Blogging Is Dangerous So Be Careful Going Pro

I don’t think that fascination with making money blogging is such a popular trend that it used to be a few years ago when we only started Profy here – at the time everyone seemed to be determined it was dead-simple to start a blog and begin making money off the blog by sharing some thoughts accompanied by Adsense blocks. Launching two or three blogs simultaneously definitely sounded like a surefire way to maximize revenue so we saw tons of blogs no one ever read advertised heavily by their authors everywhere in hopes they could get yet another reader.

By now it looks like many of those people that were not determined enough to learn how to turn blogging into some sort of an additional income have turned to Twitter or simple blogging services like Tumblr to share their thoughts and simply forgot their plans of actually making money in the process – which is probably not bad because blogging for money is very challenging and success is rare in the field while there’s still plenty of fields where new creative people arrive to hoping to express themselves.

This disappointment has a bad impact on some of the bloggers as they decided that no entrepreneurship (let along its online forms) would fit them and moved on to secure in-house positions in normal companies (which is not bad – it just depends on your own point of view). But the disappointment is certainly not the worst thing that can happen to a blogger – I can certainly claim this after 3 years in professional blogging: blogging is dangerous.

Of course I am not talking here about some extreme situations on the verge of absurdity like people spitting into bloggers’ faces because of some things they write or not write. Getting to a point like this certainly takes more than just blogging – it takes being a celebrity blogger which is a totally different thing. But even regular mid-tier blogging can be dangerous.

I only realized this recently when I moderated comments here on Profy and accidentally clicked a link from one of the spam comments. You probably know how it happens: I was taken to some very suspicious website that immediately tried to download and install something on my computer. At that I happen to know how such things happen and how viruses arrive to our computers but it did not feel any better anyway – especially since I’ve had a few very bad encounters with malware in the past and I would never want such situations to happen again.

So even despite of the fact that I knew I did not really download or install anything dangerous, I still could not resist the temptation of launching a full scan of my computer that night – just in case. And while I’ve had an advantage of actually knowing such websites exist and how they behave and what their actions normally are, I think non-tech bloggers overall are in a more disadvantageous situation because we are exposed to way more spam links in our spam comments than a normal web surfer is, especially if such a web surfer does not normally visit porn or cracks sites. And if you also happen to advertise your email openly on your blog, chances are you will be exposed to more spam in your inbox additionally.

Another problem that many professional bloggers face is our inadaptability to normal life. For example, we can easily forget how to use any home appliances that are not a computer (or a cell phone or a PDA if you happen to blog a lot on the go) so cooking something or doing some basic cleanup at home may turn into a real challenge, especially if our fridges or vacuums lack those user-friendly icons that will display directions to use on mouse-over. And unfortunately the vast majority of home appliances are not even controlled by a mouse – so no mouse-over will help select a cooking mode for a chicken.

And I would not even mention numerous health problems that the sedentary lifestyle causes. And sedentary lifestyle is inevitable if you choose blogging as your profession, not to mention that you will also spend more time behind your computer than an average office worker because you will be both working and entertaining yourself from that very place as it often happens to bloggers because we are exposed to too many timewasters.

Unfortunately blogging does not encourage any physical activities so if you choose running an online business (blogging being one of the options), especially if you do so from home, I’d strongly recommend you getting a dog that you will have to walk at least for an hour (better two) daily – this will both add some discipline to your life and will make you move more than you absolutely have to (i.e. between the kitchen and your desk).

I hope it’s clear now that blogging truly is dangerous as it involves tons of health problems, some everyday difficulties and also exposes you to more malware online than a normal internet user is exposed to. Now I hope everyone who still considers a career of a professional blogger will at least think twice before actually venturing into the online world. And if your decision is solid, don’t forget about some good internet security software and a dog – it will at least neutralize some of the worst consequences of blogging.