Page Rank and why it shouldn't matter

I have been blogging since 2005.  I have learned a lot during that time.  First I learned that to get readers/followers, I need to read/follow others.  Makes sense.

Second I learned that regardless of how much I might visit and comment and follow, if I don't have anything to provide a potential reader, I'm not going to have people come back for seconds or thirds or the current drama that I might be experiencing.  They may not come back to read about how I don't give secret family recipes.

Speaking of drama, the third thing I've learned is that people enjoy a good train wreck as long as they're not involved.  It's like a crash on the freeway.  You don't want to look, but you can't help it.  You might get to see some blood or a limb laying on the freeway.  You have to look.  Just like some people have to become involved in the sugar/corn issue or who is deceptive with baby formula.  Everyone has a cause or issue they feel strongly about.  And sometimes, that prompts some really good blogging.

Fourth, I have learned that blogging has changed.  Way back when blogging was the "in" thing, there were hundreds of blogs I visited.  There were new blogs cropping up every day.  Blogs of housewives and moms and people who just wanted their own little corner of the internets to say what was on their mind.  People blogged about what they made for dinner and how long it took them to clean the kitchen floor.  Now days I find less personal blogs and more bloggers who are wanting their piece of the commercial pie.  And why shouldn't they?  Hell, I have this review blog you're reading right now, as well as a personal blog over there.

I want to do something with my words too.  I hope to make a difference or give an opinion that can be trusted or even just give someone a heads up that Giant Cheetos are super yummy cheestastick and super gross, all at the same time.  I want to try new things and pass on that knowledge. I want to make a name for myself in the internet world too.  Law school isn't cheap yanno. 

I have developed a few relationships with advertisers and a couple non-profits (because I do believe in giving back).  I had a nice gig for some advertising that I lost because suddenly my Google Page Rank took a nose dive.  I don't know why.  I don't understand how or why.  All I know is that my blog and entries have stayed the same, but my rank went south.  This happened on my other commercial blog as well.  I've had that blog and this review blog since early 2007.  I have worked them both the same (this one considerably less than the other).  This blog has more hits and followers than my other blog and yet it has a PR of 1 while the other blog has a PR of 2.  The other blog has paid posts on it and at one point last year, Google yanked my entire PR. I was down to a zero, as if I had just started out new.  A virgin blog.  Except I had something like 750 posts at the time.  My personal blog, that is not indexed by the search engines, that has over 300 members and thousands of page hits per week, it has a PR 3.  And I've had it since 2005.  I don't get it. 

Mostly though, I don't understand why, if Google hasn't updated their page ranker since April of this year, PR people and companies are relying on such an archaic measure of popularity.  While my blog in no way compares to some out there, I certainly have a voice and followers and I can Twitter and Facebook and FanPage with the best of them.  Although I admit I have been slightly preoccupied of late.  That's all about to change however.  Because I want to be something when I grow up.  And while I'm in the process of that, I want to blog and review and have a little fun.  This is me joining a cause. 

To quote Lindsay at Lindsay Socializes, because she said it better than I ever will:

So, it’s time to educate the PR folks out there and remind them that just because I have a Google PR of zero does not make my blog worthless! I am still just as capable of working with your brand or reviewing your product as anyone else! As a matter of fact, let’s all get together and let the PR people know that we, as a blogosphere, do not want to be accepted or rejected based solely on an outdated algorithm. We would much rather be judged solely on our content, our traffic and our readership. If you like our work, then forget about PR and give us a chance!

Well said Lindsay.  Well said. 

How to decorate the perfect (in my humble opinion) rustic kitchen

You know what I need? A dinner bell. It will complete the look and feel of my kitchen, which is decorated with a smattering of this and that and all things old and rustic. I have several different sized and shaped glass bottles on the top of my cupboards. I have some old cast iron frying pans up there too. My walls are decorated with a couple rustic sunflower drawings framed in old barn wood. Once, while out browsing at a thrift store, I bought the neatest miniature barn door (yes, door), that is about two feet tall, with paned glass and real hardware for door knob. The door has a shelf that sits across the bottom window ledge, which I have placed some small herb pots on. It hangs on a wall and is painted in a rustic weathered gray color. Hanging along side it is a one foot tall picket fence, also painted in the rustic weathered gray color.

What I am missing from my kitchen, which I believe will round it out quite nicely, are a rooster and a dinner or farm bell. I have in one corner of the kitchen a rustic baker’s rack that is covered with pots of flowers, old, weathered watering cans and some very old family photographs. On my counter over the sink I have a one foot tall, carved out of wood and painted to look very old and antique, jersey cow. She is very whimsical and rustic looking at the same time. My kitchen table is an old butcher block top, with antiqued cream colored legs and wooden chairs to match. On the table sits my grandmother’s old wooden cutting board and on top of that sits a vase with sunflowers in it. I hope that I find the just right rooster for the cupboard over my refrigerator, to sit next to my bird house and very ancient wooden wine box. Once I find the perfect dinner bell, I think my kitchen just might be complete.

Until I change my mind and redecorate it using the Tuscan theme that I keep dreaming about.

Just a thought...

Rather than cutting off social security deductions once an employee reaches $104,000 per year in salary (the cut off as of 2008), perhaps a better plan would be that every employee, regardless of their income pay into the system equally.

As it stands right now, minimum wage earners pay; Wait staff who generally make $2.10 per hour plus tips pay; Those earning minimum wage pay; I pay, you pay, our parents paid. Why not make everyone pay? Equally?

If the yearly wage were not capped, then every employee making from $2.10 per hour all the way up to hundreds of thousands of dollars per year would be paying into a system that some speculate will run out of money before the next generation is able to use it. It makes more sense to me that everyone pay equally and built up the fund rather than to make the lower and middle classes pay for something that will be of benefit to everyone at some point.

Just because a person is bringing down multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, that doesn't mean they couldn't lose it all in the future and need to draw upon the very system that perhaps they didn't pay into at all.