R.I.P.

I KNEW that "internet kill switch" I've been hearing about was real!

It is clearly wishful thinking...

But Michael is right... Evolution is not death...

Bill, what one believes is going to be directly proportional to their experience
or lack thereof.

For example, if I'd been doing PPC back in the day when it was easy (direct
linking, low CPC costs, etc.) and then suddenly I saw it wasn't working
because of the changes Google made, I'd be tempted to believe that PPC
marketing was dead IF I didn't have the background knowledge of
understanding that in all marketing, things change constantly.

A true PPC expert would know this whereas somebody who was just doing
what somebody told them to do wouldn't simply because they probably
didn't understand what they were doing.

That's the problem with a lot of IM tactics. People do them by rote and
then, when somebody throws a monkey wrench into the works, they're
lost.

Take article marketing. I understand that Google is always going to be
coming up with algos to make some forms of AM obsolete, and therefore,
I am going to have to adapt, which I have done over the 5 plus years that
I've been writing articles.

But somebody who just read a book that said to do XYZ, and that book
came out 4 years ago, they're going to be lost when suddenly things in
the book stop working as well.

The true marketer who understands marketing in general will get through it
while the parrot will be dead on its perch.

Then of course there are those who know absolutely nothing at all and
take what they read at face value. If somebody who claims that they
know what they're doing says that something is dead, and says it with
conviction, the totally clueless will swallow it whole. That's just the way
it is.

Sadly, if something really does die (think MFA sites) nobody who is an
experienced marketer is going to accept it as gospel until they try it out
for themselves.

Think about it. How many people, even after folks came out and said
that their MFA sites were banned by Adsense, still didn't believe it because
it hadn't happened to them yet?

So ironically, right or wrong, death of threads are useless because most
people either...

1. Have never tried it, probably wouldn't anyway, so don't care.

2. Have tried it, found it didn't work when they did so won't bother now.

3. Have tried it, it did work, and will continue doing it until it doesn't work.

Somebody with a successful MFA site (going back to the day) isn't going
to suddenly take them all down just because somebody says they're dead
and they're going to lose their Adsense accounts. They're going to,
unfortunately, have to find out the hard way.

So, I therefore look at death of threads from this perspective.

1, What is the topic about? If it's something I don't care about anyway,
then I won't even bother reading it. If it is something I care about...

2. Who is starting it? Is it somebody I trust to fall in the category of
"experienced marketer who just might have the evidence to back this up?"

If so, I will seriously take what they say to heart including any solutions
to the problem.

It all comes down to your filters and how you use them.

Otherwise, you could torpedo your own business just because you
listened to the wrong advice from the wrong person.

My 2 cents on this subject...for whatever they're worth.