Capturing Chaos

The second trigger for my departure from Triond was an article posted by a member. It had a cheery “this site is wonderful, we’re all wonderful, and together we’re going to make this the most popular writing site on the web” tone that reminded me of the crowd-pumping speeches that are a traditional part of sales conventions, and that are so often and so easily parodied. What really clicked, though, wasn’t the article itself, though it rubbed me the wrong way and set off BS alarms, but the comments. There were dozens, and every single one was in agreement, cheering the writer, thanking her for her encouragement, etc. I added my comment, which disagreed about the potential popularity of the site, and discovered, a day or so later, that it had been removed.

To digress a bit — smart, hard-working people can make money on these sites, but if they have a real talent for writing, they could make better money elsewhere, and probably with less work. So why do they stick with these low-paying sites? There are undoubtedly many reasons, but here are a few that I think probably rank high.

1. They’re emotionally needy and get off on the applause and admiration of their followers.
2. They’re excellent marketers (and manipulators) who know how to appeal to the masses. On sites where income is tied to ratings and page views, this is a valuable talent.
3. Their writing is good, but not good enough for survival in the competitive world of professional content production.

I wonder, going back to my deleted comment — was it removed because the author can’t handle disagreement, because it introduced a note of “negativity” into the rah-rah atmosphere, or because it might provoke a few of her readers to look more closely at the topic and rethink what they’re doing? If your income depends on a devoted readership, and the glue that holds them to you is the idea that you’re all in it together and that they can accomplish what you’ve accomplished, any hint of dissent will be kicked to the wall.

Suddenly, all this came into sharp focus, and I knew that my time was up on this site and others like it. It was time to move on to bigger rewards.

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