Remember those Robert Ludlum novels about spies and conspiracy theories? You don’t? You must be young. Before the curtain came down, there were plenty of suspicions floating around. Spies and undercover agents infiltrating the government. Everybody is on alert and you don’t want to be sleeping with the enemy. Everything and everyone is viewed with caution.
It’s happening here in the blogosphere today. Back in my early blogging days, things were much simpler. The most damage a meme can do would probably be your time spent conjuring up good answers. Perhaps you feel obligated to come up with something funny or profound so people take notice. By the way, it’s OK to play the hypocrital moaner who bitch how you hate being tagged though in honesty you’re half gloating the fact somebody actually think you’re important enough to be tagged. It comes with the territory. It’s uncool to be happy getting tagged…..
Well, those days are gone. Come today, you’ll be overwhelmed with suspicions should somebody tagged you. The whole meme thing today is revolutionized by 2 words. Link bait. If you did not monetize your blog, you’re oblivious to the underlying motive. For people who monetized their blogs, we know PR is an asset. Advertisers care zit whom you are. You’re a nice person? Who cares? It’s your blog PR that does the talk. It takes time to build PR and you can lose your blog ranking if you go all out and drain every ounce of its worth with links. Personally I do find it hard to justify cheap sleazy momentary link scheme in the form of memes. You know something is amiss when you’re asked to list and link the whole list of participants. I’m not talking about 5, more like 50 at one go.
Well, if you’re a willing partner hoping to fish some links yourself I have no objection. As long as it’s not under any fake pretence and spoken outright ‘you link me and I’ll link you. Let’s help each other out’. I have no problem with that, it’s your blog, it’s your choice….. While at it, social nicety dictates one should not go all personal when someone is not an interested participant. Other people have choices too.
I spoke about memes, but in honesty, is the blogosphere really full of such dubious stuff where ulterior motives lurk at every nook and corner? Heard about the one regarding the West eradicating the East in PPP? Not with secret lasers or scentless gas. It gets better. Eliminate the East in the guise of a writing contest. Codename bad English and lousy grammar….
Personally I call it 100% unfounded paranoia. You believe? Well, you’re free to arrive at your conclusion as much as I did at mine. I guess everyone has the right to make the call himself. Live and Let Live.
This entry was posted on Monday, August 20th, 2007 at 6:54 pm and is filed under Bloggings, rants. 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.
Ta.. the meme thing is really getting to be a nuisance. Every meme is a viral list now. When I reply a meme now, I throw away that part totally.
About the West eliminating the East theory, I haven’t been following the drama, but i think this conclusion is just to far out and shallow. Yes, there might be a group of westerners out there who are jealous of us having a bite out of the pie, buthen, I think the pie owner would not be so foolish to let us get eliminated.
Initially I didn’t even know what ‘meme’ was…I mean, what the hell is a “meme” anyway? Its not even a word for crying out loud!!! Anyways, I have been tagged. Did I enjoy it? Honestly, I’m neutral about it but it gave me a chance to let readers know a lil’ something about me…
how much you think i will get paid worr for writing PPP stuff LOL…anyways, thanks for being my faithful commentator even though my articles sucks…heheh…
I used to do memes back then but only if they are “easy” topics. Some of the topics can be so hard to think and write about and hey, I got a full time job you know? Nowadays, it gets harder when I have a few blogs to juggle. So, instead to following with the meme, I give out link love where appropriate. It’s more or less the same thing
helen,
i think if you currently have a blog registered with PPP, you can submit another blog or blogs without having to register for another account or wait for the blog(s) to reach the 90 days grace period. The only requirement is that you have 10 or more approved posts on your current blog. i didn’t have to wait three months for PPP to approve my new blog.
I think meme started off as a very good way to know more about your blogger friends. I mean, I used to complete every meme sent my way, until they turned fishy. Like everything else, the misuse of something leads to it being labeled as “bad” and “harmful”, e.g. mobile phones, internet, you name it..
Hi,
As I go along in blogging.. well, some one tagged me on Meme.. (I do not know what is meme initially, sure now I know it..) and I have been written for 3 Meme I think.. =P
I am Ok with those fun meme and I enjoyed replying on those meme, sometimes. (BUT not link up to 50 blogs.. Haha..)