Saturday 16 March 2013

For We Who Grew Up Tall And Proud


In the shadow of the mushroom cloud that erupted last night on Twitter, I'd like to clear up a few things I disagree with in that situation:
1. A giveaway hosted with clear stipulations that the giveaway will only end when the blog has reached a certain number of followers is a transparent attempt to buy said followers.
2. Being called up on that is not 'cyber bullying', 'abuse' or 'trolling', it's expressing what a lot of us bloggers feel but can't necessarily find the gumption to say.
3. It is not okay to tell people who don't agree with your giveaway 'jealous' because they don't have as many followers.
4. If another blogger (aka me and countless others) joins in and stands up for a friend being called a 'bullying' 'abusive' 'troll' by backing up the argument that the giveaway was a con, it's not okay to call them subhuman and 'disgusting'.
5. It's not okay to appeal to your personal issues as a way of keeping followers on your side through the 'endless abuse' when it's plain to see you've made an error of judgement.
6. It's not okay to delete your erroneous tweets and then claim they never happened and consequently lash out at people who call you up on said mistakes.
7. It's not okay to appeal to your followers for support after the 'constant abuse' of fellow bloggers who have seen through the scam in the first place.

Yes, I am the kind of person that will jump into an argument if I see a friend is being insulted for no good reason. I'm sorry if that offends anyone, I've ridden through enough arguments to know when something starts that it's going to escalate into nastiness like it did last night. So hopefully now it can be settled and there will be no further claims of abuse and trolling, because we all know there was no abuse on Sarah's part.  

So in light of this, I'd like to make a few things really clear about Zombies Wear Eyeliner.
I won't host giveaways to gain followers. I contemplated hosting one for my blogiversary in a few weeks but it turns out money is short so it just wasn't practical. That doesn't even touch the ethical side. I don't have any desire to buy followers to my blog. Damnit, I find it hard enough to leave my URL on Twitter because I feel instantly guilty and egotistical.
If I ever choose to offer a giveaway, it'll be to existing followers, it won't be plastered over Twitter, it won't be dependent on participants RTing my giveaway. It'll be on my terms, when I feel ready and financially prepared, and when I feel I have something that followers can't get hold of themselves. So if I didn't make it clear, it'll be a bloody long time until I host a giveaway, if ever.
Having kept quiet my rage on the use of giveaways to gain followers, last night I snapped and it was unprofessional of me, but things had to be said. I never agree with giveaways spammed all over Twitter and utilised simply to attract attention to a blog. I apologise to those in my readership who are only here to win something, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed, but this blog isn't about popularity, quite the opposite

As many of us said last night, we might not have a huge following, but what numbers we have, we're fiercely proud of, because we've worked for every one of them. I remember celebrating when I got to ten followers, I was ecstatic, I had no idea ten people were even interested in what I had to say. A year and 100 more zombies later, and I'm the happiest girl, my little corner of the Internet has grown up and earned every single follower. I'm proud to say I worked for every follower I have, and I follow back everyone of them that I have the links of, because I feel that's how the blogging world works, repaying those who have helped you out. Not buying their loyalty now to ensure they help your follower numbers out in the future.

Sorry for such a negative post, hopefully it's all over now so there won't be a repeat of this drama.


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12 comments:

  1. I agree with your view on things. If I do hold a giveaway at any point it'll be for an anniversary or maybe a follower milestone (funds allowing of course) in which case followers will already have followed. I don't understand giveaways to get followers, especially since a lot of people just follow for the giveaway then unfollow straight away. I'd rather earn my followers through my content and word of mouth etc.
    I can't comment on the bullying as I haven't seen all the tweets, but for what it's worth from my experience neither you nor Makeup Magpie ever come across as the type of people who would bully. Quite the opposite in fact. Calling someone subhuman is never okay.

    I'm sorry this happened, I hate hearing about things like this. The bbloggers community always comes across as so lovely and helpful and genuine, it's sad when people do things that spoil that. :( Hope everything blows over and all is well again soon x
    (sorry for the long rambly comment!)

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  2. I fully agree with this. Having followers is lovely, but I found after my giveaway finished I lost followers and that was just hurtful. I would be a little disappointed if someone who was not a loyal reader won a giveaway run by a blogger, especially those that have just started out/don't have much money. The thing that particularly bothers me is when bloggers do giveaway, after giveaway, after giveaway, after giveaway without even a slight gap and brag about follower influx. I wish everyone just followed and read everyone, haha x

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  3. It was so ridiculous, I literally came off twitter for half an hour and when i came back it had all blown up haha!! I couldn't believe what I was reading, actually mental! OBVIOUSLY she is buying followers, can't believe how people fall for it, it's fine for companies to do that but not bloggers! When I do giveaways I try and do them quite quietly and don't allow people to share on twitter cos I don't want people just to follow me so they can win shit, I want them to like the content haha. Crazy times! xx

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  4. I totally agree with your view in this post. I only started a blog for my own little ramblings and actually never thought anyone would follow, (I did a little dance when I got my first).
    I didn't see this on twitter so can't really comment but from the screenshots it obviously looks like a bribe to follow! I would never want to post and make people follow like that as it would seem such a waste to me to give some random person who only followed for the sake of winning, won the prize from my hard earned cash. I would much rather have some lovely person who takes the time to read my blog and or comment to take the prize and enjoyment from it.

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  5. The best blog post I have ever read? haha. If anything, Ceri's the one being out of line with the 'name calling'. How childish can people be? I thought blogging was a mature way of sharing things, not taddling on others! If she wants to host a giveaway thats fine but why on earth cause a big stink out of it. If Ceri didn't agree with Sarah's point of view, why not just say something to the lines of "I'm sorry thats how you feel about the giveaway" rather than give it all "Sarah's a troll send her help". If anything that's saying that she needs help, isn't that like discrimination? Eurgh people make me sick these days sending pathetic Tweets thinking they're the bee's knees!

    xxx

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  6. All well and good and I agree with some points. I know of neither blogger though but would hasten to add that directing people directly to the girl who made derogatory comments is no better than the initial twit witch hunt though?! Just saying like haha. But on the other hand it's nice to see people being so passionate. Fist pump to integrity! I do agree give aways are a false economy and I personally wouldn't strive to host one again.

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  7. I've been blogging for over three years now and the last giveaway (products bought by me) I held was in 2011 and I asked my followers to decide on which wedding nails I should have. It was fun and I gave away some Molton Brown products I wanted to share with my readers.

    Since then giveaways have gotten out of hand, it seems that new bloggers think it's just something they are expected to do when they hit a certain number of followers or blog anniversary. It's unrealistic from a bloggers point of view, we're all skint from buying products to review right?

    I did a few sponsored giveaways last year and it was a nightmare, when you have international readers they can't participate, or it's only going to be for people who live in and around London... The list goes on and on, and I can't be arsed anymore. People will either read my blog or they won't, I may lose followers overtime if they get bored and gain new followers out of nowhere. Some bloggers have bazillion followers, some have a few that's just the way it goes. What I blog about doesn't attract loads of readers but I enjoy what I blog about so I won't change to get more readers nor should anyone else.

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  8. i am so confused over this pettyness, so many companies give away prizes at a certain amou t of followers on twitter and on fb, this seems soo silly! are we back at school?

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  9. I just don't get why this has been made into such a big deal. If she wants to host a giveaway, she can. At the end of the day, it's her money and her business whether she chooses to "buy" followers. The people that get suckered into following by giveaways will unfollow when they don't win, and she will lose followers once her giveaway is over. Let her experience this first hand, but the attack that people bought onto her was so unnecessary and it hurt watching it unfold as I thought that blogging bought us all together. After seeing so many people get involved in this whole thing and almost ganging up on each other was disturbing. We're grown women, we are not 12. This is secondary school drama and us as people who write professional beauty blogs, should know better than to get involved in petty drama such as whether or not a blogger decides to do a giveaway. This whole thing has changed my opinion of blogging and I don't want to be part of this community if this is what happens to people that choose to do things their way.

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    Replies
    1. I was the one who initially said anything to Ceri on Twitter, and I just wanted to clear a few things up. We did not 'attack' her. All she had to do was admit to it and the whole thing wouldn't have escalated the way that it did. But she twisted things around, deleted her tweets, insulted me and other bloggers and made the whole situation bigger than it needed to be. Yes, I could have kept quiet in the first place and not said anything but the fact is I was seeing SO many of her giveaway tweets tweeted into my Twitter feed that I felt I had to say something. Clearly I wasn't the only one who felt this way, and I stand by everything I said.

      The blogging community is a wonderful place that is generally supportive and engaging, but you can't explain everyone to get along every minute of the day. It's just not realistic. Personally, I feel that bloggers who buy their followers spoil the atmosphere of the bloggers community and turn it into a competition which is where jealousy and bitchiness comes into play. Without these issues and certain individuals, the community as a whole is a great place.

      I don't care what people do with their blogs, buy followers all you want but don't turn it into something it's not. I hate people who dictate 'rules' to bloggers, and that's definitely not what I was trying to achieve by saying that you CAN'T and MUST NOT buy followers. All I'm saying is you can if you want, but I would not support a blog that did so. x

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  10. I like the cut of your jib.

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