Results not typical.

Came across this in one of my bookmarks, and it's all about successful use of the Internet for money making purposes. I'll have to read through it again to see if we've done absolutely everything on it and still not found the keys to the kingdom. At times these types of articles strike me very much the same as those late night TV commercials for buying "no money down" real estate. "Results not typical" is the disclaimer as soon as all the testimonials come on. We once attended a "web 2.0" seminar in Santa Cruz, our good friend treated us to it. Fortunately or unfortunately we were already doing everything that they brought up, and more. The Internet is a really big place, it's a world of it's own, and at times a very strange world. It was created for the free and unfettered sharing of information-- an educational tool. Now it's much more than that. We share a lot of free stuff, we also try to make money with the Internet. We make a little money with it. As Sheryl has been writing about: too little.

One thing I won't do is write about Michael Jackson (he just died) just because he just died. I was never a big fan. I don't comment around on other peoples blogs just to get myself noticed, I only comment if I really want to and am sincerely interested. There's a lot of sort of questionable stuff done in the name of self promotion. What's weird is that I'll now get a few hits because I said "Michael Jackson." If I said, "Micheal Jackson speaks from beyond the grave." There would probably be much more notice. Just for the record, Michael Jackson has nothing to say to me. Give me a break. Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson. Sure, Michael Jackson speaking from the other side would get some notice, but since we are on the subject-- just because a psychic gets accurate information that way, it does not validate the event as "true." I say that because Sheryl and I frequently read thoughts out of the minds of others. I do that a little more than Sheryl.

I've also been told that I "broadcast" into the minds of others. Personally, I think everyone is a transceiver of sorts. It would be an easy thing then, even for the most ethical psychic, to accidentally gather information from surviving relatives and just as accidentally tell them what they want to hear. Just my personal opinion, I'm uncomfortable with afterlife communications even though from time to time, we've done it, it comes up and we deal with it. But grieving relatives are just too vulnerable, and I think our primary job as survivors is to let go of the dead, reconcile in our hearts the impermanence of life. Which brings me back to my prior point of not just doing what is popular or likely to make us money. Even the word "Psychic" at the top of my blog was a compromise for me. There's a lot of abuse in this profession, deliberate and accidental.

As far as sharing just for the sake of sharing goes: in some ways our lives out here in the desert could be considered interesting, especially in small doses. So even though I'm not on twitter right now, and don't really "get" a lot of the social networking stuff, recently I am trying to understand the appeal of Facebook. My Myspace page still lies fallow. It's possible I could become a twitterer, though I prefer the term "twit." The horror for me is that it would come to replace real human contact.

Through what little social networking I've done, I managed to comment a few times on a very fine photographer's blog, Mark Tucker . He's one of those photographers whose work doesn't just impress me, it blows me away, especially if you visit his web page. So I eventually wrote to him ( he seemed accessible enough ) about the photography business. I wrote him again about another subject which he is obviously interested in, and is very current for him. He hasn't written back, and I noticed he hasn't responded to my few comments-- so either I said something wrong, or he doesn't know how to answer me quite, or he gets bugged by other photographers way too often to respond anymore, or he's too busy ( he doesn't look too busy right now ) or he never got my emails. . . there are some things about all this Internet stuff which I just hate. The etiquette is vague and unpredictable. Mark is slightly older than I am, and from the South. He might be doing the social networking stuff as a matter of business-- and gathering annoying buzz around himself which does no good-- Oh, well. Mark is kind of famous and I am kind of blunt. Not like movie star famous but I'm sure he's got a life and a business to run. He doesn't owe me anything. I sort of plan to write him one more time just to see if I annoyed him etc. Such is this "new" medium of communication.