The primary reason for companies moving to a subscription-based model is for the increased control of their products. They want this for several reasons: the potential to thwart piracy efforts (which is not likely to happen), the knowledge of how many users are using the company’s products, the ability to offer simpler pricing arrangements, and the fortune of having a continuous revenue stream.

The Good & the Bad

There are benefits for the consumers and companies, but at the same time, there are various things that could go astray. It is almost impossible to make this happen unless a service is developed to handle these subscriptions (more on that later). One must question why we don’t have a system like this in place already, but, then again, we have only been blessed with the iPhone around a year ago. I guess these things take time.

The good points of subscription-based models:

• Subscription-based pricing models can be convenient if done right. For example, imagine not having to type in your address, phone number, and credit card number every time you want to purchase something. This could become a reality if a service was created to assist with managing and paying subscriptions. Also, it would be very nice to have one bill for all my subscriptions.
• A serious problem today is that some developers are not being compensated for their hard work. Piracy has become quite easy for consumers to take part in, and this has harmed many of the companies’ and individuals’ bottom lines.¹
• Consumers could potentially be more secure by using a subscription management service. When you think about it, when you want to purchase something online—which in many instances this material will come from companies you never heard about and places you never heard of before—you usually pay with your credit card. I have done this countless times over the years, and I always question what happens with my data—is it really secure? Well, if a company could securely interact with a service that manages my subscriptions for me, this transaction could be made safer.
• If you are subscribing to a service, chances are high that you will be able to receive technical support. Today, you tend to purchase products from a company at full price. The problem is that many of these companies seem to forget that their products sometimes have issues or require assistance by its users. But if you were subscribing to a product, those companies might be more inclined to provide assistance so they won’t lose you as a customer.
• There is a simple concept of only paying for what you use. This could be applied to a subscription-based model. If a user was paying on a monthly basis—which is why many companies will prefer yearly payment plans—he or she could simply stop paying and end their service. This would be the pay-for-only-what-you-use concept in its magnificent glory.

The bad points of subscription-based models:

• A huge problem that might arise with subscription-based pricing models is that there could be too many subscriptions to manage. People already have bills that they pay on a monthly basis, so why would they want to add more monthly payments? I only subscribe to a handful of services, but, even now, I still feel somewhat overwhelmed by it all. (See “Subscription Management” below.)
• Subscriptions could begin to add up. Let’s say you had to pay $5 a month to play a game like, for example, GTA IV. Doesn’t seem that expensive, right? However, what happens when you also want to play Call of Duty 4, GRID, Madden NFL ‘09, Civilization IV, and Spore? Well, your $5 per month bill is now a $30 per month bill. Now, for simplicity’s sake, this is assuming that the price wouldn’t go lower with time (which it probably would), but even so, it could still add up to the same amount you might pay on a yearly basis. If the price did decrease with time, I could see it becoming better value, but who knows? Maybe developers could add additional content on a somewhat regular basis to keep the price up.
• Software activation is already a pain these days, but could you imagine having to go through a more difficult process if a software was required to connect to the internet to check for a subscription status? Obviously, the software would need to do this on a daily, weekly, monthly, or, at least, yearly basis in order to see if the user is still paying for the software in question. What happens when your internet access is nowhere to be found while on that exotic trip to Africa—that important application you needed to use can no longer be accessed. Again, what happens then?
• Finally, I must mention that these changes are going to happen whether or not we want them to, but I still question if all this is really necessary. Must we deal with subscriptions in the future? Is it only the matter of businesses and developers having more control over their products?

Subscription Management

When a majority of companies decide to go the subscription-based route (which will happen—it is only a question of time), what consumers will need is a way to manage all these subscriptions. It is quite difficult to imagine a person having to pay bills from 10, 20, 40, or more software companies with other existing bills. It can’t work that way. Subscriptions need to be combined into one bill for the sake of sanity.

What consumers need is a service which will easily allow you to add, remove, modify, combine, and separate subscriptions. This service should, ideally, bill you once per month at a time you decide is convenient for you.

The question of how to handle someone who can’t afford to pay for these subscriptions will arise. Well, it’s simple really, you pre-pay for the services! If you can’t pay, you don’t have access to a particular item. On the flip-side, if you decide to cancel your subscription before the end of the month, you should be compensated for the time you didn’t use.

I am very confident that a handful of companies will take on this effort. As a matter of fact, I have a good idea of which companies would dare to attempt this feat on such a massive scale: Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, PayPal, and Google. Apple and PayPal are the two companies that stand out above the rest. Apple is going to become familiar with the concept of subscription-based services after developers begin releasing software on the iPhone. PayPal, on the other hand, would only need to create a dedicated section of their site to handle subscriptions—software developers could add a button on their site or integrate this payment method directly into their software.²

What’s The Point?

What I am saying is that subscription-based pricing models can be a viable option if we are given the tools and services to properly manage these subscriptions. If we are left without these tools and services, the benefits to the companies will remain, but the frustration to the consumers will be prevalent.

I leave you with one question of what you would do if you owned a software development company that is profitable but losing a significant amount of revenue due to piracy. The company I want you to imagine owning is, non-other than, Adobe. If you moved your software to subscription-based options entirely, you could tightly control the software and potentially thwart some piracy efforts. Revenues, most likely, would skyrocket. However many who have pirated your products for years might consider switching to alternatives—doors might open for other companies to take advantage of such a decision. What do you do?

As for the old ways of doing comments, “Let’s just stick a fork in it,” Scoble stated on his blog. “Comments are dead.” However, a comment left on another blog by Robert Scoble clarified that he meant “comments are about 2/3rds of the way to dying.” Still, the opinion is strong against blog comments.

Scoble is most likely of this opinion because of his ability to generate plenty of conversation on services like Twitter and, most recently, FriendFeed. Other services like Disqus and Intense Debate offer third-party solutions to commenting on your blog, but FriendFeed could also serve as commenting service to anyone’s blog (or any other posted items) as well.¹ However, one must question if this is a viable option for those of us without hundreds of thousands of followers.

My Thoughts

Well, let me begin by stating that I have disabled comments on OnlyJames. Why? Well, it is simple really—I don’t generate enough comments to justify leaving them on. Now, I know that several of you like to post comments on many of the articles I write, but, at the same time, I know many of you are friends with me on Twitter or know me more personally. In that case, I always invite you to write to me on FriendFeed, Twitter, email, or even on Facebook. I also love when people write blog posts in response to my content. I will surely consider writing a reply back. Nevertheless, none of the recent news has had any impacts on my decision making about this—I had been planning on doing this for weeks.

As for the thought that FriendFeed could replace blog comments, I must admit that I have not generated any comments through FriendFeed. Then again, I don’t have thousands of friends (like Scoble) on FriendFeed.² It does prove that if someone is going to use FriendFeed as an effective commenting platform, that person needs a number of friends to do this effectively.

With regards to Scoble’s statements, I believe it was quite a drastic opinion to come make when considering that blogs are still experiencing a major growth period. Commenting is sure to grow in parallel. People have opinions, and people want to share those opinions as well. This is what blogging is all about. Also, new methods of commenting like video and audio are beginning to make a prolific appearance within the blogosphere.

Scoble was only trying to generate a buzz throughout the blogosphere to gain traffic—that is to be expected—but at least it gets us all thinking about this kind of stuff.

Blog readership desires new and effective ways to manage and post their comments. A service like Disqus is great for this because a user doesn’t have to sign up for various blogs to leave comments, but if a particular blog or site does not utilize the Disqus service, that user is back to square one.

To sum this up, commenting on blogs will continue to increase in popularity—Scoble was just being Scoble.³

If anything, more blog comments will begin moving from first-party blogs to third-party services. It’s not the end of the world, and is nothing to concern yourself with. The blogosphere shall move forward.

That is the end of this story, for now.

It is quite difficult to define Stardock in a sentence or two. The company is well-known for its desktop enhancement software, but, ironically, it all started with the development of a PC game called Galactic Civilizations.

Stardock earned very little money—if any at all—for their efforts with Galactic Civilizations, and not because the game didn’t generate money (I have seen it mentioned that the title made over $1 million), but because the publisher turned out to be a fraud.¹ I’m sure that this, understandably, was not the start that the company had in mind.

Thankfully, it was all a moot point because the user base stuck with the company. These dedicated followers provided opportunities to the company and allowed for the release of expansion packs. Eventually, it lead to the development of more games and enhancement software.

Desktop Enhancement

Gameasutra recently interviewed the Stardock CEO Brad Wardell:

The reason we focused more on desktop enhancements really has to do with the channels. With PC games, you have to be at retail in order to sell enough units to pay for a decent budget. But with desktop enhancements, people are used to buying those online, so we could realistically create and release that kind of software with far fewer resources.

In recent years, as our company has grown and had more capital to make use of, we have begun focusing increasingly on the gaming side of things. There’s a lot of overlap between the two sides of our business, since desktop enhancements are pretty art intensive and require really talented software developers who can also help out on the games as well.

Object Desktop is one of the most well-known desktop enhancement applications released by Stardock. It was almost an essential application for the OS/2 operating system. The product suite’s focus was to allow users to really modify their computer to anyway they wanted. It was a huge success, and one of the most successful applications on OS/2.

A new 2008 version of Object Desktop was recently released, and it is a culmination of Stardock’s best desktop enhancement software: WindowsBlinds, IconPackager, DesktopX, DeskScapes, SoundPackager, and MyColors. Object Desktop Ultimate offers users a few more additional applications: ObjectBar, RightClick, SkinStudio Pro, TweakVista, IconDeveloper, WindowFX, and Keyboard LaunchPad. Stardock has been able to keep up with the times; Windows Vista and “Windows 7″ are surely prime targets for Stardock’s desktop enhancement products.

However, before all this came to be, the company had to make the tough decision of moving to the Windows operating system. By 2000, Brad Wardell decided that it was time to move on as IBM’s OS/2 was a sinking ship. However, Object Desktop sold very well on the Windows operating system, and, truth be told, was probably one of the best decisions the company could have made.

Game Development

Before long, Stardock was back to developing PC (and Mac) games—Galactic Civilizations made a return in 2003. Most of the revenue was generated through Stardock’s digital distribution site TotalGaming.net, and it was enough to keep the company moving forward. It lead to the development of one of the most successful games for Stardock.

In 2006, Stardock Entertainment released Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords. This title really solidified Stardock as a serious identity in the game industry. It featured advanced graphics, amazing “4X”² game-play, revolutionary artificial intelligence, great non-linear action, and fantastic replayability.

They also developed The Corporate Machine; Take-Two Interactive published the game. The game was released in 2001, but it was also a relatively successful title. The point was to take on your opponents and reign supreme in the corporate world. The success of this title allowed Stardock to continue work on the Galactic Civilizations titles.

The Political Machine was recently released by Stardock and published by Ubisoft. The game appears to build its roots from The Corporate Machine. It is quite an enjoyable experience. The game really goes in-depth with the running of a political campaign, and I learned a from the short time I spent with the demo. Political and strategy gamers are sure to make this game a success.

All these titles are really niche games. Surely anything Stardock develops on its own is will never be serious competition to the likes of Halo, but I have enjoyed every title I have played from Stardock Entertainment—Galactic Civilizations II in particular.

It seems fitting that the success of Stardock’s games would lead the company to actually publishing great games developed by others.

Game Publishing

Most recently, Ironclad Games and Stardock Entertainment have teamed up to release Sins of a Solar Empire. Just as its turn-based equivalent, Sins of a Solar Empire has been a hit for the company. The only difference is that Stardock is now publishing the game. Essentially, Stardock provides the resouces, markets the title, and handles a majority of the other stuff.

Stardock went a step further with this game though. The company actually assisted with the development of the title and allowed Ironclad Games to pariticpate in the marketing of the game. These events rarely happen in the game industry, and it is just another way that Stardock has really done some amazing things.

Sins, while not selling more than Galactic Civilizations II, was a successful title. I’m sure that the game will see many expansions and sequeals in the future. I’d actually be impressed if Stardock purchased and merged Ironclad Games.

Stardock is already onto something else with a new game being developed by Gas Powered Games. Demigod is looking to be something truly special and unique.

From the official Demigod website, information about the new title is made public:

Demigod is a team based action game with RPG, RTS and fighting game elements. Players choose their heroes and turn the tides of epic battles being fought in fantastic worlds. Single player revolves around the player choosing their demigod and working their way up a tournament style ladder to ascend to god status. The multiplayer experience forces teams to work together to defeat the enemy stronghold. The Supreme Commander engine gives us scale of size and scale of numbers unprecedented in a fantasy game. Colossal giants knock droves of tiny soldiers from the all-encompassing ancient battlefields.

It might be wrong of me to jump the gun, but I am confident that this title is going to be a financial success for the company.

Only the Beginning

Stardock has quite the story³, and it is going to be interesting to see where it goes in the future. It is a true success story with a difficult beginning, but the ability to strive under pressure.

What I really like about Stardock is the fact that the company really pays attention to its customers. I’m mostly familiar with their gaming products, but the company has created entire communities like WinCustomize for their users. The CEO is also really passionate about his work.

If you have never heard of Stardock, I am certain that it will change with time. It is a company to keep your eyes on. I would really recommend you check out Galactic Civilizations II or Sins of a Solar Empire if you are into turn-based strategy or real-time strategy games or Object Desktop if you want to take desktop customization to the next level.

On the one hand you have Apple: the new superstar within the mobile industry. On the other hand you have Research In Motion: the old veteran with high expectations. Apple has quickly earned the respect of many companies already in the industry—this is made obvious with the development of products like the LG VX10000 and HTC Touch Diamond. The question is can Research In Motion keep up with a company which seems to be absolutely flawless in execution as of late?

Research In Motion has developed two products to go the full 15 rounds against the iPhone: the BlackBerry Bold and the BlackBerry Thunder. The BlackBerry Bold, like the iPhone, is offered for AT&T customers only—a very bold move, indeed. The company wisely decided to offer its other product, BlackBerry Thunder, on a different wireless network. Verizon Wireless is the beneficiary. This gives both companies an opportunity to expand.

The BlackBerry Bold has been compared to the iPhone on several occasions. The general consensus seems to be that the iPhone is likely to be favored by the everyday consumer while the Bold is likely to be favored by the corporate user. I think it is a fair assessment and it was to be expected. However, the Bold might easily be outdone by the Thunder.

The BlackBerry Thunder¹ looks to be in the best position to offer the iPhone some much needed competition. It features a similar shape, a touch-based interface, a software-based keyboard, a built-in GPS, and more or less the same features that the iPhone has.² So what makes this product any better than the iPhone?

Sadly, I don’t have a clue, but, then again, neither does any other site focused on mobile technology. There are not enough details to even begin speculating.

Regardless, one reason why the BlackBerry Thunder might be a hit is because its primary competition on the Verizon Wireless network is the LG VX10000 (a.k.a Verizon Voyager). The LG VX10000 has a great design, but its functionality—like most other phones on Verizon Wireless’s network—is crippled. Research In Motion seems to receive leeway with their products, and if this remains true with the Lightning, Verizon and BlackBerry might earn themselves a huge payday.

The BlackBerry product line has sold well with people in the corporate environment, but the question is can this device attract the rest of the consumer base as well? I will, again, pass on offering any speculation. It is quite obvious though that touch-based phones are quickly becoming popular amongst general consumers, and this is likely to convince some non-corporate users to explore their products.

More details are sure to come as time goes on, but we won’t know anything for sure until the arrival of the third-quarter of 2008.³

Comcast’s total revenue went up nearly 24%, Time Warner Cable’s total revenue went up nearly 36%, Charter Communications’s total revenue went up nearly 9%, Verizon’s total revenue went up 5%, and AT&T’s total revenue went up an amazing 88% in 2007 from the previous year. These statistics are aimed at each company’s entire business revenue (including television, telephone, and internet), but the fact is that all of the aforementioned—even the struggling companies—are making an increasing amount of revenue.^{1 2}

Nice job internet service providers! But wait, what’s this: you want to charge us more money for our internet data, you want to enact tiered internet services, you want to sell our private information to advertisers, you want to harm web-based content producers who rely on this data for their user’s (like TWiT Live and Revision 3), and you want to limit the expansion of the internet in America?

Well, that does not sound like the typical “thank you” which I would have expected. Clearly, there must be some issues here.

Problems

Regardless of whether or not you believe what internet service providers are saying, it is quite understandable that there are certain people who are regularly abusing internet services.³ Some are doing this intentionally while others simply have huge demands for legitimate uses.

You might pay for an all-you-can-eat buffet, but if it was really all-you-can-eat, making money could, understandably, become much more difficult. Well, subscribers to internet services should realize this as well, but some people just don’t get it. After all, it is easy to feel invincible while sitting behind a computer screen.

People should follow fair use guidelines, but unfortunately, there are none. Really though, how can someone possibly determine what is excessive? How could it be enforced? Is 50 GB of data usage per month acceptable? How about 500 GB per month? If an arbiter must be called in to determine what is fair and what isn’t, the system itself is a failure. It is a messy situation.

Then again, should everyone be penalized because of what a few peer-to-peer power users do online?

It is also fair to believe that running fiber to new areas is an expensive thing to do. Although, since more people are getting wired to the web (and also getting wireless), this should not be a problem as the money will be made back with time.

Steve Lohr reports in the New York Times about data centers’ inability to keep up with demand:

There is no letup in the demand for data center computing. Digital Realty Trust, a data center landlord with more than 70 facilities, says that customer demand for new space is running 50 percent ahead of its capacity to build and equip data centers for the next two years. “We’re building the railroads of the future, and we can’t keep up,” said Chris J. Crosby, a senior vice president at Digital Realty.

For every new center, new data center administrators need to be hired. “It takes us eight months to find a guy to run a data center,” said Mr. Crosby.

So, our country could combine the East and West with the First Transcontinental Railroad within 10 years in the 1860s, produce military vehicles, ships, and weapons within months in the 1940s, and place a man on the Moon within nearly 10 years in the 1960s, but we can’t wire up some homes?

Time for a twist! If you are one for conspiracy theories, some folks believe that cable companies are raising internet prices to protect television services. The theory itself, while being questionable, must empower a few people to put their thinking caps on.

If you consider the possibility that people are going to be traveling less due to rising oil prices, many people are going to be staying at home. If you take a family of three, you should consider the costs incurred just to do a few things: movie theater—$15; dine out—$30; and transportation—$10. These are relatively conservative estimates.  People are going to want to get online while they are at home; it is common sense really—it is actually cheaper to simply stay home and find your entertainment on the web. Why are ISPs denying themselves of these customers?

Maybe the conspiracy theory is true.

Solutions

These problems can be fixed, but it requires more brain power. I don’t have the answers to solving this problem; I don’t own an ISP company. There are far too many factors to take into consideration. I know that a company needs to make money, but the company needs to be fair on how it approaches these issues.

However, I know what internet service providers can’t do to their users. No matter what, they can not place a hard limit on data usage. It is absolutely ridiculous to cut someone off of the internet entirely these days. Many people, like me, make a living on the internet.

Charging extra for every gigabyte you go over a certain limit is also a rip-off; it would be like dealing with a cell phone company. I don’t know about you, but I would gladly pass the opportunity to deal with all those extra hidden fees and charges.

Finally, ISPs can’t discriminate against certain types of traffic. Net neutrality must be maintained. If I pay for my bandwidth, I want to be able to do whatever I want with it. Content providers should be able to provide their content to me without having to pony up to an ISPs demands.

The perfect solution would apply to everyone equally, always allow access (no matter how much data is being used), and encourage legitimate uses of the internet.

If companies have to charge more for the internet, then so be it—charge more money. As bad as that sounds, I’d rather have my data how I want it at a higher cost than have all these limitations placed upon my connection to the digital world.

America is not running out of bandwidth. If anything, America is running out of competition. America is technologically backwards in this respect as a result of these huge companies that control the internet. It isn’t fair to the consumers, it isn’t fair to our country, and it isn’t fair for those who see America as a place of expansion and growth.

In the end, it is just disappointing.

There are quite a few problems, but here is a basic rundown of what I have noticed when the extension is enabled:

• Firefox becomes unstable, and, at times, slow to respond.
• When specifying a folder to store bookmarks in with the built-in bookmarking system, the bookmark, instead, is placed at the end of the default bookmarks menu.
• Using the built-in bookmark manager for Firefox becomes a difficult task as it will occasionally cause the browser to hang. On several occasions the browser has crashed while trying to edit the Firefox 3 bookmarks.
• After installation, the browser crashed twice in a row while starting up. I haven’t been able to replicate this, but I now believe the Delicious extension was involved. (Perhaps it isn’t playing nicely with other extensions?)

Essentially, it is not making Delicious seem like such a good option at the moment. Other services like Ma.gnolia, Twine, FoxMarks, Furl, and Netvouz might take advantage of the opportunity. This might not be a bad thing either. I’d love to see some more competition within the social bookmarking arena.

Delicious has a preview version which is significantly improved, but they have yet to release it. I think they might actually consider doing just that with these recent events quite possibly leaving a bad taste in users’ mouths.

Ironically, I was already considering a switch to another service. Maybe this is simply confirmation that my consideration is justified.

Delicious, it is time to get the extension fixed before you upset far too many, but, then again, the damage has already been done.

Update: Stephen Hood, Director & Product Management of Delicious, has brought to my attention that a new version of the Delicious extension (v2.0.64) is available for download on Mozilla’s Firefox Add-ons site. Stephen says that the update fixes many reported issues. I will evaluate it once I get some spare time.

These are just a few of the applications I have really enjoyed using over the past three months:

• BBEdit—If you need a clean and efficient text editor that can handle multiple programming languages, BBEdit has you covered.
• CleanApp—Unwanted applications are no more with CleanApp. A great tool for removing all the unwanted files that come with an application.
• Colloquy—One of the best free IRC clients I have ever used, and it is only available for the Mac operating system.
• Cyberduck—Cyberduck is one of the best FTP/SFTP clients available on the Mac operating system. It has received great praise, and I use it on a daily basis. Oh yeah, it is free as well.
• Dictionary—Dictionary is such an amazing application, and as a result, it is included on Mac OS X by default. It is one of my most used programs—you can really tell I am a professional writer.
• Disk Inventory X—It took awhile, but I finally found an application that will display all of a hard drive’s contents as a tree map. Disk Inventory X is free, and it is very useful for finding those huge files that are stuck on your OS.
• ForkLift—ForkLift is a complete file manager and FTP/SFTP client. It is also one of the fastest SFTP clients I have used so far. It isn’t free, but it is well worth it.
• iBank—Who needs Quicken when you have iBank? A great financial management package, and a nice looking one to boot.
• iShowU—Screencasting is becoming a popular thing nowadays. This program allows you to record video from your desktop, and it does it perfectly.
• iTunes—iTunes is one of the best music management application the Mac operating system. It is also installed by default, but it is for good reason.
• Linkinus—This IRC client is not free, but it does have an interface that I enjoy more than Colloquy. It also has an amazing feature that allows you to remain in a chat room even after closing the application.
• Miro—My favorite IPTV application for a long time now. Miro (previously known as “Democracy”) allows you to download video content. Miro also supports high definition content.
• Pixelmator—Although not a complete Photoshop replacement, this is probably one of the most beautiful photo editing applications that I have seen. It is also quite affordable as well. For most, it is more than enough for your photo editing needs.
• Pixen—Got a thing for pixels? Pixen has you covered. This free pixel editor is just what you need to explore pixel art or create beautiful icons.
• Quicksilver—Quicksilver is an application launcher and more. Newer versions of Spotlight reduce this application’s usefulness, but it is still a good application to have.
• Scrivener—The ultimate writing tool for professional writers. If you are going to be writing something that is more than a few paragraphs, Scrivener is absolutely amazing. One of my favorite tools on this list.
• smcFanControl—I’m on a MacBook, and I need to control the speed of the fans. This application allows me to do just that. It is almost a requirement for anyone using a Mac laptop.
• SubEthaEdit—SubEthaEdit is perfect for anyone who wishes to collaborate with others on a document live. That is pretty much all it has going for it, but that feature alone is quite amazing.
  
• Transmission—Hands down, Transmission is the best bittorrent client on the Mac operating system. I use it on a daily basis, and it has not failed me yet.
• VLC—If you are going to be watching video, then you will want to have VLC Media Player. I have not found a media file that VLC hasn’t been able to play, and that is a good thing with all the codecs available.
• VMWare Fusion—Virtualization software has been making great strides since the turn of the century. VMWare Fusion shows us why. If you wish to run a different operating system (including Windows XP or Vista) on your Mac, VMWare Fusion is a great investment.
• WriteRoom—This is the best no-frills text editor that any writer can appreciate. WriteRoom lets the user focus on the most important thing of all—the text.

There are many great applications listed here, and there are sure to be more in the future. Within a few months, I will create another article like this if I find other applications I like on the Mac operating system. With so much great stuff being developed, I don’t believe that will be any problem at all.

I learned about this company and its habits around a month ago¹, and it was a complete head-scratcher at first. I thought Zappos was just being nice when they needed to let someone go, but no, the company actually coaxes their trainees with cash to—in a way—test if they really want to be a part of the company. Talk about pressure!

Think about it: if anyone had questions about why they were working at a particular company, walking away with a grand could be quite the offer to accept. On the contrary, if that person was really determined to work for this company, it should be a no-brainer to reject the offer immediately. It is not rocket science, but it is highly possible to eliminate some bad apples within a company’s staff.

The result is a work environment with employees that are, potentially, more dedicated and loyal to their employer. This could also lead to having staff that is happier and more motivated to do their work.

I only wonder why more companies don’t put this into action. It seems like a brilliant idea, and I think people should work jobs where they are happy—not miserable as can be. Now if this applied to Bank of America and Burger King, the world (or at least my world) would be a much better place.

Statistically speaking: 1.4 blogs are created every second, 120,000 blogs are created every day, and 43.8 million blogs are created every year.¹ There are likely over 100 million blogs worldwide. That number quite possibly will double within two years. Putting the numbers aside, it is quite obvious what bloggers are working with (or against) today.

I am just one person out of the several million bloggers in the world. The only difference is that I am a professional blogger—it is my only source of income. My job, as such, is to inform and entertain an audience which gives their attention to read the opinions and insight I have to offer. Sounds easy, but at times this seemingly easy task can become quite overwhelming.

No matter how difficult it can be, I absolutely love this job—it is something I can see myself doing many years in the future. Considering the numerous times I have switched jobs and careers, it is a great relief to finally know what I want to do in life.

Why I Love Blogging

• Independence—I mean really, there are only a few jobs I can name where, potentially, you are so independent. I still rely on others for getting paid, but I love being able to write about what I want. With this comes much responsibility, but I’ve handled it well so far.
• Information—If any of you have played Sims 2, you might recall the fact you can select your sim’s life ambitions. Well, mine was always the knowledge option. After all, I love learning new things. Wikipedia, Mahalo, Instructables, and Wired are just a few of the sites I love learning from. I try my best to share this knowledge in an understandable manner with my readers.
• Creativity—I’m not much of an artist, and this is quite unfortunate as I had aspirations of working for Pixar.² I consider these very words as my work of art. Might not be as visually appealing, but, hey, you are reading this article right? It must have peaked your interest. Perhaps writing serves as a substitute for what I lack in graphic design, but I have a deep passion for what I do.
• Satisfaction—I love when people read what I write. I love knowing that people gave their time and attention. Hopefully those people respected my opinions and insights on the topic at hand. This is what motivates me over anything else.

There has been no other work which has made me so happy and motivated at the same time. Interestingly, if every blogger had just as much enthusiasm, breaking into this career would have been near impossible.

I might never reach fame like Leo Laporte or Patrick Norton (my idols since I was around 14 years old) have done. Even though the chances are slim, I will still try my best to reach that level of fame and success—we all have goals, right? I have seen a few glimmers of hope, but there is still a long way to go. However, I am completely willing to work my butt off to get there.