My Review Of iBlog Magazine

I signed up for the free print copy of iBlog. I was excited at first and started reading it with interest, as my internet has been out much of the day. 

I had to laugh when I read the article by Shelly Kramer on Facebook's dwindling reach. The headline is as follows: "Can We Please Stop Whining About It. They gave us their crack cocaine for free - we bit, hook, line, and sinker. "

"We need to understand that it's their house and Facebook doesn't owe us anything."

And she further writes..."Don't get me wrong. I feel your pain. I know you're aggravated because you thought you were doing the right things and following the rules. But the reality is that you never "owned" your Facebook fans and you don't own them now. Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook's investors own them."

Why the chuckle? I have eschewed Facebook from the beginning. I always considered it an objectionable trend, one I didn't particularly care for, so I gave it little thought and zero effort. And "following the rules?" What rules?

I guess it's a case of bloggers putting all their eggs in one basket. Social media to me is vastly overrated. Content is what we I think we need to be working on. Photography is what we need to be working on. Building a community and helping one another is what I think we need to be doing. Interacting with one another. 

This social media craze is the icing on the cake. But let's bake the cake and get really good at it before we even consider the icing.

So I found a few articles of interest in this premier issue of iBlog. But at $5.99 a copy, I expected top notch copy editing. Which was not there, folks. So many mistakes and I'm simply turned off. Get your ducks in a row if you're going to publish a magazine. And if you can't polish it and make it shine, don't bother. I found the errors unprofessional. 

The emphasis on social media experts I did not care for either. I care diddly about social media experts. I think of them as basically "fluff." Yeah, I know some of you live and breathe social media. But this has been the trend of just the last few years, and I truly hope it fades. We really did blog before social media became such a buzz word.

I want to blog and read blogs. I want it all to be about blogging. I don't care how many followers you have on Facebook or Google+ (which to me is like a giant puzzle missing dozens of pieces) and Twitter. I'm just not buying into the frenzy over it.

And as for iBlog magazine, I had high hopes. I was just about to fork over the money for a year's subscription. But they didn't sell me on their premier issue. And I did contact them with my views.

If you also read their print or online version, I'd love to know your thoughts. My grade? C+.

Enter your email address


Delivered by FeedBurner