I think I started my blog at the best time as the whole Vanilla/5x thing met its abrupt demise. The material that this “event” provided me to write, err I mean rant, about was immense. I actually had to delete stuff as the blog post was getting way too long (imagine that!). Well, it appears all the noise has come down substantially, the weather almost everywhere has been phenomenal this weekend and not much is happening in this space! And also so many bloggers are enjoying themselves at another Star Mega DO
Frequently Miler with another great post of the day after thedemise of the 5x OD deal. He lists some other prepaid cards & let you go from there. No spoonfeeding. I like the cautions also but, as we all know, the hogs are probably out there buying these cards dozens at a time. The key finding is: It is EASY to meet minimum spend requirements!!
I’m thinking about ACTUALLY posting under the radar deals. The more bashing gregorygrady or his alter ego does, or that abcx does, the more I ‘out’. Want to see which credit unions allow credit card funding (as purchases) of new accounts on this blog? Or which frequent flyer programs allow free award flights with every new signup? Just keep coming back. I use a tremendous amount of discretion here in what I write. I don’t ever share anything given to me in confidence. I don’t break ‘grey area’ stuff first. But I know more about this game than probably 85% of the folks on the private forum that gregorygrady is a part of. GIVE IT A REST.
Hopefully that can be more effective than an IP ban (across all of the various IPs the trolls have used).
Oooh.. A how-to guide on fuel dumps, complete with city pairs.
Or, y’all can give it a rest. Are we cool?
Not sure if you caught the draft from that comment above, u know, about them Private Forums…Spooky music in the background now…Ok, I stop here. Next! Well, I saw a mention about The Travel Hacking Cartel membership site in Chris Elliot’s email newsletter. Do NOT fork over your money in anything coming from this guy. I bet he was talking about 5x/OD/BB too…Then again, maybe he did not even know it!
There are others…Lips are sealed, do NOT ask or it will show up on MMS blog with pics & yellow arrows, lol
Anonymous says
Love your content and humor!
oliver2002 says
More snark! Keep it coming! I guess your forefathers invented σαρκασμός, yet I doubt they had travel cc bloggers in mind.
TravelBlogger Buzz says
@Anonymous: Thank you for the kind words, I appreciate it!
@Oliver: My forefathers invented satire too among so many things! They also invented tragedy which only became apparent years later after they went totaly nuts on credit cards:-)
MilesAbound says
I saw Rick’s offer to “help” on the affiliate side. LOL. He is the pro of this business. Yes it’s a MLM. He will take a cut of every approval you ever get. But god bless him for having the balls to just throw it out there.
TravelBlogger Buzz says
Thanks MilesAbound for the info. I was kidding about the MLM aspect actually. Wow, I am shocked. I did not have high regard about this whole thing…now I have even less!
MilesAbound says
I am shocked you are shocked 🙂 Pretty much everything marketed in the US, particularly with the word “affiliate” in it, is a MLM. I think only guys like maybe TPG or Dans Deals might generate enough volume to actually approach the banks or affiliate networks for a direct deal. Everyone else has to go to the bottom of the pyramid 🙂 Oh and the ultimate pyramid is BoardingArea. All those minions generating $$$s for Randy Peterson. Now that guy is the REAL genius. Doesn’t write a thing but takes a cut of every single commission generated by the site. That really is – genuinely – very smart. I mean this is the guy that founded FlyerTalk, sold it – and then just copied it completely once again! To create a “more friendly” version. Yeah right Randy – good luck with the next sale, if anything I genuinely admire the acumen.
3LeftTurns says
Terrific commentary and timely. My how times have changed. I stepped back a few months ago from reading travel blogs {credit cards} while I processed a Home Equity Line Of Credit. Glad I missed all of this crap. I now can speed through my Google Reader list of Travel Blogs quickly scanning the headline and moving on. Post after Post on inane banter on credit cards with the underline incentive to push you to apply. link,link,link,link on and on. Eliminated FTG and MMS already and more will be deleted soon.
How do I link you to my Google Reader?
TravelBlogger Buzz says
Miles Abound: Thanks a lot for all the comments! I agree with them by the way. Regarding the MLM thing…Of course BA will get a cut from apps as they should for the hosting (haha) services they provide, etc. BUT I do not believe there is a pyramid there…they all just give a cut to BA. Or am I missing something here? I am learning every day!
TravelBlogger Buzz says
3LeftTurns: The IT dept is working on it. As it stands, IT dept is not staffed:-) One day it will be done…You just have to bookmark me then until the day arrives. Thanks for reading!
gregorygrady says
TBB: I LOVE this new blog!!!! And trust me, it’s NOT OFTEN I say something like that about a blog, cuz like you, I cannot stand all these blogs these days and their incessant pumping of CC affiliate referral links.
Also, I’m honored to see that my name made your blog already within the first few days. Just for the record, I thought I’d post my EXACT “personal attack” Comment here that Gary deleted the first half of. For him to call it a personal attack is really stretching it (given that I had already posted similar comments previously on his blog when he gets out of control, and he did NOT delete my “lying dolt” comment. I would argue “lying dolt” is more of a personal attack than “tool”), and especially since HE ASKED (threatened?) me for more bashing in his comment #54. I simply did what he asked cuz I was truly curious about all those “deals” that supposedly I know about but nobody else does (except him somehow):
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@Gary: LOL, you are truly pathetic my friend. I would love for you to out all this stuff, so I will bash a little further:
1. YOU ARE A TOOL. In exchange for this bash, please let me know which credit unions accept CC funding on new accts. This will save me a lot of time from having to dig around to find this info myself.
2. YOU ARE GREEDY AND ALL YOU CARE ABOUT IS LINING YOUR POCKET WITH CC REFERRAL KICKBACKS. In exchange for this bash, please tell me how to get free award flights from signing up for FF programs. I could certainly use some free flights with little work and again this will help save me some time from having to dig this up myself.
3. YOUR MOTHER WEARS COMBAT BOOTS. AND SO DOES YOUR WIFE!!! There you go, I figured I’d get in 2 bashes for fuel dumps cuz that’s a lot of ground you have to cover on that topic, especially if you are going to post city pairs and all. But your “Dummies Guide to Fuel Dumps” will save me from having to read and comprehend that dreadful TrickIt thread on FT. So thanks for volunteering to do all the work of packaging it up to spoon feed to all of us lazy blog leeches. You are the best gleff!!
BTW, I’m still waiting for you to post that private forum screen shot you promised me where you swear I “work to keep info off FT”. Oh yeah, it’s because there is no such thing you lying dolt.
Finally, if you know all the above things and you DON’T share them with your blog readers, then that just proves that all you care about is lining your pockets with CC affiliate referral kickbacks. Because if any of those things above made you a dime in referral money, everybody knows you would have already pumped them left and right until they were dry, just like with all the other CC referral links that you incessantly pump these days, which has turned your blog from the darn good blog it used to be into 50% rubbish now. You should be ashamed that you have allowed all those affiliate commissions/dollars to slowly ruin your views/thinking/blog. Pathetic!!!!
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gregorygrady says
BTW, I’m glad I was able to make gleff “lose his cool” for the first time that you remember since he started his blog. I believe he lost his cool cuz fully realizes I am correct on calling him out in that he kills deals left and right with his blogging. And it has gotten worse and worse recently. I am sad to say that I can no longer count on one hand the number of deals he has killed in the past month. Yep, more than 5. Sad. He pretends like he is doing all his readers a great service, but he is really just sending them on a wild goose chase cuz the deal he publishes will more than likely die soon after he blogs about it it recent history is any indication.
He truly is getting almost as bad as MMS, with the exception that he actually does have some useful content on his blog unrelated to deal killing, whereas MMS does not, he’s a pure deal killer (and I can’t stand those pics of he and his wife holding up their CCs either, it disgusts me to no end).
The sad thing is all this is happening cuz these bloggers are so greedy that they can’t help but dig up and post deals left and right in the hopes that they can get another CC referral from their blog readership. As you almost certainly know, I started a thread on FT in the MilesBuzz forum hoping FTers could all brainstorm a way to get the CC affiliate referral into our own pocket instead of the greedy blogger’s pockets. I really hope one day that happens cuz that will be the day that probably 80% of these clowns quit the blogging profession.
TravelBlogger Buzz says
gregorygrady: Welcome. I call it as I see it. I do not censor anything (well unless it is true spam). It’s not like I got any by the way. Again, like I stated multiple times, I hope bloggers do not take anything personal. Yes, greed has taken over this space. We live in the most capitalist system in the world so no surprise there. Oh wait, we all bailed out the freaking banks so they can increase the mega signing bonuses….whatacountry:-)