The selling point was that the users could pay to read my blog via this feed. My initial thought was that folks can type in my URL and read my blog for free, so I’m not sure who their market is - people who like to pay for free stuff?

So that’s all I’ve got for ya, neil. That, and I’m not a fan of anybody who forces me to ask for an invitation, as Blogburst does. I have enough of an inferiority complex as it is.

“BlogBurst is taking advantage of bloggers who’re so eager to get their names out there — and, often, unnecessarily uncertain of the worth of their writing — that they’ll hand over a lifetime license to their work for nothing.

This pisses me off. If your writing is good enough for a major daily or chain to want to put it on their website, it’s good enough that they’ll pay you for it rather than BlogBurst. (I speak from experience here, having parlayed a cold call to my local paper’s Home and Garden section editor into a brief and ridiculously underpaid, and yet still paid, nationally syndicated garden column a few years back.)

No writer should ever sign a contract like the one BlogBurst offers unless they’re being paid. I don’t care how uncertain you are of your writing, how nervous you are about asking for money. Don’t do it.”