Good wishes to all and how ethical are bloggers?

Schools close from tomorrow onwards. Well, at least some of the schools. Atm has some work in KL on Friday so we are tagging along to enjoy KL’s haze! *breathe in, breathe out, I love Indonesia for providing oxygen, cheap labour and haze* I am taking my laptop along so most probably, we are going to be online on some of the days.

However, in case my kids monopolise my laptop and I don’t get to blog, I must take this opportunity to send my good wishes to all. Since everyone is so touchy here and there, I also follow suit to make the wishes as :

HAVE AN ENJOYABLE HAPPY DEEPAVALI!!!!

See? There are so many ways to be civil. And to all my dear Muslim friends and readers and to everyone,

HAVE AN ENJOYABLE HAPPY RAYA. MAAF ZAHIR DAN BATIN JIKA ADA SILAP KATA ATAU SILAP TULIS.

To everyone else, have a nice, long weekend break and enjoy the crowd of last minute shoppers.

Eh, haze very bad in KL ah? Penang also the same. Eventhough it rains cats and dogs with thunderstorm and almost flood, the stubborn haze refuse to budge for days already. Just like their source lor. Cilaka betul. Keras kepala dan bengang betul. I have just cured my addiction for cough syrup and rhinathol expectorant so I hope I don’t kena that mad coughs again.

In case you got bored, please visit my Make$ Money$ site to see how to earn money from blogging, read my food blog and see how to make lasagna, check out my parenting blog and see how suck-blood I am by selling my soul and become the ‘slimebucket and lowest of the food chains’ of a blogger by getting paid per post. Kehkehkeh, no…I am not demeaning myself but just re-quoting what some of those six-figures bloggers said about people who blog for ‘pay per post’.

Actually, I had almost chopped off my index finger because I was fighting with my own conscience whether to Deny (reject) payment for USD125 which was supposed to go into my Paypal or click the Accept button to get paid. I had to reluctantly Deny payment because I cannot write about something that I do not condone. The programme pays you USD125, give you a list of advertisers and you are supposed to write about it. But I told the guy, sorry, no deal. I only write what I have passion for.
I took up another programme which pays less, takes a month to pay (unlike this one which pays in advance) and my posts have to be reviewed by the advertisers (and may be rejected). That, my chewren is called integrity. And you, my valued readers, will not be subjected to marketing gimmicks. If I blog to advertise, I will state it in my categories. *wraps flag around shoulder and pretend to look patriotic* Bahawasahnya, saya 5xmom, berikrar bahawa saya tidak akan terbeli dengan matawang dan menjatuhkan maruah saya sebagai pembelog. Saya akan menjaga talian persahabatan saya dengan kamu semua dan akan berterus-terang sekiranya saya menggunakan blog ini untuk tujuan mendapat duit. Amen!

So…tadaaa….got sticky questions to ask.

  • Do you think it is ethical for bloggers to sneak in promotions in their blog without telling their faithful readers?
  • Do you think personal blogs ought to remain as personal diary and not being used as a platform to make money? Unless of course, it is openly told to its reader.
  • Do you hate my blog because it has too many advertisements?
  • Or do you never notice anything on the side bars except for my entertaining (ok, angkat bakul sendiri) posts because you forget everything when you are reading my words?

Ok lah, so many questions so take your time to reply, or not.

Have a nice holiday to all. Berhati-hati di jalanraya and don’t forget to berdoa semoga selamat before making that balik kampung trip. To the rest, Godspeed and may the good Lord watches over you and protect you from dangers on the road.

22 thoughts on “Good wishes to all and how ethical are bloggers?

  1. 5xmom doing survey of coz must reply!

    1) i think everyone is a salesperson in his/her life to a certain extent. be it for money or audience or pure pleasure, etc.

    2) same as above lor. nothing wrong la, the readers will be able to judge.

    3) doesn’t matter if got 1000 thousand ads per page oso as long as it loads in a blink of an eye.

    4) of course! esp ur colourful links.

    have an enjoyable hazy hols in kl!!!

  2. where’s the advertisement? lol.

    prolly there’s just too many of them hanging around, i’m like immune to those advertisements…

  3. Hello 5xmom,

    Have been reading your blog on and off, and I’d have to say, I do enjoy your content (I do not question it). However, pertaining to your questions, as they touch the subject of advertisements which, I’m afraid I sorely detest, here are my opinions:

    1. Well, if you’ve never had ads in your blog, and then you suddenly have a chock-full of them, then yes, your readers are bound to be miffed because you sold out. At the end of the day, I guess this very much depends on the style of the blog, if it’s supposed to be a personal diary, or an everyday journal. Which brings me to the second question …

    2. Yes. If you wish to make a few bucks out of your site, then it would only be fair to your readers to tell them so. Take one of the best blogs on the Internet, Waiterrant; he informed his readers of his intentions and objectives of placing ads in his site, which was nice (plus he did not fill every bit of white space in his blog with ads, which is VERY good). Granted, it takes money to continue hosting the site, but to be honest, who’d bother clicking on any, if not all, the ads in one’s site? IMO, ads are an eyesore. Enough said.

    3. You could do with less or no advertisements, that’s for sure. Thank goodness your content is good enough to continue sustaining your readers šŸ™‚

    4. I think the first thing that captivates your audience would be the general outlook of the page, and that includes the sidebars. Yours is pretty cluttered (one sidebar’s good enough).

    Do take my words with a pinch of salt. After all, we’re only here to learn to improve šŸ™‚

    Happy holidays.

  4. firstly, i didn’t notice the ads until u mentioned it. and besides, secondly the reason i visit your blog is to find if u have any more interesting things written (i got to know yours from helen’s blog) so ads or no ads don’t matter to me. thirdly, there is nothing wrong making money from it surely we all would like to make some money if given the opportunity

    just keep up the good posts and i’ll be back time and again

    p/s Happy Holidays to you & family too, may the good Lord watches over each and everyone of you

  5. hehe, the part of your ‘ikrar’ thingy, when you say jatuh maruah sebagai pembelog, sounds like pembelot lar!! hehehe…

    have a wonderful weekend, and don’t get sick from hazy klang valley… šŸ™‚ *cough cough cough*

  6. In reply to your questions.

    1. No…its our choice to visit the other people’s blog, if we don’t like the add’s the owner does not tie you down or force you to read the blog..is that not so aunty?

    2. A blog is the personal property of the owner, irregardless they make money or not, write nonsense, plagiarise(SIC?) or whatever, its still their own blog, and therfore its their personal property, similar to wanting to plant whatever tree in your garden and who cares if the neighbour don’t like that tree or obstruct his view..its still in his garden and there’s nothing they can do about it. SO, its up the blog owner to do whatever they feel like doing and don’t give a F*ck what others have to say lah šŸ˜›

    3. Nope, never minded the adverts as your postings are great to read and I think that’s the same with most of your faithful readers.

    4. hehehe as mentioned above, so should I make your nose kembang even more? hehehehe

    Anyway, keep up the wonderful work and your blog is one of the few that I never miss.

  7. Have a good break, Lilian (despite the horrible haze). I dah tak sabaq nak balik Perlis ni, esok I dah cuti. Dah tak tahan dgn haze kat sini, you pulak terpaksa mai sini.

  8. 1. It is your blog. And the reader has the choice to read the blog.

    2. Blog are personal, even making money are personal too. Unless you want to share your money with me šŸ˜‰

    3. All your blog are clean and mean, never notice excessive ads.

    4. sidebar?hmmm, oh… I just go straight to the contents.

  9. coming to KL? the haze is just as bad! i bet your chewren will bug ube going to either mont kiara skate park or the skate park opp assunta hosp…kiah kiah kiah..! have a good pengsan-free holiday, hopefully!

  10. One concised answer to your questions:-

    I don’t care. I like your blogS but just don’t have enough time to read them and Not enough Money to click on your ads šŸ˜›

  11. Questions 1 & 2 are wholly dependent on whether we think of our blogs as a journal, or a business. As much as we’d like to go with QV’s answer to question 2, it becomes moot when we treat a blog as a service to readers.

    If we do not care about who and what our readership numbers are, then we can say the blog is personal property and if people don’t like it they can bugger off. But presumably if we do care about them and likewise call them faithful readers, are we not providing a service to them and as such if they do not like what they see, we must adapt to win them back?

    Say if we say ‘dun care la if someone dun like’. We still have everyone else. Then are we really blogging for people, for money, or for ourselves.

    And is it probable that we do not notice the ads because we’ve gotten so used to it, knowing where they are an instinctively avoiding it.

    The gist of what I’m saying, if it doesn’t make money then its a blog. If it does its a business. As such, aren’t customers always right and if they complain about ads, then presumably something needs to be done to rectify their grievances.

    I feel as if there is something about what I’ve said that I’ve not covered but will probably come to bite me in the butt later. But I’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

  12. Lilian, I enjoy reading your Blogs immensely. If without your advertising you can’t maintain the entertainment value that I derive from reading it then I don’t see what is wrong for you deriving some income to support the Blogs.

    The question is should wives be paid salary + epf + socso for work, and yes wifely responsibilities at home. The fact that the husband alone pays for the purchase of a house does not disentitle a woman from Marital Property.

    Yes, a woman must be responsible for the child upbringing and well-being (husband must jaga also-lah) but does that mean a woman is going to tell a husband “No need to give me money-lar. It is my responsibility as a wife to take care of our children..”

    Same thing here- You Lilian, are servicing us, the reader. Summore not one blog you know.. (as if you don’t know-lar). You provide introduction services of sorts. You give knowledge (Jack high-high leh). You provide friendship to those cyber beings, whom with you have no other avenue to make their thoughts known.

    If you get money out of it by all means…
    (But if it is an obscene amount can share with me one ar?)

  13. Amendment to Para 4, last sentence- “You provide friendship to those cyber being, whom without you, have no other avenue to make their thoughts known.” (Chewah macam buat drafting agreement kat office)

  14. i rss your blog, so read no ads. ok, i confess! i tarak contiblute to your moolah! *spank me!* šŸ˜€

  15. 1) Do you think it is ethical for bloggers to sneak in promotions in their blog without telling their faithful readers?
    By the use of the word “sneak” itself implies that it’s wrong, right? šŸ˜‰

    2) Do you think personal blogs ought to remain as personal diary and not being used as a platform to make money? Unless of course, it is openly told to its reader.
    IMHO, blogs should remain as personal diary.

    3) Do you hate my blog because it has too many advertisements?
    I love your blog! Cause I don’t notice the advertisements šŸ˜€

    4) Or do you never notice anything on the side bars except for my entertaining (ok, angkat bakul sendiri) posts because you forget everything when you are reading my words?
    Why else would I love your blog? šŸ™‚

  16. adverts doesnt bother me cos i also doing the same. it doesnt harm at all unless the ads was cluttered all over the place & was heavily infested with malicious pop-up that hog even a single load of your page.

    inform viewers or not, for me is not a prob cos it is ur blog, u can do whatever you wish hor. if viewers dun like cos of this issue, mah no need come again loh.

    if a blog so damn good, monetised (with adverts) or not also will still drive the same amount of traffic cos your reputation is already there. so takut apa wo?

    “patah tumbuh hilang berganti”. moleh munya..

  17. Ok, Happy Hloidays!! Ditch blogging for a week and have a great time with ur hubby and kids for once lah. And do drop by Ipoh lah for a visit. Go KL sure passby this small tempat wann u’know….

  18. Came across your blog and thought it was one of the more interesting blogs that I’ve come across. Started a blog of my own a few days back with the help of my good friend mumsgather. Answer to your 3rd question regarding advertisements, no I wasn’t turned off by it, rather was quite intrigued. Wow, how do you guys do it? Also I have been visitng various blogs from Malaysians and that kinda makes me feel closer to home. Do visit me if you have some time and let me know what you think of my blog. I have pretty thick skin so good or bad just dish it out.

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