SG Cordray Pondering the Universe

If you really care about your business, DON’T SPAM. Becoming a spammer is no way to do business. I consider myself pretty much an average person when it comes to likes, dislikes, and so on. When I see spam, regardless of the context or location, I automatically shut down my thought processes and either delete the thing unread or close the browser.

If noone reads your spam and you are counting on that for links back to your site(s), guess what? You have a dead business. Spam is a cheap form of advertising but it comes off as cheap and possibly dishonest in the bargain. People don’t like or want spam. They get angry at it, delete it, and ignore it.

If you can’t afford decent advertising why not try posting on forums and blogs as real people with real opinions and thoughts? You can still post your link which is the whole point of the thing. You’ve just taken the time to become a real person, an approachable one, to those reading. There’s also less chance the site administrator will delete not only your spammy post but your link as well.

For a blog such as this one, basically dealing with everyday life and no set agenda it’s really disheartening to see posts such as “I totally agree with this…” when it’s an announcement such as the “Stories of Strength” post. There is nothing in it to agree or disagree to. It’s simply telling people about a book that was published to aid disaster victims. I can’t configure Spam Karma against it because it uses words that are used frequently so I have to go through and delete the junk. Having to do that further disheartens one. If the only responses I get are people spamming the site I’ll stop maintaining the site and your links will die anyway. You will have wasted not only my time but yours spamming a dead site.

If you can’t be bothered to take the time to care enough about your business to be a real person why would I want to be bothered to give you mine?

As I explained in the earlier post, I’m writing up one Sims family’s life through 10 generations. I’m catching up with the writing part now. I’ve gotten to generation four and haven’t written much. It was time to take a break and do some writing.

The neat thing about this is that the people are simulated so well that you can actually find good stories to tell from playing the game and watching them: what they do, how they interact without prodding of any kind, their thought processes (gotta love those little pictures over their heads), how their aspirations line up from day to day, and interpreting what they are saying from those thought processes and how the receiver reacts. Besides, it’s a good writing exercise.

The first generation is a bonafide romance. I didn’t engineer it, it just happened. There were some twists and turns that made it interesting and I’m playing upon those but I still have some problems. I’m not a romance writer. I don’t want it to sound really corny. As yet, there are no comments on what I’ve shared at the writing board and I could really use some helpful suggestions to make this couple stand out the way they deserve. It’s not that I don’t believe in romance… If you knew how I met my husband, you’d know just how strongly I do believe in romance… It’s just I’ve never written anything in the genre, rarely read it, and I don’t know what’s good.

The section where I’m sharing these write-ups is password protected… so that people’s works are considered still unpublished. I hate not getting any feedback even if it’s negative. I should be a pessimist and think it must stink so badly that no one is willing to comment and ready to ditch the whole project but if I don’t continue with it I would be letting down the other contributors to the exercise.

I went on a binge that has lasted at least two weeks… A gaming binge. Oh, I still saw to the servers and all the ordinary day to day tasks… well, sort of. My poor kitchen suffered, as did the laundry and a few other things like that.

I fell in love with The Sims from the first game and have every expansion pack for the original game. I have been quite a bit better about getting the expansions for Sims2 but I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to hold out.

This latest binge started all because of a suggestion from a fellow member of a writers’ forum which I frequent on http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums . Her idea was to start a new family following the rules of The Legacy Challenge which can be found HERE. The trick is to follow one family through ten generations. I’m have just seen Gen3 through adulthood and haven’t written up a thing about them nor have I taken any screenshots. I regret the screenshots. Some of the scenes my family has made would have been priceless. I haven’t kept score either. I have refrained from using the life extending elixir and am very glad I did. I’ve never had people die before in my games but the founding Sim and his wife have died and now haunt the “mansion”. It’s great fun!

I will start writing up the stories on these “people”. There is a “true” love story in them as well as some other neat stories to tell about the antics this crazy family has gotten up to.

I always give my Sims freewill and so far they have brought me lots of pleasure seeing them make many of their own decisions rather than me controlling their every move. Of course they are still programmed people so their actions are rather limited compared to real life but in this person’s view, they are better than a sitcom… the season will never be over with the Sims. There will always be a new episode.