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Confessions Of A Social Media Abuser

I have a confession to make: I abuse social media.

Not because I spam it… or… at least… not because I spam it because I’m greedy or lazy.

No. My abuse stems from a different source. I lack time.

I lack the time to participate as a proper contributive member of social media. And then I complain about the poor quality results I find in my favorite social news sites.

I’m the worst kind of social media abuser: I participate solely for my own promotion, and then expect the site to somehow work effectively without my genuine input as a contributive member.

Here’s a list of the abusive things I do:

  1. I vote for stories without reading them. I know I shouldn’t, but I know I need to vote for other people’s stories because I want to seem like I’m an active member. I’m not really - I don’t have the time to be.
  2. I sometimes vote for every story. Heck, that gets my name in front of everyone, and it seems like I’m spreading love - not just spreading myself. Which is what I am really doing.
  3. I submit only my own stories. Never anyone else’s. I’ll vote for other stories sure… but… I’ll never submit them.
  4. I collude with people who think how I think. Or at least, people who pretend to be like me.

I do more things than this. But these are the main things I do that come to my mind.

I don’t really feel guilty either. Why should I?

Business is hard. Even when the money is flowing in, there’s more problems then when there is NO money flowing in. There’s always an employee out of line, a project running late, an adwords campaign that’s failing, a competitor one upping me in the serps.

There’s always something else I could be doing that would bring me more money. And an easier life.

Sometimes I think that I should focus on giving… and I want to… and if the day comes where I’m far enough ahead - I will…

… I definitely will…

(Can you recognize someone else in there? Maybe even YOURSELF a little? I know I see some of myself in there… maybe not all of it, but some of it…)

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    • This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 25th, 2007 at 5:26 am and is filed under Consumerism, Make Money Online Tip. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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    2 Responses to “Confessions Of A Social Media Abuser”

    1. Mihaela Lica Says:
      September 25th, 2007 at 7:56 am

      Well, at least you are honest about it…
      May I have your permission to include the list (with a link to your site) into an ebook (“Blogging Tips: How to be Cocky and Vexatious”) we are going to publish (we=all bloggers that transformed the idea into a meme of sorts)?

    2. SBJ Says:
      September 25th, 2007 at 8:18 am

      Hey Mihaela,

      Sure - As long as you credit me and link my site - no problem.

      To anyone else reading this who would like to reproduce something I’ve written please remember you need to ask me first - I seem to be getting ripped off more and more - and I don’t like it.

      I’m happy to let people reproduce some of what I write (as long as they credit me and link to my site)- but not all of it - and I do require you to ask permission for each thing you would like to reproduce as I make these decisions on a case by case basis.

      Thx :-)

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