Why I Stick with Triond as an my main Online Writing Site

For those who might not know, Triond is an online site where you can publish your writings, photos, videos and sounds for free, while getting paid to do so.

I recently commented on the Triond forums about why I stick with Triond when there are other writing sites available, many which pay better than Triond. I came up with three reasons why I stay with Triond, and I thought I'd expound upon those reasons here.

The freedom
Triond allows you to publish online just about anything, with very few limitations. You can't plagiarize and you can't publish something that's already been published elsewhere, even if you should own the rights to the material. Triond also usually won't allow excessive cursing in articles submitted to it, and graphic sexual and violent content are generally not accepted. I say "usually" and "generally" because sometimes it seems anything can get through Triond's editors and automated features.

All that being said, Triond still has far fewer limitations than any of ther other online writing and publishing sites I've tried, used and in some cases continue to use.

For example, Bukisa doesn't accept fiction. Triond does. I don't publish a lot of fiction on Triond, despite the fact I'm also a fiction author, but every once in a while I'll have an older short story I've never been able to place with a magazine or ezine, and I'll want to go ahead and publish that story online. It'll end up on Triond.

Other sites, like Helium, force you to have to write to particular topics. Of course you can try to create a topic, but that's subject to approval and I've found Helium to be more trouble than it's worth when it comes to creating topics. I continue to publish there, but only if I happen to have written something that already fits into the alread-provided parameters. I don't go to Helium with an idea of starting from scratch and writing whatever I want.

And that's what Triond does for me. It allows me to write whatever I want.

The payment plan
Some sites, such as Redgage and Gather, don't pay you directly through Paypal or another online service or by check. Instead, Gather offers gift cards. Redgage offers a debit card. While I use both those sites, I find it preferable simply to have my earnings deposited into my Paypal account, which is what Triond does.

It's true many other sites pay much better than Triond, which pays according to the number of views an article earns. But a large portion of those sites pay upfront fees only. Some of those upfront fees sound enticing when compared to the seemingly paltry sums one can earn on Triond. Some of those upfront fees are as high as $5, $10, $15 and sometimes more for a story. But once you've been paid that upfront fee, you no longer receive anything more for your writing. I don't care for that. Triond might pay me less in the beginning, but in the long run I feel I'm being well-enough compensated.

Some places online, again looking at Helium, do offer some payment based upon the number of views earned by an article, but they also have a somewhat complicated payout plan that includes original articles and articles added to particular topics (though not all) chosen by Helium. Frankly, I don't want to have to think about it that much. I just want to write, get viewers and get paid for it, and not have to try to treehorn my writing into certain topics that Helium or some other site considers advantageous to them (but not necessarily advantageous or of interest to me).

One last thing about money on Triond: You can also add advertising from Google's AdSense program to your Triond articles. Believe me, it is well worth it. By using AdSense, I more than double the amount of money I make from Triond, and most other online writing sites don't provide for using AdSense (though some do).

The starting-off point
Okay, Triond doesn't pay much, but its payment plan is simple enough and hardly any restraints are forced upon my writing interests.

So what's my third reason for sticking with Triond? Because it's a great place to begin promotions. Since Triond only publishes original material, any of my articles appearing on Triond have been published there first before anywhere else. Sounds limiting? It's not, mainly because Triond provides easy connections to tons and tons of other places for linking back to your Triond articles, which brings in viewers (and thus more money). Stumblupon is one such place, as is Reddit. I also prefer to use Xomba and SheToldMe. There are tons of other sites that can be utilized for linking to your Triond articles, including socializing sites such as Facebook, Twitter and even the online classifieds site Craigslist.

It also doesn't hurt to have your own blog, or maybe even a series of blogs. Once your articles have been published on Triond, you can republish those articles on your blog. Then you can link from the blog back to your Triond articles, and vice versa. Then link to other blogs. The list could keep growing and growing. Link, link, link. That's one big key to bringing viewers to your Triond articles. You could even use sites like YouSayToo where you can bring your blogs together in one space for promotional or social purposes.

The ideas for linkage are nearly endless, only limited by your imagination and knowledge of what's available out there on the World Wide Web. Triond provides plenty of opportunities for you to link to other sites and blogs, but with some thought you can discover even more places for making connections.

Remember, Triond is just the beginning. What happens from there is up to you.

Why is Jon Stewart "America's Most Trusted Newscaster?"

According to several polls over the last few years, the most well known being the June 2009 online poll by TIME Magazine, Jon Stewart of The Daily Show is the most trusted televised newscaster since Walter Cronkite.

Some bloggers have gone on to suggest this shows just how far down in the dumps America, or at least American television news, has fallen in recent years.

I personally don't think it's that bad a thing. I'm online a dozen or so times a day, which allows me to keep up with national and world news, then I check a couple of local news sites at least once a day, and then I re-cap at night with The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Sure, technically, The Daily Show isn't a news program. It's supposed to be a comedy show. Yet it is always up to date with the latest daily news unless something has happened right before the show airs.

I have no facts or statistics to back this up, but since The Daily Show seems to be pretty popular, I'd have to guess a good number of Americans catch up with the news through The Daily Show. Sometimes they might even learn about something that had slipped past them during the day; I know this happens to me from time to time.

But considering Jon Stewart calls himself a comedian and apparently doesn't think of himself as a newscaster, and the fact his show is on Comedy Central, one has to wonder how Jon Stewart has become so trusted by Americans.

I believe there are three reasons.

1.) Entertainment value

This is an easy one. Americans like to be entertained. And Jon Stewart is funny. His whole show is funny. Yes, not every single episode will keep you laughing throughout, but generally the show is very good. And even when it's not so good, it will still provide a couple of chuckles.

Most of the jokes are at the expense of public figures, usually politicians or other members of news media outlets. And wouldn't you rather laugh along with the news than be scared by it? Which is usually the case if you watch CNN or FOX or any of the other news stations. At the best, most news show are depressing, at worst they'll have you shaking you're so scared of the terrorists who are going to kill you, or the government that's going to kill you, or the poisoned atmosphere that's going to kill your children ... I could go on and on.

At least Jon Stewart tries to give us some news and send us to bed without nightmares but a smile on our faces.

2.) Information value

The Daily Show is also informative, which is pretty important if you're watching it for some of its news value. The first half of the show is most often simply a cover of the big events of the day, which might not be new to most viewers, but the last part of the show usually is Stewart interviewing someone. Often he is interviewing an author pushing a new book, or sometimes it's a celebrity with a new movie, and yet other times it's a politician with an agenda. It could be any number of people for any number of reasons. But usually the person being interviewed is offering new information, or at least a new insight into something news oriented.

I've learned a good deal just by watching the various authors Stewart has interviewed, and Stewart usually goes for the authors with news impact, not just the latest thriller novelist (not that there's anything wrong with thrillers or thriller novelists).

3.) The "Truth" factor

I don't know Jon Stewart. He could be a complete bastard for all I know. But on television he comes off as a pretty likable guy. Not only is he funny, but he seems like he's trying to be helpful, and he's usually apologetic if it appears he has stepped over the line by not being fair to a guest (which is extremely rare).

So, he's likable, at least to most viewing Americans. Why is that important? Because of what I call the "Truth" factor. It appears that Jon Stewart is telling us the truth when he speaks about news and when his show comments on news and other media. Stewart doesn't come off as if he's trying to push an agenda or he's trying to sell us something, which can't be said for nearly every U.S. politician at all levels.

Stewart does seem to lean a little towards the left (politically speaking), but he doesn't come off by any means as a far lefty, but more as a moderate with leftist tendencies. And Stewart and his show don't shy from targeting those politicians who are on the left. He hits the Democrats and Republicans both pretty hard (admittedly the GOP might look a little worse on the show, but if you're honest about it, the Republicans give a lot more to work with in comedy than do the generally more-boring Democrats).

But putting aside politics, Stewart and his gang poke a lot of fun at the news media itself, especially the televised news media. And here I think is another place where The Daily Show really shines. Stewart and crew show us, quite baldly and blankly, how the news plays things up to look differently than they really are. The latest news report scaring you? Stewart's going to make fun of it. Tired of all the one-sidedness on CNN, MSNBC, FOX, etc? Stewart will make you laugh about it. Think C-SPAN is boring? Chuckle about it with Jon.

See, the media as a whole are supposed to be the watchdogs in America. But they've fallen down on the job the last few decades, especially over the last decade. If anything, the media has become just another part of "the system," more worried about itself and making the next buck than it is about truly, fairly covering the news.

Which is where The Daily Show steps in. Stewart has become the watchdog of the watchdogs. He keeps his eyes, and ours, glued on the happenings of not only the politicians, but of those who are supposed to be covering the politicians.

It's almost a new form of journalism, the comedy news show.

A Good Pocket Knife Can Mean a Lot

I recently lost a pocket knife, the one I think of as my "daily" knife, the one I carry with me whenever I am out of the house. It's just a little Winchester pocket knife with a three inch blade I picked up at Walmart a few years ago for about six dollars. I usually keep it in my pocket, but the knife had a metal clip on its side and I decided out of the blue one day to try to use the clip. So, I clipped it onto my belt before going out to take the dog for a walk. When I got home, the knife was gone.

I think I cursed. The knife had no sentimental value to me, but it had been a trusty blade over the years, proving its worth in some fashion or other just about every day. Also, the knife had not been expensive, so it was not as if I was out much money.

Besides, I had other pocket knives. Not a ton of them, I'm not a knife collector, but I had a half dozen or so to pick from if I wanted another "daily" pocket knife.

Then I got to thinking about the pocket knives I owned. And I got to wondering why I had carried that one particular knife when I had others to choose from. It came down to the fact my Winchester knife had been durable, cheap and handy, and I hadn't carried any of my other knives because they had sentimental value for me and I had not wanted to take a chance on losing them.

One of my knives had belonged to my father. Two had belonged to my grandfather. One I bought from a Frenchman who told me a tale of having dug up the knife on the beaches of Normandy (I like to think that knife had perhaps belonged to one of the U.S. soldiers storming the beaches on D-Day, but there's nothing to prove that). Another knife had belonged to the grandfather of a friend. And yet another I had picked up about ten years ago the first time I took my wife to a Renaissance Festival.

So, I had not wanted to carry any of those knives. I still didn't, because I still didn't want to take a chance on losing them.

Digging around in a box of office supplies, a box that had never been unloaded after our last move, I came across another knife, a cheap pocket knife with a plastic body. I remembered I had carried that knife when I worked at a newspaper years earlier and I had used the knife to cut the strings on bundles of newspapers.

For the time-being, that plastic knife (though, yes, it had a steel blade) would have to do until I could find a replacement.

Still, I missed my old "daily" knife. I walk my dog every day, usually several times a day, so on our trips I've been looking for that knife. Day after day, no luck.

Then, this morning, I got up earlier than usual, mainly because I had gone to bed earlier than usual the night before because I had not been feeling well. Since I was up early, I decided I'd go ahead and take the beagle for a walk before the day became too hot. We followed our usual path, the one we had traveled the day I lost my knife.

We had been walking perhaps a mile when the morning sun caught on something ahead of us, something glinting on the ground.

I thought, Could that be my knife?

I rushed ahead.

Sure enough, it was my trusty Winchester pocket knife. There was a little dirt on it and some smudged places, but thankfully there was no rust even though there had been rain the day before. I was happy as could be. It almost felt like providence, as if someone was looking down upon me from above and had given me a little treasure for the day. Yes, I thanked God for letting me find my little pocket knife.

Then I took the knife home, cleaned it, oiled it, sharpened it and placed it back in my pocket where it currently resides. And where it will stay. It's a good knife, but the clip on it isn't worth a darn.

10 Health Benefits of Sex

1. Headaches: Yes, believe it or not, sex can help with the pain of headaches. During sex, endorphins are released into the body that act as a natural, weak morphine. Which helps to relieve pain in the body, including pain from headaches. So never buy into that old saying, "Not tonight, honey. I have a headache."
2. General fitness: Yes, sex is a workout, just like if you went to the gym and lifted some light weights or did a short jog. During sex, you are working some of your body's muscles, and the blood gets to pumping and flowing better, taking oxygen throughout the body.
3. Losing weight: Did you know sex actually burns calories? It does. 150 calories approximately every half an hour. So, theoretically, the more sex you have, the more weight you'll lose. Now that's got to be an incentive.
4. Germ immunity: This one might sound like a stretch, but it's not. The act of sex releases an antibody into the body, which helps fight against all kinds of germs, especially germs from the common cold. And the more sex, the more of the antibody is released. So, basically, those who are having lots of sex have fewer illnesses. Though that's probably not something you'll see in any health care plan from Congress.
5. Prostate cancer: A study from Australia suggests men who frequently have some form of sex reduce their chances of having prostate cancer later in life. Again, the more sex, the lower chance of suffering when older.
6. Sleep: Men are often accused of falling asleep soon after sex, and studies show there's some truth to this, but it's also true for women (they just don't like to admit it). Sex not only relaxes the body, but the endorphins it releases allows the body to rest well, allowing a person to enter a nice sleep if they allow it, almost like a form of self hypnosis.
7. Healthy skin: Okay, now how does this work? Easy enough. Sex releases the hormone DHEA into the body, and this hormone from the inside naturally helps to clean skin and keep skin more shiny and healthy looking. Worried about pimples? Try sex! Hey, it couldn't hurt.
8. Brain power: Yep, the more sex you have, the better your brain works. The reason behind this is that sex gets the blood flowing in the body, which not only helps to clean the blood, but also sends extra blood to the brain, which helps the brain to work better. Makes you wonder about Einstein, doesn't it?
9. Stress: This one should seem fairly obvious. Sex tires you out and releases endorphins (which make you feel better) and hormones into the body (which also makes you feel better) all the while getting you blood up. Once sex is finished, you'll be more relaxed than ever. Studies have even shown that people who have sex frequently suffer less from stress not only immediately after sex, but also on a daily basis and throughout the day. So lighten up!
10. Intimacy: Sex in a monogamous relationship has been shown in numerous studies to increase one's ability to be intimate with others, specifically one's special other, thus improving overall mental well being. Unfortunately for those who are promiscuous, studies have shown just the opposite for those with many and multiple partners.

The Seven Deadly Sins of Writing

Greed
How can a writer be greedy? You write. You sell your writing. You make money from it. Where does the greed come in? Is it possible to make too much money as a writer? Well, I'm not talking about money here, not specifically, at least. When it comes to greed, a writer can be greedy by not being willing to pass along advice and tips to others who are trying to be writers. Admittedly a writer who has "made it" can't spend all of his or her time mentoring others, and maybe they don't have the time to blog or come up with a Web site about writing, but they shouldn't always shy away from questions asked them by those who have had less success. Because who knows? That kid at your book signing might turn out to be a big-time editor in ten years and he or she will remember if you snubbed them.

Sloth
This might be the most common of writers' sins. Sloth. Laziness. Never getting things done that need to be done. We've all been there, right? You've always got something else to do besides writing. Walk the dog. Wash the car. Pay the bills. Play a video game. All of it is a temptation to keep us away from writing. Sometimes things have to be done instead of writing because those things are important, but often enough we're just looking for an excuse not to write. Maybe we're not in the mood. Maybe we don't feel good. Or maybe we're just being lazy. Write. And write everyday. Work out a writing schedule. And stick to it. That will beat the monster that is sloth.

Wrath
Can a writer commit to sin of wrath, as it pertains to writing? Sure! At least verbally. How often have you seen or heard of one writer going out of his or her way to bash another writer? It happens all the time on the Web, especially among those who are still trying to be professional writers. Yes, there are certain writers I like and certain writers I don't like, but I try not to publicly bash any writers (though what goes on in e-mails and IMs is not for the general public). Not only is it taking the high road not to bash other writers, it's also smart. If you insult some big-name writer, they might hear about it and remember your name. Then a few years later that writer happens to be the editor of an anthology you're trying to get into. What's going to happen? You can guess. And it's also not smart to insult writers who haven't made it big. You never know, they might be next year's bestseller.

Envy
A little bit of envy can be a good thing. It builds competition. But envy taken to extremes can become dangerous. For on thing, a writer doesn't want to be so envious of another writer he starts to emulate that writers style. It will sound fake on the page, believe me. You need your own style, and if you don't have it now, you'll eventually work into it naturally. For another thing, a writer shouldn't become so envious of another writer that she tries to shoot that writer down publicly in an attempt to bring down someone who "has gotten too full of themselves." That's not your job, as a writer or as a human being. Anyone who thinks too much of themselves will eventually be brought down to Earth or they'll eventually die (hey, we all do whether you like it or not) and then won't be a problem any more. Badmouthing others just makes you look insecure, at best, and you don't need that type of reputation as a writer.

Pride
Pride is a sin a number of writer can be accused of, specifically a handful of writers who have made it into the big time as professionals. I won't name names, but the fans and readers know who they are. A bit of pride is a good thing. One should feel pride about their work. But pride taken to the point of arrogance is beyond silly, it's just stupid. No matter how well you write and how big your writing career becomes, you're still a human being just like everyone else. You still have to sleep, eat, go to the restroom, etc. Just because you've won an award or signed a book deal doesn't mean you're so hot you should look down upon others and treat them badly. Writing might be important, perhaps extremely important in your life, but it's not the only thing there is. And remember the old saying of "what goes around, comes around." Snub the guy working on your car, and he might tack on a few hidden fees to your bill. Be prissy with the girl in line in front of you at the store, and she might recognize you and go home and start a Web site about how awful a person you are. Honk your horn at the car in front of you, and it might turn out to be a friend or a family member.

Lust
To many, lust is the worst of sins, and that can apply to writers as well. How does lust apply to writers? Plagiarism. Stealing of another's work. When you like someone else's work so much you just have to have it and use it under your own name, that's partially lust (though sloth and greed and envy could apply as well). Plagiarism is one of the worst of writers' sins, even in this oh so modern age of the Internet. Writing is work. A writer owns his or her work (unless they've sold their copyright, that is). Using their work as yourself is stealing, plain and simple. Stealing out of want can be lust. Don't do it. If caught, you'll burn.

Gluttony
Gluttony is often thought of as eating or drinking to much, but that's only one form of gluttony. Some writers can be accused of eating or drinking too much, and sitting in front of a keyboard all day long doesn't exactly burn away the calories. This might seem a silly sin for writers, but it does apply. It suggests you need to take a break from your writing from time to time, though not necessarily a long break. A break of a few minutes every hour or so might be enough for you. Or perhaps you're one of those writers who produces in bulk, writing voraciously for several days, but then needs several days off. Either is fine, but give yourself some time away from writing. Yes, this will help to burn those calories, but it also can help to keep your mind clear. And as an extra note, there was a tradition among fiction writers (though it seems to be dying out today) of heavy drinking. You don't need alcohol to be a good writer, or even to be a writer. In fact, alcohol is much more likely to lead to bad writing. And in can kill you if not taken in moderation.