We go on another wild ride learning all about Malaysia Enrich Miles, the Citibank 2% Double Cash Back card, the SPG Tap into Luxury game, travel to South Africa, UAE, photos of rock climbing, Financial Tips/Retirement Planning/401k Rollover Checklist, and the best Blog Buzz section making enemies of the big bloggers ensuring our commercial failure lol.
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MILES/POINTS
There appears to be a new 2% cash back credit card. Double Cash Back by Citibank. No annual fee! Very welcome and surprising to see. Looks like Citibank is continuing to compete to our benefit. I am sticking with the Arrival card (click my imaginary link) for now and holding out for a signing bonus. These US banks are always making me shake my head…Here is the NON Affiliate link. Please consider helping your favorite blogger and hopefully is one we love or like in the TBB Blog Reviews, thank you! Personal Finance Digest has more on the card.
In the meantime Mrs. TBB’s Spirit Airline card is here. Oh la la. Exciting times. I have not done any MS stuff so I can keep up the blog for YOU! A whole day passed without meting the minimum spend on my own United Mileage Explorer Visa credit card…losing my touch!
Starwood’s Tap Into Luxury online Spin game. Enter twice a day, you may win something.
TRAVEL
Rock Climbing South Africa with Alex Honnold and Hazel Findley – At The Adventure Blog. Always amazing and inspiring!
30 Things Tourists Should Know About the United Arab Emirates – By Points Summary. Hands on tips about UAE.
25 insanely awesome rock climbing photos. At Matador Network. Wow!
Photo: Kiliii Fish
PERSONAL FINANCE
Don’t create a budget — and 12 other financial tips to live by. At MarketWatch. What a great read!
4 Qualities For Retirement Planning In The Stressful Market. At Forbes.
A 401(k) Rollover Checklist. At Morningstar.
ODDZ & ENDZ
Search terms that make me question what’s going on in your life. By The Bloggess. OMG, people search for these? What is the world coming to?
Autobiographical Memory for a Life-Threatening Airline Disaster. By The Neurocritic. Hmm, kind of weirdly fascinating.
What is Bitcoin. Short youtube video. Just in case you always wondered.
BLOG BUZZ
Note: This section is for long time followers of this hobby and references to blogs/bloggers may not make much sense if you are new to this. You are welcome to stay and read it of course but if you go WTF just remember this note!
I am tired from the constant credit card barrages. Some former blogs I used to enjoy (even like) have turned 100% commercial and the frequency of blog posts has increased to a frenetic pace. I mean, I could be doing this Blog Buzz all day long! Sorry I ain’t got time for dat (can’t believe I just said this!). Late at night, The Free-quent Flyer had a rant on “Bloggers, don’t ask for credit card affiliate links” which is certainly welcome and…so it’s not going to happen! Very interesting points, my thoughts were: 1) OMG, he was getting phone calls with legal threats when he was not even in the program for so long, unbelievable! 2) I had the same exact thoughts when Ariana posted she was making $500 – $1,000 from Barclays affiliate links without pushing that much in a part time blog…WOW!!!! 3) Calls out Gary Leff of View From The Wing for going above and beyond on…serving the banks 🙂 Be angry…ummm, how can you not to these days? 🙂
I need to just jot down some thoughts and take a few representative blog posts that make me angry and just ignore the rest. Summer is almost over, time to get serious and rededicate my attention to more important things. I am not going away of course, TBB is part of me now and I do like the creative outlet here… #developing #alwaysdeveloping
Million Mile Secrets: In a usual mode, waited several days, copied everyone else and posted a massive post all bout the Ritz-Carlton cards. Then continued to mega pump the Marriott cards and then had the audacity to make a post titled “Why I Don’t Sell Miles and Points”. An alert reader on Twitter sent me this: “”Why I Don’t Sell Miles and Points” because I sell credit cards!!” LOL.
One Mile at a Time: Totally gone commercial. Out of control. Doesn’t even pretend anymore. The value added posts get less and less and credit card pumping increasing to deafening levels. I am shocked. I should not be. Even turned the Shoprunner Amex promotion to a ten credit card link fest, wow!
Frugal Travel Guy: Ariana continues to mail in posts, money must be nice. And gets to sell her Uber link too…brilliant! Can I do an article on “How Not To Be a Tool?” and pimp my Amazon link, no charge 🙂 And FTG Founder takes credit for (pun intended) and congratulates Americans for having less debt. Shaking my head. And here was the email from signed by “Frugal Travel Guy” today to my inbox, starts out with: “Tick tock. Tick tock. Time is running out to get this amazing airline offer! With only one credit card application you can earn 50,000 miles. The limited-time offer is scheduled to end on 9/2/14. Want to know which card we’re talking about? Take a look at our post. ” FTG where the selling of credit cards never stops. Hey, will you ever fix the Credit Card “Tool”? Didn’t think so…And they are paying $25 for 300 – 500 words for “success stories”. LOL. Words do not begin to describe…
The Points Guy: When this site posts about a Delta policy AFTER Delta Points, you know they are really, I mean, REALLY late 🙂
Noob Traveler: I just noticed this in the Bio in the home page which I found interesting: “I have managed to earn over 1 MILLION reward points and miles every year. Traveling 1st class for pennies is truly within reach for anyone. I write my blog so my readers can learn how they can start traveling classy for pennies.” So what, really? And this dear readers goes to show you, as an elder in this space told me some time ago, it is all “Marketing” 🙂
Check out my updated blog lists: Blogs I Love, Blogs I Like, Blogs I Ignore
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TBB
travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com
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My second first???!
Winner by two minutes!
Second second by a second or so
You probably have the most 2nds!
Too busy drafting my fantasy football team.
Excuses, excuses. Ok, this is a good one 😉
I tried to post this comment on Drew’s site yesterday but I lost my wifi connection. He misses ‘the big one’ with is 102,000 miles for business class for Europe to Australia. Malaysian is running A380s out of Heathrow as well.
Hope he reads it. After today’s announcement by the airline, I think all of that post would need to be rewritten shortly
No mention of the onion post by Gary?
Not sure which one you are referring to? Trying to ignore the blogs in the Ignore list…need to do a better job of this 🙂
Well, the man who famously coined the word ‘Skypeso’ wrote a blog posts explaining a few virtues of the DL Skymiles. I at first thought it was a satirical piece like the onion does…?
That’s not new though right? The bigger criticism is that he was just rehashing content.
Anything to sell more cards goes!
Loved the riff on TPG and DP. Just nummy. Oh, and eleventeenth.
TBB blogging the truth and nothing but the truth…
Or something like that…
Have a lovely weekend everyone! Can’t believe the summer is almost over, wow!
I think the craziness like “why Delta is not that bad -> click my links” is simply a sign of trouble.
I can bet $100 they are running out of victims. There is only as many credit cards you can apply for
and after the initial run all the valuable ones have no links.
Those guys are starting to be desperate. Plus the pressure to be cut, feel sorry for them, really…
The only way is “the point dude” way – huge links everywhere are traps for innocent people who
have no idea. The content itself makes no difference, they can as easily start to write about
weather or … just nothing.
I would like to be in their trouble….. only earning in the high six figures instead of seven figures annually. It’s time to get my blog, THE HORNEY TRAVELER up and running and cash in.
Dear Buzz…… I hereby give you 2 weeks notice for my short lived, non paying job as your intern and Amazon link marketing manager. I am jumping ship and getting on the real gravy train. My dream to get my baby, The Horney Traveler UP and running is now a priority. Not only will I help others with advice on where to find broads abroad, but also helpful (and profitable for me) tips on getting miles and points doing so…..I am writing a piece right now on the best countries to get a lap dance and the best credit card ( with high paying affiliate link) to use to buy your favorite stripper a hugely over-priced glass of champagne.
Think about it…Pretty soon we run out of cards to get. And then Amex goes once in a lifetime! What do you do? You dumb down your content and you just go pump every day and hunt for fresh meat. And this is what is happening. Just watch the two mega BA blogs VFTW and OMAAT lately!
Yeah must be rough I guess…Then they wonder why readers get angry. How do old time readers feel about being pumped daily? OMAAT managed to pump 13 Chase links on a Chase Ink Cash card post for crying out loud!
I knew Mr. Bean was coming Ramsey 🙂
The Horney Traveler sounds like a weeener…I am ready to invest all of my Amazon link earnings….we’d be rich lol.
Buzz / George .. WARNING! WARNING! please do not get on that SPIRIT Airlines plane!!!! This is what happened to me, please watch…………https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk01eeKMD_I
OMG…CLASSIC!!! Woohoo!!!
MMS: “Why did you start your blog? What’s special about it?”
The Horny Traveller: “I started my blog as a way of showing my friends and familiy how to get laid when traveling abroad. Everyone kept asking me how I’m able to bang so many broads while on the road”
MMS: “What’s the one single thing people can do to get more miles?”
The Horny Traveler: “Always use shopping portals. Online malls frequently have bonuses for condoms and lubricant. I always use the first Friday of every month to pick up women at a TGI Friday’s – they swoon over the 3x points I’m earning”
MMS: “What’s your most memorable travel experience?”
The Horny Traveler: “Emirates shower, where I was with this smoking hot wom…. um, I mean because the onboard shower concept was really cool. Yeah, lets go with that”
MMS: “Any parting words?”
The Horny Traveler: “I doubt any of your readers are hot, but if they are, call me. No trannys please”
Speaking of first Friday, the team at FTG.com would like to wish a happy First Friday to all their readers and to remind you that you can get 3x points today with your CSP [insert link] at all restaurants
For information on how to redeem those points as Avios, speak with Howie
Steve, you win the internets for today.
Remember to talk to Howie quickly before those BA Avios get devalued like IBs 😉
Ramsey, shame on you for not posting the lawn mower deal here for TBB to make a few drachmas. Killer price.
Steve is on fire again!
Thanks a lot Dan for killing that awesome lawn mower deal…have you no shame?
Going to be a slow weekend…Feedly has slowed down…Time to regroup and get serious next week now that the summer is over.
TBB and serious in the same sentence LOL.
If you are absolutely bored and have time to waste you can read the back and forth between me and the owner of a blog in the Like list…so much love I get lol.
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/external-miles-points-resources/1532703-bloggers-posting-wrong-misleading-advice-10.html
I was minding my own business and then Seth goes all out on me…shaking my head. Guess it’s time to edit that Like Blog list lol.
I have to admit, that I think Seth has a valid point here. I think that anecdotal evidence is fine, but it doesn’t prove anything. As an example, when the Amex EveryDay cards came out they were largely ignored in the blogs. Now they are the darling…But suggesting that the space “feels” more Chase-y is not proof. You could never publish in a peer reviewed journal. You need to have some kind of methodology and evidence to really make the claim. I know you don’t have time for that, but just without the stats, your argument holds less water than if you could pull set them out. Look I have looked back at some of the blogs in the early days and there is no question that the emphasis has shifted. But, I really respected that Seth kept stats on the Chase Ink (I think it was that one) blog postings and so you really got a sense of how ridiculous it was. And don’t you dare remove his blog for him challenging you on this. His argument if fair.
Linda, I respectfully disagree.
The space does not only feel more Chase-y, it IS more Chase-y. You will never have OMAAT pump 13 Chase links in ONE blog post about the Chase Ink Cash card…the Ink Cash card!!!! In addition, there was a BIG drop in Amex card related posts when Amex pulled the links from BA and then a BIG increase in Amex card related posts. I stand by it.
I am not saying it isn’t. I am saying that actual concrete stats would build a better argument.
Yes. Definitely.
Having the ability to come up with templates doing exactly that would be awesome. I can only do stuff like “cut and paste”, sorry. Would love to do comparisons of how much more aff credit card links in the body of posts has gone up in BA. Until then, I can only go with what I am seeing every day in Feedly…and it’s a zoo in there!
An interesting writer I learned from yomadic today is this one:
http://adrianpure.com/
Well… all I can say about the Seth thing is that I argued with him over a year ago on something, and Buzz called me out not on argument, but on Ad Hominem, claiming outrage for arguing with a person who has done so much for this game. May 7th 2013 post here.
So I lost on argument because he was awesome, but now he is arguing with you he is no longer awesome? I’ve gone on to apologize to Seth because I’ve started to think I may have made errors back then.
The reason you cite for having him on the like list are:
Blogs and has developed many techie tools for this hobby. I always like to read his points of view which tends to be unique. Not afraid to follow any line or call something what he thinks it is. I appreciate this direct approach!
He seems to be doing no different now.
I don’t know the PM stuff, and I hear you using the term ‘liar’ which I can imagine is infuriating, but from what the observers see, he is doing what you respect him for, the only difference is that you are the target.
I think this is one of those times to hit the reset button and try to make it less personal.
Matt:
I don’t remember the incident! What was it about?
Everything under his blog name in the Like list stands. I was joking about taking him off the list for that! I did not like he posted about the “AA is back on Orbitz” whooppee do, like that was some type of news, everyone knew it was going to happen. He needs to up his game as I do not believe I have featured any of his posts in months!
I do not like to be called a liar and have my character questioned. That’s all. If it was some other blogger I couldn’t care less. Not Seth.
He has not been reading my blog and has never commented here. He thinks I am some serious blogger when I repeatedly say my site is primarily about entertainment. And I have been a fan along of what he stands for and I will admire him eternally for not jumping on the cc side, now THAT is so honorable it is beyond words to describe! And he gave me some good advice when I started which I never forgot and have thanked him for it.
The interaction with Mr.Pickles on Twitter was so funny I am still laughing about it. We should do a Cable TV show someday with all of us as characters, it would be a riot, woohoo.
Reset
Ok, so here is an ethical dilemma, or is it? In my mail was a targeted offer for the Blue Cash Everyday card, $250 after spending $1000. Only problem is that it was meant for my neighbor not me. Do you use the promotional code inside or not?
As the chance of him signing up is probably 1 in 50, I would have no qualms! 98 per cent chance it would be binned.
I would try to find out if the code can be used by legitimate neighbors 🙂
Why is this even a question?
The answer is, use your favorite bloggers link. They have bills to pay too.