22 April 2009

Mark Penn's Weird Article About an Alternate Universe Where Bloggers Are Filthy Rich!

Livin' the Blog Life: Big Pimpin', Bling Blingin' And Shit

Hillary Campaign knucklehead Mark Penn has an extremely erroneous article today in his MicroTrends WSJ article about how easy it is for bloggers to make 6 figures. The entire premise for the claim that >100K visitors/month equals $75K/year is based on a pretty shoddy looking Technorati survey taken in 2008 (the website that has a vested financial interest in more people blogging and using it's services). The "median" is actually 22K/year for those over 100K hits/month (which is right about at the poverty line), and most bloggers I've met have made very little if they try to monetize their product. McArdle, Gateway Pundit, and Gawker all called bullshit, and Mark Penn had to issue a correction the same day. From WSJ by way of Wonkette:
As far as the $75,000, the Technorati report says that of those bloggers who had 100,000 or more unique visitors, the average income is $75,000. True, it's not the median, but it is the average. We can quibble about how easy it is to make this kind of money -- but the point is, the huge potential is there.
Yeah, the "huge potential" was there for pets.com too. The fact is that blogs are a hobby for most people, and we shouldn't delude ourselves with promises of benjamins growing off sitemeter and trackbacks. So, sneaking in a post that's been running around your head while your boss' back is turned at your crappy "real job" is still the way to go. It's probably for the best that blogs (at least the political ones) remain an unprofessional rabble, as it gives it that "townhall" feel where you can get pissed off at Washington instead of having to deal with your own personal life.

For the people that think that they got what it takes to make money bloggin', check out Tough Girl 101 who helps put her way through college . Or you can go jump the shark and start posting nastiness about all your old friends like Charles Johnson. That always boosts the traffic!

3 comments:

subrookie said...

I tried to do my part to help out but you let Drudge take the big story. You would have had at least 100K hits in one day if you let that be proprietary.

In related news Mark Penn was arrested for running a Ponzi scheme telling people their 401K would be safe in these challenging economic times while he holiday'd in Malta on an illegally purchased 120' sailboat.

Ms. Kiyum said...

How do you know this guy is a blogger and not just a big, hairy supporter of William Jennings Bryan? Bimetallism 4-evah!

Nixon said...

SubRookie,

That was a good tip, and it's funny as hell that the Stranger went down, haha.

Ms. K,

Was he one of the Little Rascals?