20 February 2012

TYWKIWDBI declines a "Fascination Award"

Most bloggers appreciate recognition and awards.  We were nominated for one four years ago and still display the badge in our sidebar.  But when an email arrived this morning announcing that I had won money, I was suspicious.

The email began by informing me that "An article you wrote in 2009 titled Man Cut in Half by Vehicle Accident, Talks to Bystanders has earned your blog a nomination for a Fascination Award: 2012's Most Fascinating Librarian blog."

I've been quite aware of that post; it is one of the most visited (36,000 hits) and linked-to posts in the blog, but it's nothing I'm proud of, and the idea that 3 years later it would earn me recognition was nonsensical.   And as much as it would be nice to receive $25 and be in a category of "Most Fascinating Librarian [?] blog," something seemed amiss, especially when I noticed that the email was sent from an online "accelerated degree program."

A web search quickly led me to a post at Quantum Progress, and from there to a post at dy/dan, which nicely summarized how some online education programs take advantage of federal educational aid programs and naive students.

The badge being offered [non-linking screencap shown] would take "voters" to the promotional pages for the online degree program.  If your blog is similarly "honored," please read the above links before deciding whether to accept.

10 comments:

  1. veganboyjoshFebruary 20, 2012 at 10:48 AM

    Obviously these schemes are making money for SOMEONE, or they would cease to exist. And the more convoluted the scheme, the smaller the margin, obviously.
    I know eyeballs are extremely cheap, when you can send a million emails for the same cost a sending one email. But add in the layers of work involved in getting bloggers to post that badge and links on their blogs, it's so incredible to me that that would generate enough income as to make it worth continuing.

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    1. Lea ChristineFebruary 20, 2012 at 5:16 PM

      Ha! Thank you for this post. I received the same email nominating me for the same award and I was definitely leery of it... I Googled around and think it must be a scheme, the website is way too sketchy. Do they not realize that librarians specialize in information literacy and know the difference between legit and non-legit websites?? Anyways, whatever they're up to I'd rather be safe than sorry.

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  2. LibrarianFebruary 21, 2012 at 1:08 AM

    The same email reached me yesterday, and I believed in a hoax at first, too, but the website about rules & prizes did not look illegit to me, and I was never offered any money - on the contrary, since I am not resident in the US, I am not eligible for a prize anyway.
    Thank you for pointing out what this is all about - I am unsure what to do now after I have read your post and the posts you have linked to.

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    1. Z. ConstantineFebruary 21, 2012 at 1:17 AM

      Links can send your site's visitors to the target site and, more importantly, can affect your webpage's ranking at Google (e.g. linking out to other webpages gives the page you linked to a little boost in rankings, at the cost of rankings for your own page).

      You (hopefully) wouldn't give a stranger a portion of your site's traffic unless you agreed with the stranger's goals - don't give away links where they are not merited.

      Delete
  3. JanaFebruary 21, 2012 at 3:57 PM

    Thanks for this! Same for me as above. I felt it was pretty weird because the post I was nominated for was not a highly trafficked one! I decided to research what it was all about.
    Thanks for the help!

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  4. bonniejoFebruary 23, 2012 at 8:19 PM

    Thanks for writing this up. One of my blog entries was nominated, and the whole blog is nothing more than a listing of events. They wrote back again asking me to accept or decline my nomination, but I guess I won't respond at all. BJC

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    1. MinnesotastanFebruary 24, 2012 at 8:27 AM

      I Googled "fascination award" this morning and was surprised at how many blogs simply accept the "award" without doing any research. It seems to be a very clever marketing tool.

      btw... props on your choice of Carson McCullers as a favorite author. :.)

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    2. AnonymousFebruary 24, 2012 at 8:44 AM

      Good morning, and I would second bonniejo's comment. I put the badge on my blog but deleted it this morning.

      What I find most ironic is that the online degree people are using the badge as an SEO tool, but the words fascination award actually bite them back in Google because your blog entry is the top hit on a Google search of those words. Karma.

      And "btw" is "props" a typo?

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    3. MinnesotastanFebruary 24, 2012 at 9:28 AM

      Anon, "props" was not a typo. I guess you'd call it a "colloquialism" ? It means kudos, congratulations, agreement, as explained here -

      http://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/2009/07/props-to-otis-redding.html

      Delete
  5. Angel Dog DesignsJune 11, 2012 at 5:45 PM

    Thanks for this post. I got a nomination today in the "art teacher" category so I did some google-ing to see if it was a scam and found your write up. Very appreciative and will file the email under spam!

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