Embedding Memes on a Blog

I wanted to test this out to see how it turns out.

TEST

As you can see from the mess below, it didn’t work right posting the embed code.

//

Post by AFSCME.

<div id=”fb-root”></div>
<script>// <![CDATA[
(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = “//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1″; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, ‘script’, ‘facebook-jssdk’));
// ]]></script>
<div class=”fb-post” data-href=”https://www.facebook.com/AFSCME/photos/a.116013123060.100434.6165653060/10152583307848061/?type=1&#8243; data-width=”466″>
<div class=”fb-xfbml-parse-ignore”><a href=”https://www.facebook.com/AFSCME/photos/a.116013123060.100434.6165653060/10152583307848061/?type=1″>Post</a&gt; by <a href=”https://www.facebook.com/AFSCME”>AFSCME</a&gt;.</div>
</div>

Will the meme from Facebook show up here? It provided an embed code which I’ve plugged in here. Well, the embed code pasted in the text area of the draft just resulted in a link but no meme. The embed code pasted into the visual part of the draft just showed the html.

Finally I just copied the picture and pasted it here. That’s what you see at the top. I’m not sure that will be acceptable to the originators of the meme. They probably want some sort of link back or credit of some sort.

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Waiting for the Axe to Fall on Hubpages

Today at noon ended the 4-month grace period on Hubpages for the content transferred over from Squidoo. I’ve checked a few times this afternoon but so far no status changes that I can see.

Already about half of my 595 hubs have been unfeatured for either quality or lack of engagement. Of the remaining topics, I count 46 with red skulls. Early on, I diligently applied myself to updating to clear those away. When the updated hubs went through quality review and appeared with the white dot the next day, I abandoned my self-improvement plan.

Apparently my idea of what improved a hub did not match what Hubpages wanted. I, like other refugees from Squidoo, lost heart and said “why bother?” Now and then in an idle moment, I would try once again but more often than not missed getting rewarded for my efforts.

What will happen today? I expect my 46 red skull hubs to join the unfeatured ones and to be cut off from Google traffic. Since that traffic is almost non-existent, probably no great loss.

For hubs with my family history or Civil War information, I’ll either move the information to my blogs or make one last effort to bring them up to par. Hiding or removing all Amazon, eBay and Zazzle might suffice, though it also removes most chances for any earnings as well.

Hubpages keyboard created using GlassGiant

Getting Discouraged with Hubpages

Four months ago, my 595 web pages transferred over from Squidoo to Hubpages. Within a few weeks, the site was slapped by a Penguin update with Google suppressing Hubpages in its searches. This resulted in very low traffic for everyone there. Long-time hubbers quickly blamed the Squidoo content for the attack. I think it was just poor timing and not necessarily directed at former Squidoo pages.

Being used to ranking in the top 20 lensmasters on the Squidoo site, I had expectations for doing well on Hubpages too. I figured that after learning the ropes and making required adjustments to my pages, that I’d steadily regain traffic and sales.

Alas, this is not to be. Hubpages only seems to like my stodgiest pages and has hidden about 50% of the ones it considers low quality or lacking in engagement. Many of the low traffic ones are holiday topics, but it will require much work to get those back in service. Given the shunning from Google, hardly any traffic is finding its way to hubs.

It seems lately that any featured hubs with red skulls that I correct the issues, immediately go to unfeatured for quality. When the ones lacking engagement get updated, they do the same. I’m not sure what guidelines the reviewers are using but I’m not on the right track with my fixes.

Enough is enough. It appear from the forum discussions that a batch of old-time hubbers are brandishing flaming torches and vowing to report all sub-standard hubs. They needn’t come around trying to burn down my barn, I seem to be doing a fine job on my own getting my hubs out-of-commission.

On the brighter side, I’m just about finished with the prep work on my first ebook. It contains the content from 5 former lenses, now hubs that I’m deleting. Onward and upward.

Red Skull & Crossbones Sticker by yarddawg

Working Away Writing an eBook

Bad things happening at Bubblews has inspired me to get busy on other projects. I’ve started a second ebook. The first one still languishes unfinished.

Feeling all gung-ho, I’ve transferred the content from 5 of my Hubpages’ articles over to a Microsoft Word document. The last few days, I’ve been formatting and organizing it.

I have someone lined up to give me format editing advice on the layout, font size, sections of the book. Later that same person will copy edit it for grammar and spelling and readability.

I need to get a cover done for it. Maybe I’ll use a Fiverr artist for that or I might contact someone who’s made banners for my Squidoo niche pages.

In the past, I’ve downloaded a number of ebooks on publishing with CreateSpace and Kindle Direct. I need to read those.

I dread that part of submitting the book, but have several friends who’ve been through the process. I can call them if I get stuck.

Wish me luck!

I’m writing a book, got the page numbers done mouse pad by BadassTees
See more Funny Mousepads at zazzle.com

Why Bother to Edit Hubs?

The first 3 months after the Squidoo content transferred to Hubpages, I made a valiant effort to adjust the articles to match the new site’s wishes. It bothered me to see red skulls signifying violations and bothered me even more to see the gaping holes from missing elements in my transferred hubs.

It was hard work, taking as much as an hour or even two or three hours per hub. Then the day came when Hubpages lost patience with its new acquisitions and overnight set hundreds of hubs (former lenses) to unfeatured status. “What happened?” we all asked, as we had been promised a grace period of 4 months.

We were told that our pages were spammy and low quality, even ones with high hub scores. I decided to soldier on, but must admit I was losing heart.It’s hard to see much reason to keep editing, as the next day shows many of the revamped hubs are still not acceptable. Here’s a screen shot of my recently changed hubs:

These are my recently edited hubs. The big red X shows the ones that went to Not Featured – Quality the next day.

 

It seems the few that make it past the editing and remain featured are more personal, family topics. Those are also the ones that are unlikely to earn a penny or even draw much traffic. A couple of sales oriented hubs made it through (Easter baskets and pancake pens). I can’t see that they are any higher in quality than some of the other rejected ones.

It makes me think that the rating process is whimsical at best and probably skewed against former Squidoo content particularly if you have any Amazon capsules in them.

I’ve plunged into creating my own sites, well, only one so far. Also, I’m working on an eBook that will take the content from 5 hubs. As I gain confidence in these new playing fields, more and more of my hubs will disappear from Hubpages. About half of them are hidden right now, so they might as well leave completely and go somewhere that gives them a new lease on life.