Unread reviews

[hypotenuse]

I know, I know. You cannot remove content from epinions to another venue.

But it is terribly frustrating.

I spent thirty minutes or so other day, going through my reviews. Hey! There are only 28 of them, doesn't take long.

#1 I didn't receive any income share. At all. For anything. Which is understandable considering....

#2 I received maybe, MAYBE 10 hits on my reviews during the month.



Yup.

Ok, I'm not saying my stuff is high entertainment or anything. I am certainly not one of those *writer* people who post at epinions. I just like speaking my mind on occasion, and hope that my book reviews spark some kind of interest in science. That's all.

But it's very frustrating knowing that my reviews not only are not being read at epinions, but that I cannot take these reviews and move them to a more compatable venue. Where they have a better chance at being read.

I don't care about the money anymore. Would just like people to find my reviews every now and again.

And the situation is very frustrating. Kinda dawg in the manger. No, we're not going to pay you anything for your reviews, but you can't take them anywhere else either. Read? We could care less if people read your reviews. Just want filler content.

My love for science has been reduced to filler content.



Lynne

[Joubert[$]]

One solution - not a pretty one, mind you, but a solution -- is to create a personal home page, excerpt your reviews (the help center has the specifics) and write additional content. Then submit your homegrown site to the search engines and drive traffic to your page. You have to link to Epinions and identify their content as such, but you might be surprised as to the traffic you could generate.

If readership and feedback is what you're after, this is certainly one way to go about gaining it.

[kurt_messick]

I've put a lot of my links on my geocities page. I reshuffle them every now and then. I get some outside readers. Of course, that doesn't translate into much income share, either.

[pluckyduck]

Falling into the Who Has Time to Do This Category:

As Joubert says, you can put your stuff on your own home page or on any site that has five or fewer contributors.

User agreement:

You may also display your Reviews on any site which contains content contributed from 5 individual contributors or less, but you must include the following attribution in the display: "You can read this review at [URL of the review page on Epinions.com] and other reviews on the same topic at [URL of the product page on Epinions.com]. Check out my profile page at [URL of your Epinions.com profile page]."

The thing that you can't do is submit your Epinions for publication online to any site with more than five contributors. Easily Addictive, of course, is an example of a site like that.

Frankly, I found the online licensing restrictions more of a bummer when there were other writing site avenues like Themestream and Writtenbyme. Now that the competing sites are down to um, pretty much nothing, it's not as much of a bummer.

If there is somewhere else that you want to contribute, standard yada yada "rewrite" advice would apply....also falling into the Who Has Time to Do This Category

If I can be of any less help, please let me know.



Andrea

[erik_kosberg]

We are expected to abide by a legally unenforceable and ever-changing “user agreement” but Epinions is, from their point of view, free to do whatever they want with the content that we create including arbitrarily removing our ability to edit or delete our content.

Harrrummmph. If you’re not making any money anyway, what can they do to punish you if you add your content to another venue?

[Sordid-1]

I'm with Erik. I see neither moral nor legal ramifications to taking your ideas and posting them elsewhere if you feel you can reach a larger audience or you feel you want to for any reason whatsoever. It's your writing, it belongs to you. Epinions wants unique content, fine, delete it before you post elsewhere. They benefited from the "filler" while it was here, you were given a temporary venue, everyone should be happy.

There's been enough written about the illusory, non-binding nature of the U.A. that it doesn't need to be rehashed, but if you actually have qualms about "violating" the revolve-o-TOS, go ahead and make minor revisions to the pieces before finding them a new home.

"Yeah but, yeah but, yeah but... the TOS says this, the TOS says that, the TOS says you can't, you can't, you can't..."

Don't care. My TOS says that Epinions has to pay me $100 every time I use the word "smegma" and they are legally required to send someone to my house every alternate Wednesday to wash and wax my truck. Why does it say that? Because I printed it out and wrote those new terms on my copy well after the original terms were agreed to and without notifying the other party. Why not? It's no different than the method they use to handle changes to the "agreement." And no less legally binding either.

I'm more interested in fair play. I promise that my pieces are exclusively displayed at Epinions while they ARE displayed. If I find somewhere else I want to post them, I'll delete them and do so. I have done so in the past, and will do so in the future if the whim strikes me. They have better things to do than trying to prevent me from making people laugh or even from trying to quash your desire to spread a love of science. And if I'm wrong about that, then screw 'em. That being the case, they wouldn't deserve our efforts anyway. But I honestly don't think they're that interested in trying to prevent you from maintaining control over your writing.

[rich2003dm]

Lynne,

Do what I do.

I print them out and stick them on my refrigerator.

Rich

[Sordid-1]

Yah, I do that, too (print them out and stick them to Rich's refrigerator.)

[rich2003dm]

Yeah!

I got a big refrigerator.

Rich

[jsaunt]

I'm just glad that I don't have to pay Ken every time I say smegma. Don't get your hopes up Sordie. That's the first time I've said (read: typed) it in years.

I'd worry about this, myself, if I thought anybody else would read my stuff if it were anywhere else (including Rich's refrigerator!).

Leslie

[kurt_messick]

Welcome Leslie!

I agree for the most part. I'm currently looking for somewhere else to post my things. I just haven't found that place yet.

[jsaunt]

I haven't been inspired to write anything in quite some time....not even a post here.

Maybe I should begin with baby steps.

I do appreciate the welcome.

Leslie

[hypotenuse]

Excuse me Rich. But I have to ask a question.

Exactly how many people do you have posting to your refrigerator? If it's more than five.... You could be in serious trouble.

Lynne - who is still contemplating the issue

[theeye]

As long as his refrigerator is off-line, he's ok.

But it'll be murder on his ice cream.

[Sordid-1]

Guess that blows my plan to start a Refrigerator Cam website in Rich's kitchen. I was having trouble finding VCs to fund it anyway, darn slumping dotcom market.

And, Leslie, you owe me $100. We'll just call it even, though, if you give me unlimited rights to the word "spurge."

[Sordid-1]

Lynne:

#2 I received maybe, MAYBE 10 hits on my reviews during the month.

Also, I forgot to share my foolproof plan to increase your non-member hits. In future science reviews, figure out a way to work the words "Jennifer Lopez" or "tits" into your review title. Both would be preferable.

I'm here to help, Lynne.

[hypotenuse]

And I love you for it Ken.

But wouldn't the words Jennifer Lopez and tits look a bit strange coming from me? Now you, I can see it. Easily. But I'm more of a straight arrow, in many ways.

Perhaps I could use Richard Dawkins and ass.

Whatchya think?

Lynne

[jsaunt]

How sweet of you to remember!


And, Ken, we'll never be even. You'll always be ahead.

[pluckyduck]

I'd worry about this, myself, if I thought anybody else would read my stuff if it were anywhere else

For some reason, this cracked me up this AM more than "smegma".

Yeah, I since I toss all of the offers I get from other online venues who are dying for my toaster reviews, I really don't stay up nights worrying about the TOS.

:p

Andrea
who can't post on her refrigerator , far too covered by the kid's work

[jsaunt]

Andrea,

I'm glad that something I "wrote" cracked you up. I do enjoy making someone chuckle...even if it's not a daily occurance.


You're making me think that maybe I should take more baby steps and write again sometime. This is a great place to help me with my apparent self-esteem (for my writing) problem. [And yes, you can take that however you like (ie: my self-esteem problem or my writing problem).]


Happy New Year's Eve Eve!

[rich2003dm]

Originally posted by jsaunt

You're making me think that maybe I should take more baby steps and write again sometime. This is a great place to help me with my apparent self-esteem (for my writing) problem. [And yes, you can take that however you like (ie: my self-esteem problem or my writing problem).]

Writing problem?

You don't got no writing problem. (Ain't got?)

I read some of your stuff and it's damned good. I would probably place your stuff among the top 15% of all the stuff on Epinions.

Most of us aren't pros here. We just write because we enjoy it.

So go ahead and write. I'll let you inflict your stuff on me, if you'll let me inflict my stuff on you.

Rich

[jsaunt]

Thanks Rich.


Maybe these few posts here have been helpful. Because I finally did get inspired to write something at the mothersite.

I am a bit insecure about writing, although I've gotten better. It's the only writing I've ever done besides boring patient evaluation reports. But I was kinda referring to my writer's (block) problem.


Oh, and thanks for the writing suggestions! (I can't bring myself to utter the "word" ain't....sorry, it's the speech pathologist in me.)

Leslie

[adonna]

Originally posted by Sordid-1
Don't care. My TOS says that Epinions has to pay me $100 every time I use the word "smegma" and they are legally required to send someone to my house every alternate Wednesday to wash and wax my truck. Why does it say that? Because I printed it out and wrote those new terms on my copy well after the original terms were agreed to and without notifying the other party. Why not? It's no different than the method they use to handle changes to the "agreement." And no less legally binding either.

Realizing that this isn't the meat of your post, I still have to smile. Although they can amend an electronic agreement by posting a revision (and, if they really wanted to be legal about it, notifying the parties to the agreement when a modification is made via email, among other things best left unsaid) any party to the agreement has the right to insist that notification of modifications be mailed to them (snail mail not email). It's right there in the California version of the law that validates online agreements in the first place.

Knowing that, sometimes I lean back and grin, imagining the havoc if enough people were to insist on this right.

[adonna]

Yup, and imagine how sticky all this TOS stuff was before there was a law saying that this electronic twiddling could be used to form an actual agreement.

God, I shudder, remembering that. When people didn't even know if copyright applied to online writing. (BTW, did you know that the mothersite's house counsel has written articles advocating that nothing online should be subject to copyright protection? Do you think someone should include that one in the EP trivia game?)