No, no – I’m not throwing gang signs again. I just realized I needed to share the bling. See the little text ads at the end of my sidebar? I get paid a pretty penny for having those ads there, and have been paid for it all year. I have them on all of my sites actually. All I have to do is change them once a month. Like magic, money appears in my PayPal account. Easy as can be.

The good news is that the company that places these ads is accepting new sites! You too could be making easy money. All you need to do is let me know you are interested by leaving a comment here. Be sure to leave a *working* e-mail address (leave out that “nospam” stuff, ok?) and your URL. Their requirements vary, so it’s worth a shot even if you wonder if your site is too small. Come on … you know you want some money!

One disclaimer: I do get a referral fee of $5 for each site they pick. Christmas is coming fast, and I could use the money. Plus it doesn’t cost you a thing, and you help me out. How cool is that?

I’ve never been a big fan of the “tip jar” that you see on some blogs. I understand why people put them there, but I don’t know if I would ever give someone money through one. Sure, if they were raising money for a specific campaign (walking for breast cancer, biking for MS like I will be doing in April) I am more likely to send a donation to the cause. Or I might send someone a gift from their Amazon Wishlist. But I don’t normally toss money right in to the tip jar. Then again, I don’t give money to the people begging on the street corner either.

Last week, I mentioned that I had been sent information on adding two basic, non-obtrusive text ads to my sites. In exchange for two little href links on four sites, I got a nice chunk of change. I will get that same amount of cash once a month, along with new links to switch out. Jennifer pointed out this post about blog spamming and said that she was going to change from my default skin to avoid the text links.

This confused me, and I really don’t agree with Orange Haired Boy’s post at all. I posted two text links, href tags only. I got to pick where they are at on my site, and if you scroll so far down on my sidebar that you even see them I would be amazed. I checked the links myself to make sure that they went to legitimate sites without pop-up ads that cart you off to some porn spam mecca – and they don’t. (I could have asked for different links if I wanted to even, but I took the ones they sent to me.) On one of my sites, the text is visible, but blends almost in to the page – and I made it display “below the fold” on a page that otherwise requires no scroll. My e-mail was from a different address and ISP altogether, and to be honest – I didn’t do that much checking in to it anyways. I wouldn’t have even looked at the headers of the e-mail if it wasn’t for OHB’s post. I think he’s wrong to suspect some scam – especially based on my own experience.

Maybe it’s just me, but if you wave some free money in front of my face, I will take it. I am all about the cash. Within 24 hours of posting my 2 links on 4 sites, I had cash sent on over to my PayPal account. Bing, bang, boom, and I was $90 richer. Oh yes, you read that right. $90 for 8 text links total. Plus if I refer friends and they sign up, I get a few dollars (one time only) more. Oh yeah, $90 a month and then some? I am *so* there! (If you want to sign up, leave a comment – I’ll have them e-mail you.)

Why pay money for text links? Easy! It boosts your rating in Google if you get a site that frequently updates (and is therefore frequently spidered) to post links to you constantly. In the past, I have seen traffic hit my site from Google just hours after my posts about things like Ben Affleck’s toupee. Google is my bitch. (I mean that in the best way, as I absolutely love to use Google for my searches all the time.) So there is no scam here at all – just a quick way to make some cash.

Considering the volume of spam I get, if I got more spam because of the text ads, so what? Spam is a lot easier to take if you are getting paid for it.

Speaking of Google, after seeing their AdSense ads on other sites and reading Matt’s feature about Blogging for Dollars, I decided to sign up. I never received notice about whether or not I was approved though – so today I tried to just log in to the site, and it worked. Guess they approved me. Now I’ve gone and added the AdSense banner to the bottom of every main page and to every individual archive page. It’s fun and amusing to see what ads you get for some of my posts, especially that last one about Howard Dean being metrosexual.

Which brings me full circle to the point of this post – edited at Google’s request. Just look at the PVR Blog results from talking about Tivo!

I’m all about the Benjamins… does that make me a bad person?