Would you boycott over longer waits for payment?

Feisty56 wrote on October 11, 2014, 8:23 PM

There is an addendum of sorts to the 60-90 wait for payment for international users: If they are members in good standing -- no history of cheating, etc., those international members will be paid as promptly (well, as soon as) the members from the UK, Canada and the US.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 11, 2014, 8:46 PM

I do hope that holds true! I know of at least one proven international user who was already told she'd have to wait 60-90 days...

Feisty56 wrote on October 11, 2014, 8:51 PM

That doesn't bode well at all!

allen0187 wrote on October 11, 2014, 10:26 PM

I'd likely leave the site as well. 60 to 90 days is a long time to wait for my hard earned cash.

BarbRad wrote on October 11, 2014, 10:58 PM

I will stop writing if they stop paying me. I'm used to 60-day waits on some other sites, though I think 90 is a bit much. If i were two payments behind I would not write again until I had received at least one of them.

paigea wrote on October 11, 2014, 11:42 PM

I think they could have implemented a longer wait for all new comers no matter where they were from. And kept the 30 days for all established members. I would appear more fair.

bestwriter wrote on October 12, 2014, 12:30 AM

In the absence of a system to determine who is good and who is bad and yet promising that they will go by that norm is ridiculous. And this thing about spamming from countries whose native language is not English? What's that? We have a good grounding better than those whose native language is English. I have read posts of native English speakers who say 'use to' instead of 'used to' because they start learning the language 'phonetically' probably from those who have not had any formal education and not the way we learn the language.
This poll is just to disturb the hornet's nest and that is all I can say.

And now waiting for 90 days - not unless we are paid with interest. I do not depend on this money to buy fruits anyway. These native English speakers say' anyways' and that is wrong English. :grin:

paperdaisyflower7 wrote on October 12, 2014, 2:49 AM

Last year I was caught in the upgrading process and was not paid so I took a hiatus but checked in once and a while when i got back i got paid so will wait and as long as i get paid I'm ok so I just have to wait and see. My acccount was never deleted so I hope the 2 years standing in Bubblews will merit me some consideration

golgizumi wrote on October 12, 2014, 4:26 AM

It's just not about the delay.. What if after 90 days bubblews comes up with another excuse to further delay the payments? or worse they might ban the international users altogether just like iwriter.

On the other hand things don't add up. Any user with even the slightest knowledge of web knows that it's a cake walk to detect plagiarism on the internet. Tools like copy scape and siteliner do it in seconds.

I'm afraid bubblews is broke.

CoralLevang wrote on October 12, 2014, 5:34 AM

I would argue that they have not "kept (to) the 30 days for all established members," as I am on day 51 for one now.

CoralLevang wrote on October 12, 2014, 5:40 AM

There are two thoughts I have: 1.) To make those from Australia and New Zealand wait the 90 days is preposterous. If they are going to allow the UK and Canadian writers, to exclude those two countries is crazy. This is not from where the plagiarizers come, I am sure. They need to take a look at the patterns; they are not hard to detect. 2.) They clearly have a cash flow problem. When they say 30 days, but it's taking double that, and they do not respond to the email with the "priority" they say they give their customers. Blah blah.

I wish I knew how/where to go for more consistency. This is getting ridiculous.

Kasman wrote on October 12, 2014, 10:30 AM

A boycott simply wouldn't work (like Bubble Ooze cares what its member think!). Anyone who leaves will quickly be replaced by someone else and the site will roll on as normal.

LoudMan wrote on October 12, 2014, 12:47 PM

Bah! This is all just more flak, intended to distract folks from what's really going on and a manufactured crisis/excuse to shield from future criticisms, too. Others may do as they wish, of course and, perhaps someone is actually doing good with it. Well, bully for them! That's great! I'm eventually working what's left of my stuff from there. They mangled some Wikinut-quality work there and I refuse to forgive either Arvind or Jason for those pictures of my kids.

LoudMan wrote on October 12, 2014, 12:50 PM

Let's all bail, gorgeous. I'm expecting folks to begin lodging complaints with AdSense, themselves, anytime now, if not already. Get your better work off the ooze now. :)

LoudMan wrote on October 12, 2014, 12:56 PM

Nothing is going to hold true on the ooze. From the first time they chose to gloss problems over, they began their own descent. It's a matter of a couple figurative "death throes" and a bit of time, now.

alexdg1 wrote on October 12, 2014, 4:34 PM

I agree. Excluding Australia and New Zealand (plus South Africa and a whole slew of ex-British colonies) from "most favored nation" status is nuts.

alexdg1 wrote on October 12, 2014, 4:38 PM

Re the plagiarism: Yes, they can (and should) use Copy Scape and Siteliner.

And they can (and should) act faster when members report spun or copied content.

AliCanary wrote on October 13, 2014, 2:32 AM

Every single time, without fail, that Bubblews has a problem, their idea of a "solution" is the stupidest possible one.

Witness: When they changed the front page to a "news feed", a glitch caused any articles that were edited to show up on the front page as new. This resulted in hundreds of assholes gaming the system by repeatedly editing their posts to keep them in view on the front page. Instead of fixing the glitch itself, which did not exist in the previous version of the site, Bubblews discontinued the ability to edit posts more than 24 hours old. This didn't even solve the problem of the abuse, as you can still edit repeatedly for an entire day, but it did ensure that we couldn't update our older articles to improve SEO, add backlinks, or fix the articles that were ruined when they changed the site and any article with multiple pictures was drastically truncated.

In an effort to reduce "spam comments", they instituted a Captcha on the comment box, which will clearly reduce the number of legitimate comments, as well, thus docking the income of completely honest users.

Now, while ignoring their own writers who are actively policing the site and reporting plagiarists for FREE, they figure the best way to stop scammers is to just cut most of Europe and all of Asia loose, even though people from the Phillipines basically built Bubblews. It's so disgusting.

I didn't answer the poll because the option of "I'm already boycotting because they haven't paid me" wasn't on there, but I figured I'd get my two cents in...

AliCanary wrote on October 13, 2014, 2:34 AM

"UK" may include those two countries, or not; they haven't really defined it.

AbbyBiha wrote on October 13, 2014, 9:15 PM

I am not sure what I would do but I will slow down posting.

alexdg1 wrote on October 14, 2014, 5:36 PM

Unless Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa suddenly decided to become British colonies while I was asleep, they are no longer part of the United Kingdom.

AliCanary wrote on October 14, 2014, 11:49 PM

They've got the union jack on their flags and Queen Elizabeth on their money, so they might feel a tad affiliated, but as I said, Bubbs didn't clarify. And I never mentioned South Africa.

alexdg1 wrote on October 15, 2014, 8:16 AM

i wonder if Arvind and Jason named the site "Bubblews" with the knowledge that bubbles eventually pop.

alexdg1 wrote on October 15, 2014, 8:34 AM

Australia (AU), Canada (CA), Great Britain aka United Kingdom (GB), Ireland (IE), and New Zealand (NZ) are among the most favored nations in the redemption list. Good old USA is, too. At least AU and NZ didn't get placed on the 60-day list.

I think, though, that Arvind and Jason should have come up with a realistic pay scheme from Day 1 and at least tried to anticipate the problems with spammers, spinners, other issues that have plagued the site.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 15, 2014, 3:14 PM

I think you may very well be right, Donald. It's sad, because it was a good source of income for me. But I do hope that means Persona Paper will finally see the activity level and membership rise to what it ought to be. This is a tremendous site, but we've all had to go where the money was.....

elitecodex and MaeLou There are a lot of great writers who have just signed up using my referral link. Several of these folks are writers I have known for years through other sites, and one in particular is a serious go getter who will produce content, promote the site, etc. I know you guys are really busy, but I'm hoping you can glance at bios quickly to see these are good writers, and let them loose on the site. You'll be happy to have them join our community :)

Ruby3881 wrote on October 15, 2014, 3:15 PM

I think a lot will leave, not over the longer wait but over the sneaky rate reduction they just pulled....

Ruby3881 wrote on October 15, 2014, 8:40 PM

I have to get on them about two slightly overdue payments. If they are too much longer paying out, I may pull back a bit. But I'm keeping up for now.

MaeLou wrote on October 16, 2014, 11:27 AM

We're keeping an eye on new registrations. We are getting a LOT of them lately, and we're trying to get through some of the older ones first. Now that we wont have them on the front page, we can approve or deny them more quickly.

MaeLou wrote on October 16, 2014, 11:38 AM

I think the wait is a little extensive even for US countries. They could have very easily fixed a lot of their issues if they kicked things before they started. When a bunch of India members were joining, most of them were plagiarizing or spinning articles. When reported, they let it, left it ignored. This only told other people that they could join, and get paid for writing content that wasn't theirs. Now, everyone suffers, no matter what country. US, Canada, etc will now wait 60 days before they receive a payment (30 to be able to redeem and 30 wait time) and other countries will now wait 90 to 120 days. It's an extensive wait, no matter the situation.

That said, I'm not boycotting just yet. I will receive a random payment here or there but am hoping that I will still get paid. Any little bit helps. I have just learned that I don't post informative stuff there anymore because of the lack of them actually paying.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 6:16 PM

I can see that you were really speedy with the folks who signed up this week. Awesome job! Thanks for all the work you put in over here :)

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 7:21 PM

Putting it on pretty thick today, aren't you Grace? We all know you have a grudge to bear against Bubblews because they deleted your account, but there's no need to bring that here. This poll is an honest question to my fellow users. I believe I've said it before, but I'll say it again because it seems to be needed: if you don't want to discuss Bubblews in a civil fashion, don't read content about the site.

Please stop putting other writers down and casting aspersions on their parents' education. That does nothing but make you look like a snob.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 7:23 PM

I believe they have a longer wait for everyone in mind. The 60-day wait will be instituted in a matter of weeks. My thought is somebody told them the 60-90 days for "international" users looked discriminatory.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 7:24 PM

I think my husband might be mildly amused at the "pet" name! I'm still earning at Bubblews and so far they're still paying me. I'll leave when there's no more to be gained from using the site.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 7:34 PM

I'm glad to hear you got paid what was owing! I know a lot of people are still trying to sort out monies owed, but I do think the site is trying to be honest about that now and pay what they hadn't in the past.

bestwriter wrote on October 16, 2014, 7:45 PM

"No, I would not join the boycott. I think the longer wait is justified because most of the cheating is from users in countries that speak a language other than English."
This prompted my response.It is not right to assume that cheating, spamming or whatever comes from countries that do not speak English . It is time this thinking changes.

bestwriter wrote on October 16, 2014, 8:07 PM

And whatever you have said about me, I suppose that comes from the fact that you are 'different'. Right? You know what? I still like you. :)

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 8:16 PM

Even Google is useful in detecting plagiarism. It's not hard to figure out of someone is copying.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 16, 2014, 8:18 PM

I agree about taking prompt action: they are taking a month or more to delete now, whereas it used to be about 3 days.

k_mccormick2 wrote on October 19, 2014, 3:00 PM

I think that it is a different way of dealing with people who come from other countries. I would have just installed a program to catch the plagiarized content and made them pass a simple test (like we did on here by writing an introduction.) I think that this is a small solution to a big problem and that they may need to find other ways of dealing with issues that are coming up.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:17 PM

I am assuming nothing at all. Almost 100% of the plagiarism, spam, and traffic manipulation I have found on Bubblews has been from users in countries where English is not the language. That is not to say that this is the case on other sites, nor does it imply that only speakers of other languages cheat.

You should also realize that it's one of several possible answers for a poll, just like any other poll I publish. Many of the options are just guesses at what some people might say if the question were open-ended. And like it or not, there are a good many people who tie the cheating to Bubblews' reputation in developing countries and to the fact that the site doesn't test for English proficiency in any way.

I had a poll where one of the answers was, "I do not think anyone should use condoms. Only married people should have sex, and they should always be willing to accept whatever children come to them. Sex is about procreation." Another poll offered the option, "Yes, any closely held company should be able to claim status as a religious person."

Both of those options are just that: choices for people to select. They are about as far from my own personal beliefs as possible! They were simply offered as a possibility that might represent others' feelings or beliefs - or at least come close to what they think.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:20 PM

I celebrate diversity, Grace. I belief what makes us different is also what makes the human race strong and what makes life worth living.

What I cannot abide are sour grapes and passive aggression. Slamming another group of people because you feel personally slighted is very distasteful to me, and I find that on the subject of Bubblews you tend to do an awful lot of that. It's not that I don't like you. It's that I find your behaviour inappropriate.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:22 PM

I don't think they've added South Africa - which has a good track record on Bubblews and other sites - but they do seem to be counting Australia and New Zealand as exempt from the longer waits this month. Check the form on the bank page.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:23 PM

They've written it up as "GB" plus "IE" now - so all of Great Britain, plus Ireland. They're also including Australia and New Zealand now.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:27 PM

I feel your pain, Coral! They know where the problem comes from and probably also what to do about it....

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:28 PM

I agree Bill, and I think this is why they've gone to such lengths lately to stress that Bubblews is a "social networking" site.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:44 PM

Yeah, they decapitated my daughter and father in one photo. If I were to post that same photo now, it would display preoperly. But whatever they did during content migration, they messed up the photos really badly.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:48 PM

And now they's saying it's NOT a writing site....

Yes, much agreed about the extremism and stupidity of many of their "solutions." When some folks believed that seeing a "flag" page indexed by Google meant that their content had been flagged, instead of just telling those folks they weren't flagged and fixing the glitch, they did away with flagging altogether. So plagiarism got out of control on the site, and guess what? Flagging is back!

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:49 PM

I'm still not sure what to do, Abby. My earnings went down, then back up, and now they're down again. The statistics I can see show me that it's not a problem with the traffic. It's the lower rate of pay....

Ruby3881 wrote on October 20, 2014, 2:58 PM

You'd better get ready for an even longer wait, because after the 28th of October, the wait goes up to 60 days for everyone! (I wrote about it at http://goo.gl/NmHctb)

It's obvious that cash flow is a huge part of the problem. I suspect they intentionally left both spam comments and plagiarized posts on the site because if AdSense was going to pay for the impressions, they weren't going to tell!

I'm taking much the same attitude as you, but with the lower pay rates and the snotty comments staff has made lately, I am definitely looking for other places to write. It may take 90-120 days now to get paid even in exempted countries, between lower earnings and the "once in 30 days" cap on redemptions...

LoudMan wrote on October 20, 2014, 4:05 PM

BTW, I don't mean your post is flak. The actions of Arvind and Jason are the flak. They just don't have the courage to just tell anyone the truth - they're broke. I tried helping the site. I did things for them which I don't even claim credit for today. All they do in return is spit in our faces again and again and again, while trying to "remind" us all how much we love them.

CoralLevang wrote on October 20, 2014, 4:53 PM

If you look at the quoted passage, Ruby3881 does not make an assumption. Assumptions are based on no proof/evidence whatsoever, but rather , on a belief system which takes something for granted, i.e. "People who are not first language English speakers are cheaters and spammers." Of course, this would be ridiculous, untrue, and no different than saying, "People in Canada who say, 'Eh?' and spell English differently than we do here in America are cheating the system." However, bestwriter , the sampled, observed patterns of behavior and evidence would suggest that there is a preponderance of the cheating, spamming and plagiarism being committed by those who have joined Bubblews seemingly to take advantage of the once-generous payment system, many of them from "third world" countries, where one USD can feed one person an entire meal.

A friend of mine from India (that is also your country, right?) shared with me this summer that he could buy any one of these items in a market focused on the middle-class consumer in India for one USD: Approx. 3.3 lbs./1.5Kg of mango; two cups of coffee; a vegetarian Indian food breakfast in a mid-level restaurant or a lunch of rice and chana dal. All of these foods are healthy foods, yet we pay more than a dollar for a cheap, unhealthy McDonald's burger. If you want a tastier burger, even at a place like McDonald's, but high in fat, sodium, and other preservatives, you will pay six or seven dollars.

In Jakarta, one USD buys a restaurant meal of chicken, rice, vegetables and a drink. That would cost me $15 here in most mid-range places in my country. I am sure that we could find the same things to be true for the Philippines, and other countries. As well, we would find the opposite to be true.

I have traveled to many places where English is not the native language, as well as all over the United States, and I would never assume poor behavior from anyone unless they give me reason to question them.

But back to assumptions vs. INFERENCE...when one has evidence and can reason using said evidence to draw a conclusion, it is implied and then we call that an inference. Her inference, which is valid can be either an incorrect or correct conclusion, logically speaking.

The only assumption that was made (logically-speaking) was that Ruby3881 's way of thinking was needing to be changed because of what you inferred about her being unfair to those who are "different" than she is.

We can all use some changes in the way we think about the world around us.

AliCanary wrote on October 20, 2014, 7:50 PM

Ha ha, I forgot about THAT giant boner. Clicking on those messed-up Google links actually DID flag articles, though, and there were links that caused DIslikes (I managed to Dislike one of my own articles by clicking on a Google link), too, so they just started ignoring the flags, which:useless. I swear, are they allergic to fixing the actual problem?

bestwriter wrote on October 20, 2014, 10:01 PM

This poll is based on what Bubblews assumes as Ruby3881 could not have possibly identified all violations from the 9000000 odd posts. At long last they have got down to actual working as they have now realised crime is universal. They have yet to detect posts that are less than 400 characters though as the one I reported is still doing the rounds.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 22, 2014, 6:05 PM

Thank you for a well reasoned response, Coral. I can see we're on the same wavelength :)

Ruby3881 wrote on October 22, 2014, 6:15 PM

Agreed! Vetting both users and content at the outset seems much less hassle than anything. But Bubblews is known for choosing the most cumbersome way to address a problem!

CoralLevang wrote on October 27, 2014, 12:28 PM

Ruby3881 And you will see that the response left after mine addressed nothing of which I spoke.

CoralLevang wrote on October 27, 2014, 12:28 PM

We can say "boner" around here?

CoralLevang wrote on October 27, 2014, 12:39 PM

And, might I add that they do not grandfather anything. What they promise starts over from square one. I'm guessing my payments won't be seen until after the first of the year, if ever. Because I have not kept copies of my writings, trying to get all (nearly) 800 will be impossible. I plan on building my current bank to 50$ and then not writing there after that redemption. I will pull off what I can, copy and paste, delete what I can find, from the "most popular" page, and then start from there. Hope to salvage something.

In addition to PP, I do hope to find a way to get some money for writing. Just need to figure out how and where.

Oh, and I'll write on Bubblews after I'm paid. But they won't like what I am writing. If banned, I will have no problem turning to other venues to talk about things...like many blogs I read and leave messages. Or I'll start several of my own blogs and write the F*** what I want about my experiences. I'll even allow for guest writers to share their experiences. I just don't want them to fold until I and my friends get the money owed to them.

AliCanary wrote on October 27, 2014, 3:22 PM

I contemplated using another term, but I couldn't even think of one that wasn't equally salty-sounding.

CoralLevang wrote on October 28, 2014, 4:14 AM

Ali...*laughs* I like salty. After all, I was in the Navy, you know. And you know what they say: You can take the woman out of the sailor, but you can't take the sailor out of the woman! *wink*

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 10:25 AM

Yes, I did notice that.

The way I look at it, if a person avoids responding like that then your points were well taken.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 10:28 AM

Not that it matters terribly much. We're all on 60 days now. And it seems that even those of us who were told 30-35 days are still being put off for payments. I have a missing payment from September that's due to turn 60 days at the end of this week. And apparently as early as a week ago, a user in the US who requested her redemption saw a notice that said she'd wait 60 days.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 10:32 AM

Thanks for the clarification, Donald. Yes, I hear what you're saying about the way Arvind and Jason deal with internal relations. It makes Arvind particularly look like her lacks ethics - among other things. And Jason seems rather ornamental and useless.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 10:50 AM

Yes, clicking those links did flag your content (or dislike it or like it) and I honestly have no clue how any programmer could not have known such a page needed a "noindex" attribute to prevent such a situation. But the mere existence of those links on Google search results didn't mean that a page had already been flagged. And there was a panic started on Bubblews over that, because of a bunch of people who proclaimed a long history of "writing experience" but who knew nothing about HTML.

This gaggle of silly geese was telling anyone who listened to Google their username and the word "flag." Which, of course, brought up those specific pages that shouldn't have been indexed, and that Bubblews had already warned us about. And had probably already asked Google to de-index. These idiots would look for the "flag" pages each time they published a new post. And when they found it, they'd take its mere existence as proof that there was some malicious flagger out there reporting every single post they wrote, within seconds of it publishing.

Forgetting for a minute that nobody have two hoots about their content, and had nothing to gain from flagging them repeatedly for content that was not in violation at all, when they reported these "malicious incidents" Bubblews failed to explain that they were misunderstanding. And when I tried to explain, they were so worked into a tizzy they refused to listen to reason. They were on a campaign about a flagging conspiracy, and how Bubblews was doing nothing to fix it. They were sure their accounts would be deleted for all the flags, and they were posting all kinds of crazy posts about how it could happen to others too!

Instead of setting these panic mongers straight and deleting their posts, what did Bubblews do? They simply removed the flagging option to shut them up. They were tired of reading emails from crazed idiots, but too ineffective to realize a single well-worded announcement would fix it all.

That's when plagiarism started to flourish on Bubblews. And now it's being used as an excuse to take 60 days to pay us.

It almost seems Machiavellian.

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 10:51 AM

Now who's being salty, Coral? :P

Ruby3881 wrote on October 29, 2014, 11:06 AM

I might be tempted to do something similar. But I'd really like to see them turn things around. For selfish reasons, of course. If I could replace the income, I'd be all for toppling an evil empire....