Mar 7, 2011

Is it unethical or just rude?

Expounding a bit on my prior post on ethics in blogging, after the umpteenth blogger friend told me they’d been given a shady offer on a “permanent” advertising link from the same person/company, I just couldn’t keep my mouth shut anymore.

I’ve dealt with a lot of advertisers in my time. Some who are great and respectful, some who haggle or stall at every renewal, and even some who just never respond to your renewal reminder as you let their link continue on until finally giving up and removing it. But never have I had someone offer a one time payment for a link on my site forever. The company owner of sextoy.com (a place I used to review for but he didn’t seem to know that when contacting me) is making the blogger rounds every month with a new batch of people that I can only assume he hopes will net him one who will be newbie enough to take him up on his insulting offer. He’s hit up newer bloggers, established bloggers and everybody in between. He emails you with a dollar amount for a link and he conveniently leaves out his time frame. All other decent advertisers ASK what your monthly rate is, do you offer longer contracts with discounts, etc. No, he pulls up a pathetically small number that basically says “I think your site is only worth $25/$50, period”. He’s never going to pay you again and he will expect you to keep up his link until the death of your site.

Seriously?

I hope against hope that he’s not had any luck and hasn’t screwed over a blogger who’s not dealt with advertising before. I did talk about these “permanent links” before over at the Blogger Education page on advertising, but I know that not everyone reads e[lust] and has seen it.

Let me bottom line it for you:

A permanent link is bad. Unless it’s in the many hundreds of dollars, it’s a fucking insult. The amount that he offered me for my sites was about equal to what I get for 3 months. First he contacted me at the e[lust] address and I couldn’t let it go with just a “no”, I told him off a bit and let him know that it’s insulting to all bloggers, no matter their stats or stature. I also let him know, since he didn’t bother to learn his audience before typing, that I owned this domain as well and already am involved in their affiliate program that he offered (without the offer to review toys, again, insulting as all it gets them is a link and you probably won’t see any sales). He asked for my rates though, and I can only assume that they were too high for this supposed multi-millionaire as he never responded. Until……he emailed me on THIS account a few weeks ago.All brand-new and fresh-like as if he hadn’t already tried to hit me up the month prior.

*headdesk*

He’s not even TRYING to not be an idiot.

Is this post harsh? I’m sure some of you think so. And I realize that by calling this person out this way I might get bitten in the ass somewhere down the road. But I’m pissed. I’m offended. And I’m protective of all my blogger peers. I know that many of you who’ve gotten the offer and have discussed it on Twitter just laugh it off because you know he’s an idiot and you know you’re better than that. Jesus, I hope you know. I’m pissed because he’s trying to take advantage of us and momma bear is growling now. I don’t care who offers it, permanent links are never good for you and only really awesome for them. A company owner who is trying to take advantage of bloggers in this way makes me never want to support sextoy.com again. So if Dave emails you, either tell him off or just delete it. I don’t care what your stats are: You are worth more than whatever he offers. Much more.

Bloggers, I don’t care what your site is about, if you ever have any questions on advertising and even specific advertisers please don’t hesitate to email me. I will gladly let you know if someone is worth dealing with or a deadbeat, and will help you figure out what to charge. If we don’t stick together…..we all lose out. That’s just my opinion, though.

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Jun 12, 2009

Posted by Lilly | 5 Comments

Change

Regular readers of this blog have likely noticed that there was a sudden rash of sex toy reviews recently posted. Yeah it’s my blog and I can do what I want, but I do want to mildly apologize because I don’t like it being that way, that high ratio of reviews to regular posts on my blog. MY blog, not other blogs. Just sayin’, I’m not saying I hate it when other blogs post that way.

I do have good reason though. Part is due to my writing funk in April, I couldn’t fucking review toys. I just couldn’t be arsed to do my usual reviewing. And since I fully believe that the whole damn point to me reviewing them is to cover all pertinent information so that a potential buyer has all the information they need, I didn’t want to do a short post or a half-assed review. Yawn, right?

The other part of the reason is that I’m changing who I review for. I know personally quite a number of other bloggers who review and they review for a number of companies – anywhere from 2 or 3 up to 6 or 7. But I’m getting picky. My god am I getting to be a picky little bitch. No jelly/rubber toys. Nothing from Doc Johnson, or Topco, or the awful California Exotics. And I won’t bother to review a toy that others have reviewed and have said it wasn’t powerful enough. If nothing else I have learned that if ANY other reviewer claims that the toy isn’t powerful enough to get them off, it surely will not get my clit-o-steel off.

The manifestation of my pickiness then is coming out in multiple ways.

VibeReview – while I still think they’re a great company, just doesn’t have a decent selection of things *I have not tried*. I don’t want to imply that they don’t stock much in general. But it’s time for me to move on from them for now, with fond memories of them being the first ones to let me review toys.

Babeland and Sextoy.com – I had a lot that I wanted to say, but the diplomatic polite side won out. I will leave it at this: I had minor “affiliate/reviewer” issues with both companies, multiple minor things over time and it all added up to “stop”. Also with Sextoy.com, they have not become the site I thought they had the potential to be, back when I first reviewed the site. Too many products, from too many suppliers, and not enough focus on quality over quantity.

There were other retailers that I had sporadically reviewed for or reviewed for once, that I’ll also not be continuing with simply for the fact that I wanted to pare down.

While I decided against publicly airing my issues, if anybody, reviewer or buyer, wants to know more about the whys – email me.
I plan though to stay on as affiliates of these companies, so I will still get credit if you buy things via my links.

The other side of this change now is that I’m only going to be reviewing for one retailer exclusively, and that is EdenFantasys (didja notice the cool banner that I MADE over there in the sidebar, eh eh?? I think it rocks, frankly, and that I was able to make it change photos. I liked doing it, it’s personalized to my site). I know that a couple of bloggers had major issue with them last year. While the company is still owned by the same person, there were TONS of staff changes and other changes, and I’d like to give them the benefit of the doubt, clean slate, etc etc and so on.

I’ll also be occasionally reviewing items directly for Liberator.com.

This change up means that I’ll be doing fewer reviews over all. For those that don’t care much about reviews, it’s good news! You can also expect that some reviews will be in a more fluid format, less “inside the box” kinda like this (awesome. hot. steamy.) review that Sinclair did recently.

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Jun 5, 2009

Posted by Lilly | 2 Comments

Review: Slut Paddle

There were two reasons I requested this paddle to review. The first being the novelty factor of having something “imprint” the word SLUT on my ass. The second being that it was an affordable leather paddle of smaller length (only 12″).

The Slut paddle is made by Sportsheets. It’s basically made from two shapes of leather – they are stitched together with a metal flat rod running through for the handle (making it nice and solid) and then left “open” for the paddle part employing a “double slapper” type of paddle. In between the two pieces is a piece of red paper – that’s the red you see in the photograph. It’s sewn in there but for what purpose, I’m not sure. Aesthetics?

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Mar 14, 2009

Posted by Lilly | Comments Off

Review: Frixion Lube

Today’s straightforward-no-bullshit review brought to you by the letter L. For lube.

Frixion 4 oz Lube

Really, there’s only so much you can say about lube! It either, well……it either lubes or it doesn’t! Once again though, Lilly Succumbs to Pretty Packaging. Remember the last two times?

I’ve got a thing for cobalt blue glass, and while i know that the bottle isn’t glass….well, close enough. It’s pretty translucent cobalt! All the text/etc on it is on two labels so if you’re resourceful you could remove them and have a pretty nondescript bottle on your bedside table. Of course….well honestly now, what else could it be? I sure as hell would assume lube, but that’s my perverted mind.

Now see, I realized recently that I’m not really the best gal to have reviewing lubes. I don’t really ever need it on the girly bits, and anal is not in the picture. I tried it on a dildo I used anally but then again it wasn’t really used in the manner in which a cock would be, and also the dildo was non-porous. A cock is decidedly porous.

I put it to the biggest test then with giving a hand job and tit fuck. We had to keep reapplying it, especially during the handjob. So much so that when we were done, we were sticky/tacky. Not sexy. I suppose that for things such as that, a silicone lube should be used – this is water based.

sextoys | lubes and lotions

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Jan 10, 2009

Posted by Lilly | 9 Comments

Sextoy.com Review: Nexus G-pod

So this is going to be the first time ever with this sort of review…..because not too long after I was sent the Nexus G-pod, Nexus discontinued it. We’ve had no word if the company plans to replace it with something “new and improved”. Sadly, this means that there are even fewer attachments for the Hitachi out there that are silicone. But, being the good lil reviewer I am, I’m trying to find out what your other options are. We’ll get to those in a minute though. First…….

The fairytale of……. The Geeky Princess and her Magic Wand.

ahem

There once was a Princess, geeky and fair.

Suitors across the land gave her their wares

Her opinions they sought

Be it positive or not:

“Princess, was it orgasm or despair?”

{Nexus G-Pod vs Miracle Massager Attachment}

The Princess compared betwixt her two toys

She tried out the new one as instruction implied

But she cried out “Ouch! I do not enjoy!”

And so she thought for something different to try

The local wizard applied ribbons and magic

The Princess, determined, tried all sorts of things

But her final spell ended up quite tragic

She thought she could make her friendly pussy purr

By a tap or a flourish of her trusty Magic Wand

But her efforts backfired, a horror did occur!

Her pussy turned to lion and ran away with a roar.

Tada! (I apologize for the poor rhyming)

Anyways. The nubs, in theory, are good but the whole thing was just too firm. Once it vibrated at Hitachi Warp Speed, holy ow. And y’all know I kinda have a clit o’ steel. Vibrating nubs become kinda itchy. Not fun.

We’ve got some options. There’s a few here that are affordable but not silicone, not do they stimulate more than one area at once. Here is one that is the same design, but “soft jelly” – likely not Phthalates-free, and not for sharing but “soft jelly” might mean that the nubs are no longer owie and itchy. Here is a nice non-nubby alternative dual-stimulator. It’s not specifically for THE Hitachi, but should fit nonetheless.

Since this thing IS silicone and boilable, therefore can be shared, perhaps I’ll try it out on someone else someday and see if they like it – I’ve read other positive reviews, others have liked it.

Vibrators | Sex Toys

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