No more freebies

Hi Scoble. To 'help' you out, I'll take all that free hardware and guilt off your hands. Just ship it to me and I'll blog about it :) Specially any new Mobile 5 phones, dual-core laptops and Tablet PCs. :)

Vinny: heheh. But, no. :-)

WWID? I'd keep the stuff and laugh at them for sending it without being asked to. As far as I'm concerned, they sent you free stuff. You never signed anything.

Lol, I'd help you out too! I think trying out new things and writing about them would be fun. Perhaps you should make time for a few good things:P

Can't say I blame you. When it becomes about other people's interests and not yours, then it ceases to be fun. I wonder sometimes if some forget that this isn't your job.

Robert - you might point these people to blogcritics. That's what they do -- and have been doing for a couple years now -- and they have 1,000+ bloggers ready and willing to review anything they are sent. They even have a database setup to handle stuff like this.

If compannies send you stuff unsolicited, then I suggest you donate it to a local public school. They always need new stuff. At worst, they could turn around and sell it.

Phil: most of this stuff is not unsolicited. I accepted it cause it sounded interesting to try out. But it puts pressure on my life to work with that stuff rather than other stuff. It also means that I'm a marketing vehicle now, and that mentally burns me out.

Robert:

Sending back the stuff you currently have is good mojo. But now that you have announced that you are not going to review any of the stuff, I don't think you have an ethical obligation to take the time and expense of sending it back. Presumably this stuff was not requested by you, and you've issued your caveat. Anyone who continues to fire it at you has no reason to expect you'll take that time and money to mail it back. Perhaps you could keep it in a box until it's full then call a charity somewhere in the P.S. area that's willing to drive out and get it. It could raise some money for them, or, if their techie, it could reduce their outlay on hardware. (Maybe you could publish a list of what you gave who once every month or two if you're still feeling guilty. Then the indisciminant senders will get unearned credit for their high-mindedness.)

The more gadgets you use/test and the more things you use, the more your views/opinions will have value :)

Blog about the ones you like the MOST, not because someone gave it to you or because you like the person (even though that should be a factor for a service product).

Then people will 'suck up' to you by making/showing you better products not by giving you more goodies.

The people with bad products will get pissed off.

That way you get to filter out the the baddies, and you hang around with the right people, and your popularity will increase (more) - isn't that what you wanted ? and your opinions will be valued (more)...

I think that's a very interesting thing to decide to do - very noble in fact. Great to see you focussed on what you're passionate about. Great move!

met: I can use and test a lot of gadgets without having them sent to me. I'll just go over to Chris Pirillo's house! :-)

But, seriously, that's my point. I don't care if I have value based on how many gadgets I've bought. I'm not here to be a replacement for News.com or Tom's Hardware or Walt Mossberg.

I completely understand, but is my understanding that this happens so much that they barely remember who they send that stuff to, most techwriters and know bloggers get some amount of it.

People always gravitate towards notable people like yourself, so organisations see this as an easily exploitable situation to get cheap marketing, but it's your Blog, you write what you want to write.

Allow me to offer a contrarian view -- I really think you should not close the door on this channel completely; at least let the door open a crack. You are experiencing what many others have experienced since they entered a territory called "celebrity", and you are a bona fide celebrity now, no matter how humble or in denial you are. Movie stars and pop stars get hounded frequently by people who want them to read their screenplays or sing their songs, not to mention the autograph-seekers and stalking paparazzis; in other words, being famous has a price.

You might want to consider allotting a specific time for these activities, say, like 30 minutes a day. And be straightforward on your blog about your experience with these things; for example, you can say, "I've just looked at Gadget X, and I got bored after 5 minutes, so that tells you something, but to be fair, during the 5 minutes, I found Gadget X to be this and that..." No one expects you to be another Walt Mossberg, plus you don't aspire to be one anyway.

Slashdot and Engadget have a staff of writers who are paid to do this. You've volunteered : it's a measure of success as a public person ( you're famous, already ) that you're overloaded for commentary.
Your duty is to have fun, not run yourself ragged running around in ever-diminishing circles at others' request. I'm sure you're big enough to figure it out.
So relax, already. You were saying ...?

Pick a few products that you don't like and blast them.

People would then think twice about sending you unsolicited products.

Itzy: that's not true.

I've done that, even to Microsoft products, and find that that actually increases the requests. Why? Cause then your audience finds you're even more valuable (and entertaining) and that people who think they could survive the snark are even more interested in playing the review lottery.

You sure do seem to be unhappy lately. I hope you figure out what the problem is because your blog is suffering from it too.

El: my back hurts. Seriously.

But, I'm just overloaded. Seriously. Stick in there. I'll solve both eventually.

Robert, if you get a chance, you might speak to Jerry Pournelle about this issue. He dealt with it for years and years when he was writing his column for Byte Magazine. He refined his policies over a long span, and I bet he could offer some good insight.

Simplify! Simplify! Simplify! Life is too short to let it be dictated by others. Go with your gut, it has served you well so far.

Besides "freebie" is a misnomer. It costs you something very valuable - your time. If it works and improves your life and solves a problem -- I think you should take it.

If it is such an alpha product that the bugs have bugs, why bother?

Keep blogging!

I like the idea of giving any unsolicited items to local schools or community activity centers.
And if you are looking for something to jump start your enthusiasm, maybe offer to teach them how to get started doing this for themselves. Nothing revives enthusiasm more than sharing it with some kid.

Reading through all this makes me realize: I'm so happy I'm not an A-Lister. Maybe you might want to take a whole week off to recharge your battery - and giving the stuff to charities sounds like a mighty fine idea to me. Either way: it might be advisable to place the physical and mental health before the urge to blog. ;) Hang in there.

Pierdol sie ty huju jebany.huj ci w dupe skurwielu!!

Robert - according to BlogCode.com, my blog at blogging.wurk.net is the closest match to yours "in terms of style, content and delivery."

So, you can't argue that it makes perfect sense that you simply forward all that stuff on to me. Everyone's happy.

Drop me a line, and I'll send you my mailing address.

;o))

Every thought about donating them? Like to the schools or to Goodwill? If they are unsolicited, they are gifts to you. If you aren't going to use them, donate!

So I guess then no UMPC review? Gotcha. ;)

But yeah, people think the freebie game is a good one, until it ends up consuming your life. Double-edged sword. Nothing a stint on the journalism beat couldna taught yah, but bloggers and MVPs learn things the hard way, seemingly many many years later.

If you want the freebie life, you will have to MAKE it your life -- morphing into a pt-like robotic-creature, always fiddling with gadgets, doing eternally stupid geek hack tricks to entertain the masses of geeky short attention spans.

Since my gadgets already consume my life, I really don't see the problem. Maybe I should apply myself so I can have hope of filling the new void :)

I know I'm on the outside looking in, but it seems to me the hard part is getting to the point where people want you to see their stuff. Thank goodness I'm starting to get review material (loaners) tossed to me at work. Thanks for the warnings, but one day I'll strive to learn the hard way. I just have to stop procrastinating!

I certainly do understand the pressures (especially on time) that this all means. However, be careful to maintain context and stay grounded.

We often speak of community in relation to the web. It is a fitting analogy. You are an influential and popular member of the community around you. It is obvious therefore that people will value (and seek) your support in all manner of things. It is perfectly natural, inevitable, and you may as well get comfortable with it, because the only real alternative is to seek quiet and become the community hermit.

Be comfortable enough to say "No". People who truly value you will understand that, and will even appreciate your honesty. Sure, some only want to use you, and those will handily make themselves known and easy to ignore forever more. However, it is not wrong for people to ask for your support, so be very careful about turning away all comers. That's the hermit route, and is rather dishonest. Its fine and good to say no, but to pre-judge all requests, to say No in advance is not right.

I know you've wrestled with it, and especially with the ethics of accepting freebies that you cannot possibly promise to review. But do keep those lines of communication open.

All the best to you.

Some people have all the luck. Now, see, they woulden't send ME free stuff no matter how much I blogged about it. ;-)

You could always just become a lot more selective about what you agree to review. That way, you still get neat gadgets, but it's the stuff you actually want to fiddle with & talk about.

Good luck..
Keep sending back the stuff and eventually they'll stop sending them at first.

A better life is waiting for you :)