vowe dot net :: I don't do chain letters, and I will try to not make an exception

I don't do chain letters, and I will try to not make an exception

by Volker Weber

Rocky has picked up a meme called Pay it Forward Tuesday. It is not exactly what I understand as pay it forward*. Let's call it "link forward". As I understand you are supposed to recommend a blog that you read to make others aware of it. Then the blog you are recommending has to do the same to yet another blog, etc. etc.

I first misunderstood Rocky. I thought this was yet another "send this letter to five of your friends" scheme. These are pyramid schemes that I despise. Since I was busy doing something else, my reaction was pretty bad, and I have to apologize to Rocky for that.

So let me recommend a few sites I read every day, and I am afraid they are pretty obvious:

boing boing is simply the best source of one-off news. They are doing an incredible job of picking up what's happening on the web, and to me they have no competition. I'd actually love to learn about anybody else who is as good as they are.
Jon Udell has always been my favorite reporter. He justs tells it as it is. Jon is always trying out new stuff and then reports what works and what does not work. He has recently been hired by Microsoft, which tells me one thing about Microsoft: they simply hire the best people they can get.
Joel Spolsky is refreshingly different from other entrepreneurs. Whenever he writes something up, I find myself nodding through the whole text.
For german readers Robert Basic is a must read. I have no idea if he even has time to sleep, or if he can type faster than he talks (and he talks fast) but he is churning out an incredible stream of postings every day.

See? No chain letter. I don't expect any of them to pick up this meme. OK, maybe Robert. :-)

*) If you ever ask yourself, why I am doing something because there is no obvious return for me, most likely you watch me paying forward. There are quite a few things in my life I am very grateful for, and which I never could pay back, so I am paying forward. It is pretty easy to do. Try to find something that is easy for you, but hard for others, and then start doing it. And if they ask you what they can do for you, tell them to pay forward instead of paying back.

Tags: pay+forward

2007-02-27 :: email :: twitter :: facebook :: google+

Comments

Love your explanation of "pay it forward"... If only more people would understand that concept...

Thomas "Duffbert" Duff, 2007-02-28 00:06

Joel used to work at Microsoft as well. Another great blogger is Scott Berkun (also a former 'softie) writing about innovation at http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/

Amy Blumenfield, 2007-02-28 00:08

Thomas, this movie will teach people the concept.

Volker Weber, 2007-02-28 00:18

@Vowe, if you are going to recommend them to watch the movie, you might want to be kind enough to tell them to bring along a box of tissues. It is quite the tear jerker.

Sean Burgess, 2007-02-28 03:13

I've seen the movie not long ago and I was deeply touched.

Martin Hiegl, 2007-02-28 09:20

RandsinRepose is quite good as well. His N.A.D.D. post is one of the best entries describing Nerd Attention Deficit Disorder.

You'll find in the top right corner under the "Popular" heading.

Alex Boschmans, 2007-02-28 10:04

The movie is simply great, watched it last week for the first time.

Dennis Wegner, 2007-02-28 11:08

Hi,

Thanks for paying it forward. When I started Pay it Forward Tuesday, it wasn't intended to be a meme and it's not intended to be a "chain letter" or pyramid scheme. I started the Pay it Forward Tuesday to give something back to the writing community. You see, my Freelance Writing Jobs blog gets a decent amount of traffic. I realized I could help other bloggers get their start by mentioning them on my blog and sharing some of my traffic - a way to pay them back for their loyalty. I only asked that they plug or give encouragement to another blog. I don't ask to be included in their pay it forward post (just that they mention the pay it forward concept), instead, I encourage them to help others. Some bloggers claimed a huge surge in traffic on the days I plugged their blogs on Pay it Forward Tuesday. If that's true it makes me feel good I could help.

Here's more about why I pay it forward:

On Paying it Forward

Thanks again,

Deborah Ng
Freelance Writing Jobs
About Weblogs

Deborah Ng, 2007-03-06 19:03