now, I don’t see any of this happening. It doesn’t make sense for advertisers and it definitely doesn’t make sense for the company. Yes, it makes sense for the members, but that is all.
FishHawk
May 7, 2009 @ 3:34 pm
Speaking of “widget hopping,” I would very much enjoy hearing what you know about “SiteHoppin.” I signed on with them a couple of weeks of so ago, but I am beginning to wonder if it may be a waste of time. I have read some glowing reports, but…
Gary R. Hess
May 7, 2009 @ 3:59 pm
When they first came out, I received some decent traffic from them-100 or so a day-and this is without me doing anything at all with the service. Now though, I get maybe one or two hits every month (this is purely without me doing anything).
I don’t really know much about the service, especially since they look like they have changed quite a bit since last time I looked into them.
I could try to get some more information about the site, but I am going to be pretty busy until sometime in June. Probably the best thing you can do is use them for an hour or two a day for a week and see if you get anything out of it.
FishHawk
May 7, 2009 @ 4:33 pm
Thanks!!!
madbadcat
May 7, 2009 @ 9:00 pm
Entrecard is an interactive process and I have to admit that I didn’t pay much attention to it when I first joined. Then I put some energy into it and now I get as much as I put into it. I am enjoying being a member of the community and as a member, while I disagree with some of the recent changes, I want to support Entrecard as much as it’s supporting our site. as for the malcontents, glad they are gone and f0ck’em if they can’t take a joke…
I wrote about my experience here: http://digitalapplejuice.com/web-traffic-entrecard/
Mar Matthias Darin
May 8, 2009 @ 1:18 am
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve had and still have a few bones with EntreCard… But that’s no excuse for personal attacks.
I look at it this way, as long as I like the direction EntreCard is going in, I’ll continue as a member. If their direction turns to such a way that I think it’ll damage my blog, I’ll leave. No hype, no BS, and certainly no personal attacks. Graham has a business to run and like any business, he’s going to do his best to stay in business. Its really that simple.
Jan from BetterSpines
May 8, 2009 @ 4:36 pm
I have no idea what you guys are talking about regarding the politics of the system. I don’t hear the rumours to which you are referring. So … I like visiting other sites in a simple Entrebar way, I like earning credits for doing so and I like advertising on the sites of my choice. Traffic is never a bad thing! Whatever is going on behind the scenes is nothing to do with me.
Gary R. Hess
May 8, 2009 @ 5:23 pm
Most of it happens on Twitter or on the forum. Well, did happen. I don’t think I would really call it political though, since most of it is just banned members obsessed with EC.
Acadia
May 8, 2009 @ 10:24 pm
WTF is this?
http://badgals-radio.com/?p=2355
Gary R. Hess
May 8, 2009 @ 11:51 pm
Honestly, I have no clue. I tried reading it a few times and couldn’t make out what was trying to be said. I guess they are trying to say that you hacked EC? ERr… honestly, I don’t know.
madbadcat
May 9, 2009 @ 1:03 am
as distressing as being the object of a bully’s focus, that weird lunatic blog rant is incoherent and weird and does nothing more than make the writer seem like he/she lost his scrip for thorazine. or lithium. or both.
sadly, most of us have afoul of an online bully. i offer my condolences.
part of this conversation (started by Mr. Hess) is about having civilized social discourse regarding entrecard- open forum here for anyone’s opinion- there hasn’t been much name-calling or insults; just an exchange of differing opinions. as i have said before, i don’t agree with a lot of entrecards latest policies but for he moment its working for me so i continue to be involved.
at the end of the day, when i no longer get anything out of it or its more hassle/aggravation than its worth, i will walk away from it.
Acadia
May 8, 2009 @ 10:26 pm
“Acadia’s ban, well, he knew exactly what was going on. He had to have known he would be banned if he continued advertising his forum on EC’s board as a place to talk about Entrecard. He isn’t that stupid. Actually, Acadia is a pretty intelligent man.”
Thanks – and I didn’t want anyone to talk about Entrecard in the cave – I just wanted everyone to have someone to talk to!
Gary R. Hess
May 8, 2009 @ 11:46 pm
Ah, sorry then.
madbadcat
May 9, 2009 @ 1:12 am
for the record- i am one of those people who does not run paid ads. i would happily run a second ad for entrecard no problem. i just want to support people who visit my site (as most of my ec ads are from people who visit my site – is ee their names in m y inbox over and over again)
the argument against developing a second ad widget has been that the entrecard folks don’t want to spend the time to develop a second ad script. ok fine.
i would gladly pay a membership fee to entrecard of say $20/year which is probably more than they would make from clickthrus from my site- my visitors don’t clickthrough. they just don’t. i look at the stats to reciprocal links i have with other art sites and i see little click thru activity.
Gary R. Hess
May 9, 2009 @ 2:06 am
Yeah, I understand where you guys are coming from, I just don’t really agree with it. But to each his/her own.
As for the paid membership, I am 100% for this. The argument against it is ‘it will create a class system’. Which, I guess it would to an extent, but so what? The paid ads are already creating a class system.
madbadcat
May 9, 2009 @ 12:54 pm
class system? the internet isn’t free. access to the internet isn’t free, having a website isn’t free. the important thing is trying to help entrecard set up a revenue stream that makes it viable for him to continue. it wouldn’t be the first site that had different levels of service: ads, no ads, etc.
people who don’t get anything out of entrecard, don’t want to run paid ads and don’t want to pay for the privilege to NOT run paid ads will drop out if $20/yr isn’t worth the traffic they get. let them. the wackos will react badly but you cannot build a successful business model kowtowing to them.
philly5113
May 10, 2009 @ 5:22 pm
I am new to Entrecard and I enjoy it. I guess you are right, they had a good thing and they blew it away and now its a hate game.
Joella Molson
May 12, 2009 @ 6:50 am
I am fairly new to Entrecard and I find it to be a great help to my new blog. All the crap flying round is obviously ridiculous and I have managed to ignore it, based on critical evaluation. For those people out there who will believe almost anything, they should read your article. Thank you for the cool objective and well made arguments in defense of a good thing that many of us are grateful for.