Don't Steal My Moneymakers

Now, I've been playing around with a lot of stuff on this blog. Some just at random, some for practice, and some just to see what I can do with a blog. To be honest, I'm a little disappointed that no one comments...cause I want to comment back, but I supposed that has to do with my low readership and the lack of incentive to actually "say" something. At any rate, I try to stay on top of things for the sake of staying motivated and actually seeing something through.

The conflict of interest lies in how public I really want to make this blog. Obviously, the more public I make it, the more people read it, the more likely someone will make a comment that will spur more discussion and more commentary. At some point, though, an overly public blog will make me question whether I want to publish more intimate "private" thoughts or not.

Now I know some people like to emo-whine about how crappy their lives are, or talk about all the sex they're having, or something about how hot Jessica Alba really is. But is that really appropriate for this medium? I don't know. With that in mind, I like having a more intimate audience for my thoughts. You and me, just chatting together, a two-way dialogue between my friends and my thoughts. Still, I can't help but wonder how different it'd be if more than six people read this everyday...(how do I know this? It's one of those things I'm fooling around with. So I know. EVERYTHING).

Having said all that, I've got this strange suspicion that a really good blog could be a pretty decent money maker in the long run. If I can advertise it out in the open, with an thematic idea and a solid writing cast (either me pre-writing a lot of stuff or collaborating with other people to maintain a steady stream of solid content), I could be making a lot of traffic and a lot of ad dollars. Now, I've been thinking about spending the summer developing some stuff, potentially even try to run a small Web 2.0 site with some interactive things (using LAMP), but more importantly, I'd like to start up a solid topic-centric blog (unlike this random milieu of thoughts). I'd like to work on my html coding, my CSS design, and my photoshop skills, but that'd all be with the goal of publish a really good blog that more than a handful of people would want to read and would come back to read.

What ideas do I have for that? Well, they're good ones...let me tell you that.

Cal Football Blog. Commentary and analysis of games and matchups; score predictions; injury reports; interviews; news clippings. Upside - instant audience in a pretty empty market niche. Downside - I don't have inside access to the team, the facilities, or anyone on the team to make it big.

College Student Financial Blog. Insights and advice for college-aged students to start investing their money for the future. Discussion of high-yield, high-risk investments, the value of compounded returns, even stuff on credit. Upside - potential to attract of lot of different people on a global scale, plus, I could cross reference the blog with a newspaper article (say...Daily Cal?). Downside - what do I know about finance? I'm not even a business major (although I'm pretty good at explaining why it's better to risk higher yields now as a 20 year old than invest in pedestrian index funds...)

Pre-Med Blog. Insight and experience of a pre-med undergraduate preparing and applying for medical school. I and other people could share their experiences and let other pre-med's around the country comment on our successes and failures. Upside - Interesting idea with a lot of short-term potential. Downside - really short-term. Unless I continued it into medical school or I keep up the site for other pre-med contributions.

Poker Blog. Cliche and definitely "boring", it'd be the biggest and most consistent audience I'd probably get. Daily results, thoughts, hand histories with user submitted commentary. Upside - lots of hits (probably), easy to advertise, and easy to do as long as I play. Downside - I've got to play, and with me, it's hard to stay motivated while I'm losing money.

TV Review Blog. This is a new idea that I came up with last night, but basically, I'd do play-by-play reviews of TV shows that I want and let other people collaborate and submit their reviews of certain shows that they watch. Upside - easy to organize and promote, enjoyable since I watch the shows anyways. Downside - hard to say something compelling all the time and continue to publish on a schedule. Could be big though.

Oh, and I just got off the phone with my mom. Apparently, my dad is thinking about working in Shanghai. That'll be weird if my family moves again...