Hey, Can Somebody Stop The Time, Please?
18. Mar, 2008 
4 Comments - Leave your comment
As Ronald already told you, today we have an anniversary here. Isn’t it funny how time passes by so quickly?
Less than one year ago, I bumped into an event called Reader Appreciation Week. At that time, I was looking to participate in group projects, because I was amused of how many people one can meet during such events. I didn’t quite understand what we were supposed to do, and I soon forgot about it completely.
How It All Started For Me
Not long after that, I received a message from Vivien, who was asking me if I wouldn’t like to write for Reader Appreciation Project, because the authors liked my style of writing. I was amazed by that, as I was mostly writing for people coming from the search engines, who were supposed not to find anything interesting on my site and move away by clicking my ads.
It is true that in that period I was just discovering that blogs have loyal readers, that there were about 14-16 people who were subscribed to my feed (it felt good, although I had no idea what that was). Discovering I have readers and not only traffic, I sometimes was trying to catch them, so I changed the direction of my blog. Although I liked what I was writing, readers were not at all flooding my blog, so I started to compare my articles with others on famous blogs.
My conclusion was that I wrote better than many of them, and I started to wonder why readers were not coming to me as they came to those famous blogs.
This was the moment when I got this inquiry from Ronald to write on Reader Appreciation Project. I’m still smiling when I remember: he meant that they wanted me to write one single guest post, but I didn’t get it right and I answered that I cannot write more than 4 articles a week 
A Little Bit Of Posting History
I stayed, and I discovered another kind of audience and another kind of writing.
I was pleased to see that being no 1 was not everybody’s goal, I was amused to discover what fishing has to to with blogging, and I couldn’t believe my eyes seeing how a very short post can lead to a huge line of controversial comments.
What You Should Not Expect From Us
I can understand why we don’t see a big wave of audience over us, and I doubt we shall ever see it. For that to become real, we would need to change the style, to stop thinking and to stop asking readers to think. Well, this is not going to happen.
- You should not expect to see here endless lists of what you should know in order to get smart without reading books and without thinking. I’m going nuts when I see14-15 years old kids reading and actually believing those things. Do you want to write better? Go read some dozens of books, think about their content, and come back in a few years: I’m sure you’ll have a much better writing style.
- We shall never publish guides or courses trying to teach you things that we just came across one-two months ago, thinking that we know everything about them and even something more, and even worse, charge you a fee to share our wisdom with you.
- We won’t give you free things with hidden strings attached, hoping that we are going to make money on your back while you don’t even notice that.
- We won’t make a strategy out of using you, the readers, nor we are going to intentionally offend you in any way.
- We won’t lower our standards only to get followers, so if anybody expects this to happen, please go away, as this place may not be for you.
One more thing: to us, all readers are equal. There are no readers more equal than others. We respond to every commenter, and if sometimes we skip somebody, please accept advance apologies, as we won’t have been doing it on purpose. I know you all do that, but believe me there are lots of bloggers who don’t.
What’s next? Just wait and see. There will be a lot of surprises for you.
Other RA Project Articles
Author Info
Yay, Happy Birthday RA Project!
Simonne,
It’s been great having you around this past year. I am truly thankful for your contributions and know for a fact RA Project wouldn’t have made it this far without you.
I really liked your “should not expect” list. Blunt and right on.
Thank you, Ronald. I can’t wait to see what this new year is going to bring us.
A Very H-A-P-P-Y Birthday to RA Project!! And kudos to its authors for the great job you are all doing here.
and Let’s hope you’ll be able to open eyes to many more people in this blogiverse.
Simonne, I’m so glad you joined RA Project, sprinkled it with your witticism and wisdom, and stuck with Ronald through the hardest of time. If I were a sculptor, I would’ve made a monument in your honour.
Ronald, you never cease to amaze with your love for people, your generosity and your amazing writers skills.
Thank you, guys. Keep up the good work, keep going and going like bunny Energizers
Wow! Thank you for the monument, Vivien. Regarding opening eyes, I try hard not to be mean or rude, but since I’ve started the new blog about money, I’m amazed every day with how many people are writing non-sense and thousands readers applaud.