I am here to personally advise Absurdia upon “How To Become Famous On The Internet”
First, let’s establish a basic or two. A couple of things you need to know; The Players, as it were:
1. YOU. You wrote a blog. Maybe you decided to overstate your case on it. Maybe you went the “shock / horror” route. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is:
Do not forget this
2. Now. What is it you deserve, because you wrote a blog? Why, fame, fortune, adoration…just the basic things, of course. Certainly you deserve NOTHING BUT PRAISE. Which leads us to…well, The Adversary. We’ll call them readers:
I can hear you already. “But aren’t readers, you know, the people who give me credit for my work and stuff?”
Yes. Yes, they are. That doesn’t mean you have to be nice to them, stupid. In fact, it’s best not to. Here’s why:
A. Readers are not smart, ever. They learn nothing by doing that reading thing. Certainly they are not as smart as you. Hey, I don’t see them writing blogs, the losers.
B. Readers cannot be trusted to recognize your talent. They can’t be trusted to always love your work and praise you. This horrifying situation must be remedied.
C. Readers – I can hardly bring myself to type this, even – cannot be trusted to keep their mouths shut when they do not like your blog. They seem to think that reading your blog gives them the right to say whatever they like about it, even if – man, this is hard! – even if it is not praise. The nerve of them, I know. Please sit down for a minute to get over the shock. Just breathe.
D. They compound all of these errors by thinking that just being able to read makes all of this okay, even though they have not written blogs of their own, and therefore cannot understand the fragile and special bond between a writer and her BLOG. Or all the hard work that went into that blog. How the hell do they know what good writing is? Really. I ask you. Idiots. I bet they think they’re capable of judging whether or not a meal is well-cooked even if they are not professional chefs, or whether a car runs even when they are not mechanics, or whether an airplane flight is enjoyable even when they are not pilots, or whether an item of clothing provided adequate cover even though they are not seamstresses. Everybody’s a fucking expert these days, you know? Sheesh. I’m telling you, they are a scourge.
E. Worst of all, readers seem to not realize that their job is solely to love and promote your blog–and by extension YOU. It’s like they think they’re totally separate people from you as a writer, like they don’t have some sort of obligation to you because you wrote a blog. They actually don’t think they owe you anything at all, if you can believe that arrogance. They actually think, even, that you shouldn’t tell them what to do or treat them like you expect the deference you so richly deserve. It’s like they’re just walking egos thinking you should let them have opinions of their own or let them talk to each other about your blog without you butting in or whatever.
Anyway. Now we have the basics. Let’s get started.
The most important thing to remember is that everyone in the world sees everything on the internet every minute of every day. This is key to your promotional strategy and will make you very famous a whole lot faster.
You must keep a careful eye on every single mention of your name and make sure that you control that situation totally. For example, let’s say some dumbarse has the nerve to think your opinion was stupid. Now, you could just think, “Oh, too bad,” and move on. You could think “I wish I’d written smarter,” and move on. You could think, “Well, huh, it seems smart enough to me, so oh well, I guess my blog just wasn’t right for that person,” and move on.
ALL OF THESE ARE WRONG. If the above is your instinct, you are Not Ready To Be A Real Blogger.
The correct response, as everyone knows, is to firmly step in, tell the reader first of all that you see her review, and that she has been remiss in her duty to you by actually forgetting that she is not the person who matters in this little transaction. You are. Explain to her not only why she is wrong about your opinions, but that she was wrong to say such mean things about you as well, because who does she think she is?
Remind her that her opinions only matter insomuch as how they relate to you and your feelings. She should be happy you’ve done this, as it will make her see how much you care.
“But,” you say, “That’s fine for some readers. But what if the reader actually, like, made a joke in her comment? What if she said more than one bad thing about my blog? What if she was actually morally and intellectually bankrupt enough to hate it? What do I do?”
Well, of course, not every bit of advice is fit for every situation. Sometimes you must be stricter with those morons. It’s perfectly okay to call them names if they hurt your feelings–after all, our teachers on the playground told us not to do that, but we learned that calling the other girl a poopypants meaniehead made us feel better, didn’t we? And if it was good enough for your five-year-old self, it’s good enough for you now.
This is why you must control every word said about you everywhere. When a reader posts a comment s, it’s like an insect flying into a spider’s web; it sends little vibrations through the whole entire internet and within thirty seconds every reader in the whole world has read that comment and decided they love or hate you based on it.
But you know what else will make them love you? Standing up for yourself. Aggressively. Now we’re getting into the advanced promotional techniques, so I warn you: some of this may seem a little strange. But bear with me. You’ll be glad you did. Because really…
THIS IS THE INTERNET. YOU CANNOT POSSIBLY GO WRONG BY MAKING A SPECTACLE OF YOURSELF.
Trust me.
So.
Your mission is to get some dumb little bitch to change her opinion of you / your blog, right? You can’t have people seeing that YOUR opinions might be stupid. I mean, this is your raison d’etre! Don’t they understand it’s their obligation to make sure you earn acclaim through writing this blog? Jeez, you’d think they had their own families to take care of or something, or their own lives to live. Selfish, selfish, selfish, that’s all they are.
How do you do that?
There are a number of ways.
We’ve already covered responding yourself. This is a good and right thing to do. Not just because it will show that moronic reader who really matters, but because it will draw attention to you.
Remember, attention is the name of the game! The more people see you, the more people who will immediately rush out to read your blog.
But what if you did, and the reader is too stupid to be grateful that you have turned your Glorious Bloger’s Eye onto her, and allowed her to bask in its gentle Sodium Glow of Truth. Trust me, she’s posting her review just to get your attention.
Readers are attention whores, see. They pretend they’re just trying to engage you, but really, they are desperately trying to steal your own Internet Fame. (There is only so much internet to go around.) Do not fall for their claims that this is just their opinion (we know that’s not true, due to them being stupid) and especially do not fall for their claims that they have a right to their own opinions. They do NOT.
See, in addition to their sheeplike, easily led “brains” (I know, it makes me giggle too), readers are sometimes incapable of accepting your superiority over them. This is because of their own silly insecurities, their tendency toward attention whoring, their sluggish pea-like minds, their lack of morals, their denial of responsibility, and their sick, sad need to put other people down just for achieving something they could not themselves achieve. I repeat: if readers were so damn smart they’d write their own blogs. Am I right? Of course I am! I wouldn’t steer you wrong.
Tomorrow we’ll get into the nitty-gritty of the battle. Don’t forget to come back, and learn everything you need to know about vanquishing those idiots who have questioned your blog and crushing both their free will and, hopefully, their personal lives. It’s nothing less than they deserve.
Thank you for your attention.
(Do I have to spell S.A.T.I.R.E. out for you?)
(with special thanks to Stacia Kane)
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