I must be insane, I started a blog

[Darin Boville]

If you don't see a blog you really like, start one of your own! That's the theory at least.

Stop by, bookmark it, send your thoughts and ideas. Comments both here and there are welcome.

My blog is called A Bigger Camera and is, no surprise, at http://www.biggercamera.com/

Just started yesterday.

What say you good people?

--Darin

[r.e.]

What say you good people?

I say that I haven't got a clue, based on what is there now, who you are or what the blog is about. Also, of the five prominent links on the upper right hand side, what are the Register and Log-in links to Wordpress for and why is there, on top of that, a link to the Wordpress web site?

[Darin Boville]

I say that I haven't got a clue, based on what is there now, who you are or what the blog is about. Also, of the five prominent links on the upper right hand side, what are the Register and Log-in links to Wordpress for and why is there, on top of that, a link to the Wordpress web site?

Those will be gone soon. Just boilerplate...

--Darin

[r.e.]

Those will be gone soon. Just boilerplate...

--Darin

Yes, but it is what is there now. Maybe get the site the way you want it, and then ask what people think?

I mean, the only other thing that is there is your post that is sort of a history of modern photography which, to be honest, comes off as filler for a site that doesn't exist yet.

[r.e.]

Darin, it's kind of like you've selected a Wordpress theme and are asking what we think of the theme. You know, Wordpress themes are a dime a dozen. It's a question, having bought into their system, of what you do with it.

[Darin Boville]

So, r.e., your saying you love it so far, is that it?

--Darin

[r.e.]

So, r.e., your saying you love it so far, is that it?

You asked what people think and I gave you a response. Right now, you have a Wordpress theme with no content and a bunch of boilerplate that comes with the theme that you say you intend to get rid of.

So what do you want? That people should tell you that you have selected a brilliant
potted Wordpress theme and that when you get rid of the boilerplate, and add content, it will be awesome?

OK

[Darin Boville]

What you have said so far, r.e. is that there isn't enough content there for your taste yet and you don't like it that the blog has not stated its intension clearly enough nor polished the template to a final degree.

But why feign surprise? The title of my post indicated that I *started* a blog. My post indicated clearly that it was "just started yesterday. " So, yes, there is not much content there yet. I hope you understand the reasons for this.

The "filler" is from a book by Fredrick Lewis Allen written in 1939. I thought it fascinating to see a perspective of the rise of serious photography written at the time. It seems amusingly relevant now with so many people, think DPReview, snapping away with their digicams and doing other trivial things with cameras--the book has fascinating economic parallels with today. Perhaps its description of photography's development will also be paralleled in some way. We can hope.

In any event, I welcome all feedback, even yours. But is the caustic tone of your posts intentional? Is it necessary?

--Darin

[Vaughn]

"I must be insane, I started a blog...What say you good people?"

Yes...;)

[r.e.]

Darin,

You asked for comments. There is nothing caustic in saying that your site currently consists of a standard Wordpress theme and boilerplate and that there is nothing, apart from your quote from Fredrick Lewis Allen, to react to. So yeah, whether you think that I am being caustic or not, I don't think that there is anything there at the moment that is worth much, certainly not worth bookmarking.

It's kind of odd that you say that you are doing this because you don't see other blogs that you like. Maybe that statement results in an expectation that you would offer more than a potted, free design and a quote from an obscure text that you happen to find amusing.

Gertrude Stein comes to mind: "There is no there, there." At least, not from you.

[Brian C. Miller]

Darin, I don't think that r.e. is being caustic, it's just that you need to start blogging! :) Like was remarked lately on the OLP blog, it's the blogger who is to create the content.

Start writing! :)

[Vaughn]

r.e.: I think darling Darin was just asking us about the insanity of him starting a blog -- not necessarily about the contents of his yet fleshed out blog. He was just trying to share where the there will be when the there is there and not just under his hair.

[Darin Boville]

He was just trying to share where the there will be when the there is there and not just under his hair.

Say that five times fast!

--Darin

[r.e.]

Darin, I don't think that r.e. is being caustic, it's just that you need to start blogging! :) Like was remarked lately on the OLP blog, it's the blogger who is to create the content.

Start writing! :)

Yup, or post photographs, or both.

And fix the potted Wordpress theme :)

[Corran]

Hi Darin. I just started a blog about a week or so ago myself about film photography in my area.

I am trying to write a post a day (as well as shoot some film everyday as practice anyway!). I will be interested to see your blog as it gets posts. I had been meaning to start one but was spurred on by seeing some blogs from other members on this forum.

What is your intended audience, by the way? I'm hoping to get locals interested and possibly generate work from mine eventually, but it's an uphill battle since everyone and their dog has a blog these days.

[mdm]

The Sartorialist makes a million a year from the ads on his blog, I'd say get snapping.

[Darin Boville]

The Sartorialist makes a million a year from the ads on his blog, I'd say get snapping.

He makes a $million from two ads on his blog? I know he gets tons of hits but $500k an ad? Oh my.

--Darin

[mdm]

Product placement too.

[Jack Dahlgren]

It appears to be more about words than anything else so I'll base my commentary on that. For example:

"From time to time I would like to share books that I am reading, want to read, or which have arrived and am about to begin reading. It is that last case I’d like to start with–a first impression of one that came today.'

You could leave that whole paragraph off your post and it would be just as^H^H^H^H^H^H^H more effective.

I've been blogging for 6 and a half years and I find that my least successful posts (and most incriminating ones) are those where I state what I am going to do. No one cares what I plan to write about. They only see what I have written. Skip the prologue and be wary of 16 part series that end on the 3rd episode!

Your previous post - the long quotation - does not read well. When at the main page I only see part of it and only find out who it is from and when it was written by clicking to read more. Introduce it at the front. Tell us why you think it is interesting or why we should think it is interesting.

Anyway, I encourage you to keep at it. I find that it is interesting to look back and see what I have written and thought in the past. Many of the posts from years back surprise me as if I've never seen them before and sometimes I wonder if i actually wrote them. Memory is truly a fluid thing. But this will only be valuable to you if you actually write things that indicate what you are thinking and feeling.

Reposting a quote reveals only a little about yourself in that you selected it. Complaining about the poor colors in a book indicates that you are a curmudgeon and may not understand that authors don't always have a big hand in reviewing the print samples.

The other thing I enjoy about blogging is finding people who read and comment on my blog. I've had many good conversations about what I've posted. But people will only engage in conversation if it is interesting and you invite or challenge them to respond.

I've also run into people who know me first from my blog so do your best to represent yourself in a way that is representative of you. I don't really see your voice coming through in your blog in the way it does with your photography. The blog is the ghost of you.

(disclaimer - my blog is becoming ghostly itself. You will slow down over time. You may end up posting every few months. But resist the temptation to comment to your readers about that fact, or proclaim you will be revitalizing your blog shortly! It never happens.)

[munz6869]

Blog on - the Robert Hughes post is an interesting one!

I agree with Jack's comments - my own blog started at a feverish pace and is becoming a bit sporadic - even so, there's so much content on it now that search engines alone seem to generate a fair bit of traffic daily - onwards to infamy!

Marc!

[Brian C. Miller]

He makes a $million from two ads on his blog? I know he gets tons of hits but $500k an ad? Oh my.

--Darin

Per year. A couple of years ago I attended a seminar about starting your own business, and one of the fellows, who runs icanhascheezburger.com gave a presentation about making money on blogs. Yes, he's well off now. I have the notes somewhere, but the gist of it is that you have a bazillion hits, and initially are running junk ads. Then you can move up the ladder to more targeted ads, with better revenue.

[Darin Boville]

Lts of great thoughts. Thanks!

Re ads: Is there a reputable set of guidelines as to what to charge for ads? I see suggestions all over the web--but are they reputable? I also see what other sites advertise that they charge but are there behind-the-scenes discounts?

--Darin

[Mike Anderson]

Did you catch this one:

http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2011/10/kirks-take-kirk-tuck-1.html

Blogging about blogging about photography. (Summary: equipment reviews are popular, thoughtful deeper musings on photography - not so popular.)

...Mike

[Darin Boville]

Did you catch this one:

http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2011/10/kirks-take-kirk-tuck-1.html

Blogging about blogging about photography. (Summary: equipment reviews are popular, thoughtful deeper musings on photography - not so popular.)

...Mike

I *did* see that one, in fact. Probably the lone that motivated me to get it going (at long last).

--Darin

[Brian C. Miller]

Re ads: Is there a reputable set of guidelines as to what to charge for ads?

In the junk ad market, they will dictate what you get. You need X page hits, which results in average fraction Y ad clicks, which in turn generates your revenue. Once again, you don't set the price.

Once your blog gets up to a certain amount of traffic, you can change to a higher class of ad provider, because you can prove with statistics that your blog is worth their time.

[Frank Petronio]

http://www.kottke.org/

Gets $20K/month for one of those little thumbnail ads. Of course he has done his blog forever and built a great audience. And his content is top-notch.

The Online Photographer, Luminous Landscape, and Ken Rockwell are the three most popular photo blogs and they all make a living (more or less) from their blogs, even though their design/code/content are hideous trainwrecks.

So get cracking.

But heed my advice: skip the art talk. Focus on camera reviews and film versus digital arguments. Show pictures of hot women. You'll beat those other photo bloggers into a pulp.

As for what to charge for ads, you have to go a year and get some hits.... don't put the cart in front of the horse yet. Roughly speaking, once you get 1500 real visitors a day you might expect $5K/yr from Google Ads. So to make a living you're talking 20K per day. That takes some doing.

[dperez]

Yes, the Hughes post was good.

[Darin Boville]

Yes, the Hughes post was good.

Ahhh, thanks for this and the earlier comment about the Hughes post as well.

If you liked the Hughes post just wait until 2 am Pacific time...

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

161 views, according to WordPress. Not bad for the first full day, I think. About two thirds of those came from this site (aside from Facebook, the only place so far I've mentioned the new blog).

I've got posts set to appear in general at 2 am PST (early morning on the US East Coast). I figure some people like to do their browsing in the morning, before the kids get up, etc. Does that sound right?

--Darin

[Larry Gebhardt]

You will need an RSS feed if I am to come back on a regular basis.

[Darin Boville]

You will need an RSS feed if I am to come back on a regular basis.

Hi Larry,

Can you double-check your browser for me? On mine (Safari) there is an RSS icon in the URL bar area. Click on it and you get your choice of a feed just with articles and with both articles and comments. Does yours not have that? If not I can add a feed icon...

Thanks,

--Darin

[Jack Dahlgren]

Darin,

How are you getting those Amazon links working for you? They recently cut off the affiliate program for people living in California. If you have a work-around, please let me know.

[Darin Boville]

Darin,

How are you getting those Amazon links working for you? They recently cut off the affiliate program for people living in California. If you have a work-around, please let me know.

Hi Jack,

Gov. Brown and Amazon recently came to an agreement. The program si back on (I'm in California...). Apparently you can restart your old agreement without having to re-enter all your data.

--Darin

[Frank Petronio]

Looks like you got 3x more visits to this thread than your blog, lol.

[Darin Boville]

Darin,

How are you getting those Amazon links working for you?

Zero so far. I figure this will not bring in much in the end--but if it pays for a book or two now and then (which I can then feature back on the blog, then great..."

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

Looks like you got 3x more visits to this thread than your blog, lol.

I'm thinking of moving the whole thing over here!

--Darin

[RJC]

Insane indeed, given that 85% of blogs on the interweb are never read by a single person other than the author.

I'm not suggesting for one moment that your blog will not firmly be in the other 15% but personally I have given up visiting personal blogs except on a very infrequent basis as I rarely find content that is not covered here in the forum (in addition to a general desire to spend less time in front of a monitor).

I know of many photographers who had been convinced that a blog is a 'must have' marketing tool but in the last couple of years have ceased updating their blogs in favour of photo-sharing sites like flickr.

Anyway, good luck with yours!

Rob

[Frank Petronio]

It is a bit like preaching to the choir, now that every photographer has a blog, usually with between four to forty lifetime entries, with progressively longer periods in between entries. The most common phrase used in these blog entries is, "I'm sorry, I need to be better about updating this...."

In fact, if you search for that phrase, Google will return about 2,000,000,000 results ;-p For real.

I had a blog starting in 1999, before they were called blogs. The current version with a content management system was developed in 2005 and since then I've made almost 1000 posts (edited down to 400). At the peak I had 2000 unique visitors a day and yep, I could have sold ads for money.

You'll have to pardon me for being skeptical about blogging and other forms of social media but in my humble opinion, with everyone doing it, it becomes less valuable.

[Darin Boville]

You guys are bumming me out! :(

Ha!

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

Huh? This is weird. I just had my first Amazon sale. Happened in the last couple eof hours. (Thanks!) It's a very cool looking exhibit catalog (mine should arrive today).

What's so weird about that?

The link to that item won't be posted until tonight at 2 am. It's from an unpublished post!

How does that happen?

--Darin

[Mike Anderson]

Darin,

I recommend making outbound links open in a new window/tab.

And it took me a while to find the "leave a comment" link - shouldn't that be at the bottom of the post, not the top?

...Mike

[Darin Boville]

Darin,

I recommend making outbound links open in a new window/tab.

And it took me a while to find the "leave a comment" link - shouldn't that be at the bottom of the post, not the top?

...Mike

I thought about the outbound link thing--don't people tend to hate having all those new windows open? Or not?

I lie the comment thing art the top :) Maybe it would be good to put it in both places? Maybe down by the category area? There's empty space there...

--Darin

[Jack Dahlgren]

Hi Jack,

Gov. Brown and Amazon recently came to an agreement. The program si back on (I'm in California...). Apparently you can restart your old agreement without having to re-enter all your data.

--Darin

Great! Thanks to you I'm back on.

Unfortunately I lost about $100 of ad revenue in the meantime :-(

-Jack

[Jack Dahlgren]

Huh? This is weird. I just had my first Amazon sale. Happened in the last couple eof hours. (Thanks!) It's a very cool looking exhibit catalog (mine should arrive today).

What's so weird about that?

The link to that item won't be posted until tonight at 2 am. It's from an unpublished post!

How does that happen?

--Darin

If they got there from any amazon link on your blog, anything that they purchase during that session will be credited to you. You can see them in the orders report in the "All other items ordered" column.

It would appear that someone followed your Hughes link and then bought that catalog while they were there - a coincidence. Some of the things my readers buy are kind of odd... and some are things I wouldn't ever have imagined that Amazon carried.

-Jack

[Frank Petronio]

When I tried ads they advertised pasta sauce, Italian surname I guess.

Who knows what kind of cooking "Boville" will inspire?

[jp]

Congratulations. You have potential.

I'm thinking about starting a blog too.

I've had static webpages up on my personal website for various topics that interest me, only one of which is photography. I put some google ads code in them, and I get about $100/yr for having some non-intrusive ads in a sidebar on the few pages. They are basic how-to posts that people find by using google to learn how to do something, like change the oil in their Saab http://www.f64.nu/oilchange/ or how to make oatmeal muffins. I'm sure more content could scale up for more $. I'm not in it for money, but if I'm going to put time into it, $ seems less ego driven than hits, which I consider a popularity contest.

I don't have any crazy single reason for starting one. It's kind of a practical rebellion against facebook, etc... I want to be in control of the information once it's written, sort of like why we host photos not on facebook. I want to be able to write a whole paragraph without character limits. I may even write things that would get me defriended on facebook by a portion of my friends. I think you can be more creative and expressive in a non-mixed crowd. Obscure things that would be of interest to people on forums I visit like this would have no interest to the facebook crowd.

[cdholden]

Obscure things that would be of interest to people on forums I visit like this would have no interest to the facebook crowd.

I've seen some here refer to a red bellows club on Facebook. Unless it was a joke, you've got potential for at least a niche audience.

[cdholden]

When I tried ads they advertised pasta sauce, Italian surname I guess.

...and an IP from NY.
Double whammy!

[ROL]

+1

Well... suckered another one into visiting your site! I can't believe the way you've innocently gotten forum members to edit your site for you. You make me feel like such a chump, a loser, for not advertising or charging on my site. I'm such an idiot, I can't even believe that over 500 man-hours have thus far been wasted on views of an arcane 10 minute YouTube video submitted less than a year ago that Google has been after me to monetize.


I thought about the outbound link thing--don't people tend to hate having all those new windows open? Or not?

The custom (with some exceptions) is to use the same window when linking in site, but to open a separate window when leaving the site. Check out blogging design websites for the "rules".

[Mike Anderson]

I thought about the outbound link thing--don't people tend to hate having all those new windows open? Or not?
...

Most browsers have multiple tabs now and respond to the target="_blank" attribute by opening a new tab and not a whole new window, so it's not as heavy as it used to be when browsers (other than Opera) didn't have tabs.

...Mike

[Darin Boville]

When I tried ads they advertised pasta sauce, Italian surname I guess.

Who knows what kind of cooking "Boville" will inspire?

Microsoft Word used to want to replace "Boville" with "Bovine." So I'm guessing beef. But I don't plan on having those sorts of ads--need to control the user experience and all that!

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

Most browsers have multiple tabs now and respond to the target="_blank" attribute by opening a new tab and not a whole new window, so it's not as heavy as it used to be when browsers (other than Opera) didn't have tabs.

...Mike

O.K., that sounds good. Thanks Mike and ROL. Unfortunately the Amazon gizmo that gives you the links doesn't seem to have an option to include the code automatically. I could add it by hand but that is just adding more overhead to an already laborious process. There must be a widget for this!

--Darin

[Greg Miller]

O.K., that sounds good. Thanks Mike and ROL. Unfortunately the Amazon gizmo that gives you the links doesn't seem to have an option to include the code automatically. I could add it by hand but that is just adding more overhead to an already laborious process. There must be a widget for this!

--Darin

Somewhere in your Amazon Seller account they provide script code to add a widget to your page. You just copy and paste right into your page on the WordPress "Edit Page" screen. I did mine so long ago I don't remember the exact place where they provide it.

[Darin Boville]

Who are the good Wordpress theme clubs or whatever nowadays? I know about Rockettheme and Woo themes but the rest all seem to blur together. Anyone have first-han experience?

I like a theme with an Apple-like attention to detail and with no need to dig into the CSS or, god forbid, the PHP. Also need a great support forum.

I used Rockettheme in the past for Joomla but I fear they have grown too fast and their customer service has dropped badly.

--Darin

[Brian C. Miller]

Look in the Business thread, there's a post from somebody who made a photographer-friendly theme.

[Darin Boville]

No luck on the other themes. Those all look like gallery/portfolio themes.

But regarding WordPress in general, I'm *really* liking it. There seems to be a nicely programmed plug-in for everything. For example, several people suggested I have the external link open in a new window. That sound's great, but the Amazon Affiliate thing doesn't do it for you automatically, and so forth. Lots if minor pain in the ass coding to do. Except that there is a plug-in. Six or ten of them. Now that task is done automatically! Oh, I like it...much more fun to use than Joomla...

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

Insane indeed, given that 85% of blogs on the interweb are never read by a single person other than the author.

Looks like the Gods are with me. At least for November--2000 views so far. Quite a good start, I think!

--Darin