I Think I Was Wrong...

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Happy Friday,

Oh the irony. It’s April 1. April Fools. I was going to write about some of the best April Fools pranks, but it occurred to me the joke might be on me.

Here, let me make some sense…

If you know the people I’m going to refer to, please don’t say names. “Who” isn’t the point. It’s about something I realized that surprised me.

First one.

I read a post about selling websites for a living. I clicked because websites are how I’ve made a living for over 20 years.

This woman said she can build brand new sites and sell them for $150 each. When you deduct the domain name, hosting and seller fees at the platform she uses, that’s about $100 profit. She said it usually takes a day or two.

It wasn’t even the math that got me. It was the comments. People said they love her posts because she comes up with such interesting ways to make a extra money.

Next one.

Some guy wrote that it took him over 600 posts to get to $2500/month writing on Medium. He said he had to figure out a lot of stuff. Like how to write better titles and find the right balance between writing too much and not enough.

When I scrolled through his profile, seems to me it would have been more honest if he’d said he started making money when he learned that journal entries didn’t pay and swapped to writing about money. Cause that’s what his profile told me.

Last one.

I saw a post about tips to write better titles, so I clicked. Titles are hard and if I can find good tips, I’d happily share. Know what the article was? lol. It was a list of the writer’s top posts. It kind of made me laugh.

Again, the comments surprised me.

People were saying thanks for the inspiration. No one seemed to realize there were no “tips” — unless you count the author’s guess as to why the article did well. But it got more clicks to those posts, I guess.

Those 3 pieces were a weird revelation to me.

I used to think people read “advice” posts because they’re actually looking for advice, but I’m not so sure about that anymore.

I think I was wrong.

Now I kind of wonder if they read them as entertainment.

I once read a psychology article that said reading about success gives our brain the same buzz as actually achieving it. That’s why people love to read about celebrities. It’s a little feel-good buzz for the brain.

Maybe that’s what’s really going on?

Maybe people aren’t looking for advice at all.

Maybe they’re just looking for a buzz?

I don’t know — but it would certainly explain why bad advice floats to the top so often, especially on places like Medium. Maybe it was never about advice at all. Maybe it was only ever about entertainment.

What do you think?

Is it about the advice, or just the buzz?

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Did you miss these…?

• Regeneration Makes Liars Of “Apocalypse Porn” Writers

• 3 Words That Weaken Your Writing

• What Keanu Said About Aging Beats The Crap Out Of Any Advice, Ever

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P.S. If you are reading this in email, you can click the title to see the online version, where you can leave comments, just like on Medium.

xo,
Linda