Editing 741: Blogging

{{comic
| number    = 741
| date      = May 17, 2010
| title     = Blogging
| image     = blogging.png
| titletext = I'm looking to virally monetize your eyeballs by selling them for transplants.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a satire of the conflict between consumers who expect quality results and creators who just want to make easy money by pandering to their audience. [[Cueball]] says ''the'' key to making a successful blog is to build a relationship with your readers. While this may be a good way to ensure you are delivering content that is relevant to your audience, if a blogger keeps the audience's interests as the foremost priority, the blog may become focused on making their core audience happy rather than quality. When an audience member raises the concern that quality should be a paramount concern if you want to impress people, Cueball responds that content (the quality of the blog's content) will be addressed later in the speech. This quickly placates the audience member, illustrating how the audience (for example, readers) of a service can be easily satisfied by telling them what they want to hear. This validates Cueball's point that the audience does not want ''quality'' as much as they want to hear their own ideas repeated back to them.

Alternative explanation:
This comic is a shot at all the typical blogging and social media instruction that is given. Cueball indicates he believes great content is not the highest priority when writing a blog, relegating it to at least part three of the coverage. The person in the audience, who is representing the "normal people", shows that people actually go to blogs for good content and couldn't care less about the other "strategies" the person on the stage is talking about. "Awesome! I love content," is probably highly sarcastic, implying that Cueball's talk is rather devoid of it. It could imply that the speaker thinks this talk is mostly marketing jargon that misses the fundamental aspects of writing skills (style, personality, good ideas, research, basics of style) and focusing instead on schemes to artificially gain popularity.

The title text takes a jab at blogs concerned with "{{w|viral video|viral content}}" and "monetization". That is, bloggers are only concerned about their audience because they might potentially give them money. Cueball drops some marketing jargon — "monetize the reader's eyeballs" — in order to disguise his true purpose: illegal {{w|organ harvesting}}. "Virally" in this context might indicate that the reader may become infected with a virus during organ extraction.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball stands on a stage before a large audience, holding a pointer and using it to highlight something on a :screen behind him. He interacts with a member of the audience after making a point.]
:Cueball: The key to making a successful blog is building a relationship with your readers.
:Audience Member: I thought it was "make your updates good so people will want to read them."
:Cueball: We'll discuss content generation in part three.
:Audience Member: Awesome! I <u>'''''LOVE'''''</u> content.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Internet]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]