The First Thing You Should Know:

The submissions for the IttyBiz Gift Guide end today. Click for details if you’re interested. It would appear that my writing ability is getting better because only two of the submissions were wildly and ridiculously inappropriate. Based on the frankly shocking level of inappropriateness, I choose to assume these people had Google Alerts for “gift guide” and were submitting with their eyes closed and their finger poised over their mouse clicker.

The Thing That’s Kinda Neat:

Thank you for all of your emails asking if I’m spending my days having dirty sex in a pile of American money. No. But not for lack of trying. I’ve been very busy responding to hate mail. (See below.) Since I have to make sure I’m drunk and angry before responding, it’s taking me some time. You can only get redrunk so quickly, you know?

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 15, 2008 in Home Business Blogging
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When my husband was young — like young enough for his parents to still buy his clothes for him — he didn’t have a lot of interest in fashion. Most 12-year-old boys don’t.

His mother, because she was a nice mother who thought children should have input in these things, used to ask him what he wanted. My husband, like most boys his age, didn’t know. She asked what he liked. He didn’t know. She asked what other boys his age wore. He didn’t know.

She, quite sensibly, suggested that since he saw these boys at school FIVE DAYS OUT OF SEVEN, that maybe he should have at least a clue what other kids are wearing. My husband, never the most observant when it comes to things like this, confessed that he did not.

One day, though, he knew. There was a new fashion, and he wanted in on it. He wanted a buzz cut.

By Naomi Dunford - Jul 31, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 19 Comments
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Yesterday, I got a Google alert for my name. It came from a website I have heard of, but not really visited. The website has a subscriber base of about one quarter of what IttyBiz has, give or take, and doesn’t have a bad design. Definitely in my niche.

I dutifully followed the link and saw an article with my name on the byline and my photograph in the top left corner. Here’s what it said, with identifying details removed:

“This week’s [name of series] is a special contribution that [website] Founder [name of dude I’ve never heard of, hereinafter shortened to DINHO] lined up from Naomi Dunford. Naomi Dunford writes for IttyBiz, a blog for entrepreneurs, freelancers, and other work-from-home types. Come by for marketing tips, small business advice, and the occasional very bad joke. Naomi shares with use [use?] her top ways to get a new business off the ground.”

Um, WTF?

By Naomi Dunford - Jun 24, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 39 Comments
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In Which Jamie Welcomes the Lurkers, and Lays the Smacketh Downeth in a Nice Way

OK, first things first. Naomi had a post a few days ago, and we saw the lurkers (and I use this term nicely, it is not meant to be derogatory) come out of the woodwork. Sometimes we get so used to seeing the same names on the comments on different posts that we forget that there are other people reading these posts whom we have never met. While it is always awesome to see our regular commentators show up and put in their two cents, it was especially awesome to see so many new names in the comment section.

By Jamie Dunford - May 11, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 37 Comments
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First off, thank you everyone for stopping by with your thoughts on yesterday’s No Asshole Rule post. Big supersized lilac colored thank yous to the lurkers — commenting here is not for the faint of heart, and I’m grateful. Hi, everyone. It’s nice to meet you.

Jamie is off thinking of a comment policy that is suitably funny and appropriately vulgar for this little home business blog — we might end up using something from How To Avoid Running Your Mouth Off Online — and I am thinking. I don’t have a lot of time to think lately, so sorry about that. It tends to get ugly because I’m so out of practice.

I read a comment by Milena Thomas of Quiet The Thunder, and she points to a link on her blog about comment rage. I was not a reader of hers before but I sure as hell am now. I’m not even going to bother to try and express what she expressed because I’d be useless at it, so just read it yourself when you have some time.

By Naomi Dunford - May 10, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 24 Comments
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Hey, y’all. IttyBiz need your help.

There is a commentator who comes to this blog a couple of times a week seemingly just to be an asshole. This individual stops by every now and again ostensibly joining the community but only has one topic to discuss: why I am dumb and they are not dumb. It seems like everything I do inspires this individual to tell me how retarded I am. If they cannot find anything to act superior about they generally remain silent.

I have seen this person on other blogs doing the same thing. I was on the phone with a particularly prominent blog consultant a while back and he told me that the pain in the ass factor of this individual made him not want to leave comments on my blog anymore. Nobody wants to come just to be argued with.

By Naomi Dunford - May 9, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 70 Comments
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There are no words to explain how Not Safe For Work (NSFW) the following video is. It is not safe for kids, it is not safe for church, it is just generally unsafe.

I present my esteemed professional colleagues having a friendly chat at our favorite blogging conference.

Must See SOBCon08 Video.

(The handsome man on the left is one of my clients, Clay Collins, who writes a pretty darn cool blog about meaningful productivity and anti-hacks. (I have to say it’s cool because I do his PR.) The beautiful young lady on the right is Sonia Simone of Remarkable Communications, the only blog in the world that will make you well and truly believe that marketing people aren’t all shysters. And the final gentleman in the picture is Michael Martine of Remarkablogger who needs no description.)

You: But Naomi, I thought you weren’t at SOBCon!

By Naomi Dunford - May 7, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 18 Comments
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IttyBiz has been awful busy lately, and I figured I’d give y’all an update on what’s going down at the home business HQ.

IttyBiz and Brazen Careerist Get Together To Make Sweet, Sweet Love

Brazen Careerist is:

“We’re an online career center aimed at Generation Y — young professionals who want to design and define their careers using the new rules for success.

“The Brazen Careerist network is made up of a vibrant, curious and ambitious group of career-minded bloggers, passionately covering a variety of fields: personal development, entrepreneurship, public relations, technology, marketing, and politics, each blog offers a unique, informed perspective to our ever-expanding audience.”

They’ve included me in that network of bloggers, which is damn nice of them, wouldn’t you say?

IttyBiz and Alltop Get Together To Make Equally Sweet, Sweet Love

Moving on to the lovely folks at Alltop:

By Naomi Dunford - Apr 24, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 57 Comments
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It has come to my attention that many home business bloggers are discussing their comment policies. Specifically, they want to know which comments they should delete. (Jonathan Fields at Awake at the Wheel discussed this recently, and very well.)

I’ve previously heard people say, both in business and in blogging, that they will accept criticism as long as it’s constructive. Personally, I don’t have a whole lot of time for constructive criticism because I don’t have a lot of time for criticism in general. But if you have to criticize, I guess it may as well be constructive.

What I notice, though, is that what gets packaged as constructive criticism tends to be a thinly veiled form of assbaggery. Someone says something is constructive and then they proceed to be a total prick for no good reason. (You get this when you go into freelancing a lot.) Kind of like prefacing something with “With all due respect.” Cause what they’re about to say is just SO respectful, I’m sure.

By Naomi Dunford - Apr 9, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 44 Comments
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I get a lot of shit for being so sarcastic on my little home business blog, and I happily take it. If I wasn’t sarcastic I wouldn’t have very much to say at all, so for me it works out to being either sarcastic or blogless. Blogless means businessless — I get about 95% of my business because of my blog — so I choose the former.

But what happens when people don’t get the joke?

I didn’t post an April Fools’ post on my blog — well, I posted on the first of April, but it wasn’t a joke — because I’m not into it. A lot of people are, though, and the blogosphere was abuzz.

Deb Ng Quits Freelance Writing Gigs

Darren Rowse Launches PayPerTweet

Tim Ferriss Quit Blogging A Year Ago (Thanks, Hunter, for this one.)

By Naomi Dunford - Apr 2, 2008 in Home Business Blogging - 34 Comments
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