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ActiveRain's "antiquated and (hilariously dilapidated)" outside blogs

Don't laugh... I'll show you my "hilariously dilapidated" blog if you show me yours... Mine is DiscoverColumbusOH.com

Header image on DiscoverColumbusOH.com

Yours?

Jorgen wrote of the NEW and improved Outside Blogs "These replace the antiquated (and hilariously dilapidated) Outside Blogs." in his post:Winning Wednesday: Introducing New Team and Individual Blogs

Jeff announced the ActiveRain blogs:ActiveRain Launches ActiveBlogs, a Multi-Author Blogging Platform for Real Estate Industry Professionals

Brad talked more about group blogs: ActiveBlogs - 5 Suggested Ways To Maximize Your New Group Blogs

I knew about it because of Linda Scanlan's post: What They Did is Just Wrong!

Antiquated??? How old are our "hilariously dilapidated" outside blogs?

My "antiquated (and hilariously dilapidated)" outside blog is only a few months old isn't it? I understood from conversations with Rich Jacobson about Do you feel betrayed by ActiveRain? that using custom or outside blogs to monetize ActiveRain had been ruled out. I said of monetizing ActiveRain with sponsorships on ActiveRain:

"OUTSIDE Blogs

In 2007 (?) ActiveRain started talking about selling OUTSIDE blogs... I thought devoted members were lining up to pay for OUTSIDE blogs. I had two blogs plus ActiveRain but was waiting to see how the OUTSIDE blogs looked... how they were set up. It was an opportunity to give AR some money... I could figure out what blog to kill off... but then ActiveRain GAVE us OUTSIDE blogs for free. That would not have generated much money though."

I understand there is no head shot now on "the antiquated (and hilariously dilapidated) ActiveRain Outside Blogs" anymore. There never was on mine. I had a map of Columbus. I am not a big head shot person. What will I get if I upgrade Columbus Ohio real estate (DiscoverColumbusOH.com)? More than a head shot!!!

Upgrade Columbus Ohio real estate (discovercolumbusoh.com)

Ready to take Columbus Ohio real estate to the next level? Upgrade your existing outside blog!

A few words regarding the new Outside Blogs…
Location-Aware: Neatly categorize your posts by location, all the way down to the neighborhood level
SEO Optimized: Automatically ping Google and other search engines when you post new content
Custom Domain: Don't fret over nameservers or registrars or DNS — just pick a domain and go
New Themes: Add a (professional) splash of color to your blog
And so much more… Countless bug fixes, tweaks, and improvements

That raises some more questions for me.... but I am wondering who has upgraded? Show me yours.

Your new shiny undilapidated (group or individual) outside blog or the "antiquated and (hilariously dilapidated)" outside blog you've had for months now... pretty please.

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Posted by Maureen McCabe Central OH Homes on 01/08/2009 11:03 AM

Comments (39)

Outside Blogs in the ActiveRain Channel

blogs, columbus, activerain

39 Comments on ActiveRain's "antiquated and (hilariously dilapidated)" outside blogs

JAN

The ups and downs of AR. All we can do is keep blogging

Maureen,

I am always into the FREE. Yet free has to be paid for somehow and often is through advertising revenue.

I do not now or have ever found the ads placed on this site to cause any problem with my enjoyment. For the company ( AR ) to offer blogs at a cost is also not a problem to me. Of course I personaly would not be interested in paying what I can get for free elsewhere.

Change is inevitable. Especially to something that I do not personaly own. As much as I feel this is my content and my site that I built, the Platform belongs to someone else. Should they decide one day to abandon the free portion and make it all pay to play that would be their decision entirely.

That is just life. Hope it doesn't go that way of couse as I do love the site.

I can't help, as I do not have an outside blog,,,but, I am planning on getting one.

I don't mind ads on the site. $19 per month for an outside blog though is kind of hefty especially when Jorgen says there still may be some server issues...hmm.

Jorgen still never did answer my question back in November about possible data loss, though I posted and reposted the question multiple times on his blog. That's just rude.

That makes me not only nervous, but irritated. If I were paying $19 a month I would want to know for certain that people looking for my blog will FIND it.

It's moot anyway cause I'm not paying it.

I do not have an outside blog and not sure if there is any benefit. AR is obviously pursuing business opportunity to increase their financial bottom line. As it is notably growing I am sure the ads will just increase and paid enhanced services will be next.

Change is inevitable, personally I might pay for a new (non antiquated) shiny blog. I probably won't pay for one and pay to sponsor communities on Localism.

I have my WordPress blog and I get traffic on it. I need to hire someone to do some work on it for me though. I am inept.

I am not sure why ads on the site are an issue? That has nothing to do with the new NON hilariously dilapidated outside blogs does it? Are we talking about ads on AR. The first thing AR did to monetize? I don't see them. I don't think I was upset about them when they first appeared. I have never begrudged AR (or any site ) $$$$$.

Sorry....only "brightly shinging" thing in my business is my rapidly balding head!! But seriously, we all have to expect that AR will look for ways to increase & maximize revenue.......just like we will make the decisions to pay it or not! I like AR now because it's free!!

You know I bought my domain for the ""the antiquated (and hilariously dilapidated) ActiveRain Outside Blogs" the day it was released and that is all I did except check the box to post to it. There wasn't anything else to do - so free was ok. (cost $8.00 for domain). The "new" outside blog doesn't seem to have much more going for it so this time around I am not going to be one of the firsts. I am going to wait until all the bugs are worked out. I do pay to blog on another site - my blog does get a ton of google juice and in less than 6 months has a 3/10 page. I also get other services for my $29.00 per month. I like it because it is an egg in a dfferent basket.

I will be watching for others to show us theirs!

thanks all for the comments. If anyone does one give me the link!!!! I would love to see before and after so that is why I am asking for links of old dilapidated ... I mean hilariously dilapidated outside AR blogs.

Jo said: "The "new" outside blog doesn't seem to have much more going for it so this time around I am not going to be one of the firsts"

I have NOT paid attention to how my blog has done as far as PR... I know I am NOT getting the traffic on it that I got on my RealTown blog which I killed when I stole it's name for my AR Outside blog.

This last week I was back to getting Proxy Errors on AR. I am concerned about the bugs.

Randy ??? Because you are concerned about bugs are you upgrading to a paid outside blog (other wise known as a shiny new non antiquated and hilariously dilapidated ActiveRain outside blog)???

The new blog offers:

And so much more… Countless bug fixes, tweaks, and improvements

Maureen: I don't think Jorgen used the best of terms to describe the Outside Blogs, so I apologize for that. We had determined that the benefits offered by the initial version of the Outside Blogs really didn't warrant a cost associated with them, so we provided the option at no cost. With the new upgraded features, we feel there is a ROI proposition, and as such, have implemented a corresponding fee.

I'm concerned with how the new outside blogs were rolled out. There doesn't seem to have been any testing, and response to issues so far has been slow. What frustrates me is that Localism was started well before any of this, and it's still in beta after more than a year.

John: The original plan was to finalize Localism shortly after the LandRush, and launch it to the public. Unfortunately, we began to experience some serious problems with our platform efficiencies. As a result, most of our time and energy over the past several months has been spent repairing and restructuring MAJOR portions of code. At times, we were tempted to rebuild the network from scratch. That would have been simpler, but it wasn't a viable option. Hopefully there has been a noticeable improvement in the last few weeks in the network running more smoothly and loading faster. We still have some work left, but at least things are more manageable. Now that this re-coding is done, our focus will return back to Localism, and the public launch as promised.

Maureen - Weren't we promised better SEO with the current, free, outside blogs? Wasn't that the point? I seem to remember there being a post about that. Didn't Bob write up a whole explanation about the SEO benefits of the "original" outside blogs?

I've never received much from the outside blogs. Google Alerts picked it up once or twice in the beginning, but never again after that. Seems all Google juice was given to the posts on AR - not on the outside blogs.

I also remember - when the "original" outside blogs were released, that it was stated that they had decided not to charge for outside blogs.

There was a comment on one of the recent AR posts about the new blogs, stating that the "current" outside blogs were dead in the water. (possibly Jeff or Jorgen made that comment? I'm not sure.) I took that to mean they were no longer usable. Now I'm hearing that that might not be the case.

They're also telling us that we cannot use the URLs we use now for the free outside blogs. We have to purchase a new URL through AR and then AR owns that URL. That's not cool.

Too much confusion. AR always works things out in the end, one way or another, but I've learned not to jump onto anything new. Too costly, and I haven't heard of anyone claiming benefits thus far to sponsoring Localism, or paying for Lead Router or placing ads on AR.

FYI: The links for "Search," "Groups," "Blogs," and "My Home" at the top of the pages are no longer working...

No relevance to this post...just an observation.

John your wait and see attitude probably makes sense under the circusmstances. Here's advice from Rich Jacobson on my old post where I commented on the fact complained that Localism is a beta with no commenting ability MONTHS after the Land Rush, yet they are charging the sponsors?

Rich wrote "Is anyone from ActiveRain twisting your arm and forcing you to pay? Are we holding your family members hostage in lieu of your monthly sponsorship fee? If you don't see a value in something, don't pay for it....."

Wouldn't you think they could either get Localism up and rollling or update us on what is going on? Instead they've gone off on another tangent introducing NEW and improved outside blogs? Listing router... and other things have obviously been a priority as well.

Don I am not sure that Bob's post about SEO had to do with outside blogs. Or maybe I am thinking of another post. I remember his post about the pages on AR that help with the SEO, I can't remember what they are called.

I don't know if the blogs were ever supposed to enhance the SEO. I remember posts early on about the fact that people were not seeing their blogs coming up but I did not pay that much attention to it. Jo said hers is a PR3. I have never looked to see what mine is.

I understand from Rich's comment above:

"I don't think Jorgen used the best of terms to describe the Outside Blogs, so I apologize for that. We had determined that the benefits offered by the initial version of the Outside Blogs really didn't warrant a cost associated with them, so we provided the option at no cost. With the new upgraded features, we feel there is a ROI proposition, and as such, have implemented a corresponding fee."

the blogs we got for free are "crap." Or is that just to sell blogs? They do need to monetize the site.

From Rich's comment to John above Localism "Unfortunately, we began to experience some serious problems with our platform efficiencies. As a result, most of our time and energy over the past several months has been spent repairing and restructuring MAJOR portions of code. At times, we were tempted to rebuild the network from scratch. That would have been simpler, but it wasn't a viable option." the outside blogs weren't the only thing "dilapidated."

Will the new blogs be great? Maybe.

Here is my antiquated (and hilariously dilapidated) ActiveRain Outside Blog.

I cancelled my Localism sponsorships about a month ago because I really didn't see the value in them. I'm open to starting them up again, if things change. I haven't really made a decision about upgrading my antiquated (and hilariously dilapitaded) outside blog yet, because I am thinking that I'll wait until the bugs are worked out. If I could convince the rest of my team to start blogging, then perhaps it would be worth it, but otherwise, I'm just not sure I would need it.

I have not decided yet what to do. I heard through the active grapevine that we might be able to transfer our old domains over to the new ones. I will wait to see if that will happen.

If not I may buy a Saline domain and focus on the community I actually live in since most of my localism posts are about Saline anyway.

I just read Debe's post and she kept both of hers.

So I could keep Ann Arbor Undressed for Ann Arbor and buy a new domain for Saline or other...

That is probably what I will do and then when I write on Ann Arbor I will check the old outside blog and when I post on Saline check the new paid outside blog.

I have no problem with them trying to make money and I know you don't either. I'm sure with the quality of programmers they have the new blogs will rock. My old outside blog never did get any syndication or Google Alerts anyway. I know others did but mine just didnt'.

Maureen, I agree that they dropped the ball on Localism! I like the concept of the new blogs, but yes there are concerns about jumping in too soon. One thing I just became aware of is that for now AR will own the Domains. I understand there is a plan to allow use of our own domains upcoming. I think it would be a good choice to wait for that opportunity.

Ginger

Don: Here is how the Outside Blogs were initially promoted:

* Host your Blog on your own domain name. (You must own name) ie: BestHomes.com
* Customize the look and feel of your Outside Blog.
* Set up in 10-15 minutes max.
* Build your posts in ActiveRain, no need to learn a new Blogging platform.
* Publish your posts to AR, Localism, Outside Blog, or all three, it's your choice.
* Benefit from the SEO power of ActiveRain.
* Brand your own Blog and yet stay connected with the AR community.
* Comments are syndicated between your ActiveRain Blog and your Outside Blog.

While many of the Outside Blogs did achieve reasonable ranking, in most instances it was always just behind our AR blogs. But I don't think search ranking was ever a primary benefit of the Outside Blogs. As I had explained to Maureen, I don't think we felt there was enough benefit to the initial release of the Outside Blogs to justify charging for it

Ginger & Roger: I wouldn't necessarily say that we 'dropped' the ball. More like we had to juggle a bunch of other balls first. We had a huge amount of positive momentum going into the the LandRush, and our intention was to finish up all of the changes necessary to launch it publicly. But as Maureen referred to above, we had some serious code restructuring that had to be done. I agree that better communication should have been forthcoming.

Okay...I decided for $20, I would try it for a month or two, so I am the guinea pig. So far, I have had trouble with setting it up and paying for it. Regarding the domain name, I used the one I already had, so I don't think AR owns it. So far (a whole 24 hours), I haven't seen the advantage, but maybe there is more that I am not getting. If it doesn't change, I will cancell in a couple of months.

Thanks all for the comments.

Jeanne thanks for showing me your antiquated and hilariously dilapidated blog.

Ginger said "One thing I just became aware of is that for now AR will own the Domains." That was a big red flag for me. It says: Custom Domain: Don't fret over nameservers or registrars or DNS — just pick a domain and go" ActiveRain will own the domain.

Paula I will be watching your blog. What's the URL?

When I read about it this morning I was thinking about doing it. Now I am definitelty waiting to see what happens, what they look like, how they perform.

I had given up on a "good" outside AR blog and finally broke down and created a wordpress.org blog. So 2 days after I have pulled out 50% of my hair they finally roll this out - my luck.

I am really hoping for fixes and improvements to Localism and would have appreciated this announcement more if I had not been paying for communities for a month while nothing was able to be posted there! And see if my headshot ever shows back up on many of the communities where I am a top neighbor with a lovely red X instead of my photo.

I'm just going to sit back and bite my tongue for a while now.

I know there's a lot of hype about the new blogs but I don't know if I'm going to do it right now. I'll have to look at this a bit more.

Won't you be better off on WP.org Michelle? You will own the domain. Do you mean you had given up hope of your old Outside blog doing any good? Or that it was a good outside blog?

Gee I had forgotten about the month of nothing showing up on Localism.

JAN

I will probably be better off in the long run, BUT there is something to be said for the SEO power at AR and the dear techie boys :) over at AR. I wouldn't have minded paying for something easy to set up that was still customizable. I didn't set up a custom domain for my outside blog - I kept waiting to see something better than what it was. WP has given me a huge headache and cost me countless hours of work and frustration and it is still not quite how I want it. I really didn't want to learn how to manipulate code!

I didn't - it burned me up everyday when I though about paying and not being able to post. I cannot decide whether to stay or go from sponsoring communities. I've really been disappointed in the results - I was getting much better activity off the old version of Localism and I am truly sick of some of the trash posted in my area. I have held off on posting my "sponsorship" paragraphs because I cannot decide if I want to be seen as "sponsoring" that crap!

Michelle: I'll see if I can get a definitive date for when Localism will be launched publicly, or at least, when the majority of elements for completion will be in place. That may help to guide your decisions.

Outside bologs are really that tricky? Well anyway have a great 2009.

Terry Miller

JAN

Rich: looking back that comment above sounded more bitter than I really am about it all :) I do realize that platform stability is critical and love all you guys do for us.

Michelle: I think many of us are frustrated to some degree. Especially those who have invested so much into Localism. While the exposure we've received through organic searches has been good, we all have been waiting very patiently for the site to be completed and launched to the public. We appreciate the feedback and opinions of our members. We do try to listen and take into consideration what our members tell us.

JAN

Maureen, wow, did you ever start something... I am too new to know what is right, but thanks for the post - it s posts like this that help us newbies to learn the ropes and behind the scenes goings-on..

JAN

I have been trying to activate the new upgraded blog but have not had any success. Program will not accept my correct payment info or upgrade my blog.

Also, I have not seen any Activated Upgraded blogs. I noticed that you asked for someone to give you a link to theirs.... however I don't see where anyone gave you a link.

What gives?

JAN

????????????????????? I tweeted to see if anyone would show us theirs. Are you on Twitter Pam?

MoInColumbusOH ActiveRain members Who's done a NEW outside blog? Pam Jank is looking for examples http://bit.ly/w1zh who's blog had Laurie M's content? 1 minute ago from TweetDeck

Maureen, I did join Twitter about 6 months ago but I don't really know it's advantages.

Pam someone has a blog about how absolutely, fantastic and wonderful the Google juice, is or will be with the new blogs. It is on the featured blogs.

Sorpressa, sorpressa, sorpressa!!! <--- may or may not say surprise, surprise, surprise in Spanish. ;- )

JAN

Maureen, thanks for the help.. unfortunately the system still will not allow me to UPGRADE. I see that others were able to, maybe the system is down/having problems???

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