I Like Them!

I was reading this fun article about mooncakes shaped like cell phones, when I noticed this line:

A couple nights back, I mentioned mooncakes at a dinner in Beijing and the table erupted in hilarity and derision — my hosts advised me that mooncakes are the Chinese equivalent of Christmas cakes — no one likes them, everyone gives them (I like Christmas cake!). They are haloed with weird possible urban legends, like the scandal of a mooncake manufacturer that was recycling last year’s filling because no one can taste the difference between year-old and fresh mooncake stuffin’.

WHAT?! How can this be?! I freaking love mooncakes!!! The Mid-Autumn Festival is like one of my favorite holidays ever, and I never get any gifts! While I am not a huge fan of that awful little yolk ball in the middle, that can be easily removed, and many cakes are sold without it. I prefer lotus seed, black bean, and red bean fillings, but I’ve had some other good fillings. Wiki had the following snippet:

But despite its central role in the Mid-Autumn festival, the popularity of mooncakes has declined in recent years. Part of the reason is that people are becoming more health-conscious. Traditional mooncakes are made with lard, and a lot of sugar. Another reason for the decline in popularity is that the Moon Festival has become increasingly commercialized. People are focusing more on the exchange of gifts, and less on the traditional celebrations, such that its symbolism has eroded. Many mooncakes are bought by businessmen who give them to their clients as presents.

I guess that makes some sense, but it doesn’t change the fact that mooncakes are delicious. Plus they’re not that large, and you don’t eat them that often, so what is the big deal about how unhealthy they are? I am very sad to learn that mooncakes are not held in esteem by people in China, because there is always a special place in my heart (and belly, and mouth) for the mooncake. In fact, I am honoring the mooncake by making this the first post that I used the new WP 2.3 feature of tagging on, in case I ever want to find this post again.

Updated to Wordpress 2.3 Beta 3

I got overly excited about tags, and so on a whim I upgraded to a beta. Nothing looks different, except that there is a single line below the post area for tags. While I am glad that the page didn’t blow up and that the theme didn’t break, I guess I will have to wait for some tag management plugins to take advantage of the hooks and such that have been added on the backend.

Edit: Haha, of course after I go to publish this post, I get SQL errors from the ELA plugin. Oh well, I haven’t even enabled it on this site yet, and have been kinda disappointed by their slow update cycle. I mean, the categories can’t even be sorted alphabetically…

Upgrading to WP 2.2.3

Upgraded to the latest version of Wordpress. Cleaned up the database. The current theme is just a placeholder.

Full Feeds Enabled

I think…

Selling Out 2.0

Oh, to be young again. Three years ago when the anime blog was young, I agonized over inserting a small text ad into the sidebar. Flash forward to today, and I feel no such guilt over adding a bunch of Amazon Affiliate ads to the sidebar of every page that is not the front page. I run the very slick K2 theme, and with the power of PHP the non-front page portions of Sea Slugs! were all directed to display very little information on the sidebar. Now, you see one small ad on the front page sidebar (hasn’t changed for 3 years), and on all other pages you see 5 small Amazon ads instead of a big blank sidebar.

The cost of running Sea Slugs! is still hovering just under $100 a year. Looking back at Adsense, and looking forward at Amazon Affiliates, here’s what I think so far:

Google

• The best part of Adsense is that it pays per click.
• It took over 2 years to get the first check, but the site is on course to earn the second check in a little over a year. Obviously the Adsense ads alone do not cover costs.
• Adsense is kinda hit or miss, because as there are not that many people willing to pay for an anime ad. It’s a niche market, and since there are not that many relevant ads out there, sometimes the stuff displayed in the Adsense box has no relation to the blog.
• The worst part of Adsense is that they only pay you once you have earned $100. I know this isn’t a problem for some webmasters, but I find it to be a pain.

Amazon

• The worst part of the Amazon program is that it only pays you if someone buys something from Amazon within 24 hours of clicking on one of your affiliate links.
• I’m hoping someone uses an affiliate link to buy a boxset. Buying a volume of manga or an anime DVD would help, but 4% or more of an expensive item can give a quick boost to income.
• Amazon has an option for direct deposit after earning $10. For obvious reasons, this rocks the socks off Adsense’s payment policy.
• Amazon is a trusted vendor, whereas some of the companies advertising on Adsense seem kinda sketchy.
• Amazon sells a large selection of anime and manga related products, and from what I have seen so far, their matching algorithm is quite good. In each 5 block segment, usually 4 are anime DVDs or manga volumes, and the last one is a bestseller or some non-anime DVD. The filters were very helpful in preventing Oprah and adult magazines from showing up in the ads.

I’m not expecting huge profits to come in from the Amazon Affiliates program, but the gattai of both programs might help the site break even. Also, if you are planning to buy something expensive from Amazon, please let me know! I think the referral fee might be capped at $25, but $25 for doing nothing but clicking one link (for an item someone was going to buy anyway) is still pretty sweet.

We Interrupt This Message

Velius alerted me that there are some issues with commenting. I experienced this myself lately, and I would either get a 404 if I was signed in, or a ASCII smiley face when I wasn’t. When I heard Velius was having the same problem, I decided to switch the theme. I tried disabling all plugins and this didn’t fix the problem. Only switching to a non-K2 theme seemed to work, so I wonder if it is a javascript problem. Until I get it figured out, I’ll be going with a default theme.

Edit: I think it might be a problem with the live commenting, which is not such a big deal.