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MyBlogLog Contest Winner

written by John Chow on February 16th, 2007

ikeryoldas.jpgCongrats goes out to ilkeryoldas of The Thinking Blog for winning the John Chow dot Com MyBlogLog community contest! ilkeryoldas is the proud owner of a new Kingston 1GB Lego flash drive. In addition, ilkeryoldas also wins a set of John Chow dot Com and 1234.Pens.com pens!

Look for another contest sometime soon. In the mean time there’s still a contest going for the Top Commentators. Be on the top commentators list at the end of this month you will win a set of John Chow dot Com and 1234.Pens.com pens! Good luck on that one.

The only question on everyone’s mind at this time; is that really ilkeryoldas in the avatar?

Ryan said on February 16th, 2007 at 9:01 pm

The obvious answer is no.

I do, however, think everyone over at MyBlogLog should change their avatar to a woman wearing panties / thong. That way I could just spend all day over at MyBlogLog browsing user photos.

Seriously though, I bet those type of avatars drive traffic.

Reply to this comment
Jane May said on February 16th, 2007 at 10:58 pm

I thought of that, but not too confident to do that just yet :) I agree…definately not her picture.

Reply to this comment
Dan and Jennifer said on February 17th, 2007 at 10:29 am

Cute Jane. :-)

Seriously, I don’t think it matters worth a darn one way or the other. That’s the image she wishes to portray so that’s cool, I don’t really care.

Besides, mug shot pictures don’t generaly convey personality and the spirit of the person, so I think it really doesn’t matter. But they do give you an insight into what people wish to portray of themselves…

We like to use our real photo, but that’s our choice.

Have an awesome day!
Dan

Reply to this comment
Jane May said on February 18th, 2007 at 12:41 pm

This is very true! I would completely agree with you Dan in that the pictures are small apples compared to the content and how effective the blog is.

p.s. I like your photo a lot…very genuine.

Reply to this comment
Marc said on February 17th, 2007 at 4:58 am

You don’t find my avatar attractive enough? Come on…

Reply to this comment
Million Dollar Blog said on February 16th, 2007 at 10:40 pm

I believe its a proven fact over at dp by having a girl as your avatar and putting your blog feed next to it drives traffic to your blog!

Reply to this comment
bryce said on February 17th, 2007 at 1:24 am

I’m thinking of putting MyBlogLog on. I like my blog :) you should give away Tshirts

Reply to this comment
Marc said on February 17th, 2007 at 5:02 am

Congratulations Ilkeryoldas. I hope you enjoy the flash drive. It seems like a really cool little gadget.

Reply to this comment
Ramanathan said on February 17th, 2007 at 5:24 am

Definitely not. It is not her.

Reply to this comment
Leftblank said on February 17th, 2007 at 6:29 am

I doubt it’s her, lucky winner though ;)

Anyway, if it’s her, I think you should give her a visit and report your experiences ;)

Reply to this comment
Hannes Johnson said on February 17th, 2007 at 10:35 am

Congratulations Ilker Yoldas on the flash drive.

Yeah, I’ve been wondering the same thing - she has 6 pictures on her MyBlogLog profile and I don’t see why she would do that if that’s not her on the pictures… either way, the girl on the picture certainly attracts clicks ;)

John, how do you pick the winners of the contests? Is it totally random or do you just pick the one you feel like should win?

Reply to this comment
John Chow said on February 17th, 2007 at 10:42 am

It’s completely random.

Reply to this comment
ilker said on February 17th, 2007 at 12:26 pm

WooHoooo!!! WOW! I can’t express how happy I am!! Thanks a lot John! YOU MADE MY YEAR!! I knew there was a good karma in being active in MyBlogLog. Sweet.. now I get to write with my John Chow dot com pen! =)

About my picture.. few other people also asked me in MBL. I don’t know if it will be true to say that is “real” me. The picture is taken by a professional photographer and I guess there was some Photoshop involved as well (oh and a bit of make-up :). Haven’t you seen what could be achieved with that combination, like the girl in Dove evolution video?

Besides, it doesn’t drive as much traffic as people think it does (just helped a bit on the number of community members). On average, I get about 200 visitors per day with 60/70 clicks coming from MyBlogLog. Last weekend, I was on MBL the whole time chatting with my members (now friends) It was a record for me in terms of time spent on MBL that much (WARNING, its really ADDICTIVE!) but there was little effect on my traffic. That is despite my avatar showed on every profile’s “People Who Viewed This Page Recently”. I’m assuming few people clicked on it because it doesn’t appear there for long. In any case, I am not interested in traffic or SEO and nothing like that. I just want my readers to keep coming back and contribute to the thinking process!

What’s more, I don’t think people read blogs because the author is hot (certainly I don’t, with the exception of John ;) but because the content is worth reading.

Hmm.. Guess I need to make a post about this.

Reply to this comment
Jane May said on February 18th, 2007 at 12:45 pm

Congrats ilker!!! I would agree with you, having a picture like this doesn’t really attract as much traffic as people think. I’ve appreciated your interactions on MBL. Keep it up as I’ll keep checking your site out :)

Reply to this comment
David Temple said on February 17th, 2007 at 1:55 pm

Congrats Ilker (Turkish name meaning “first man”). Great avatar and since he changed from the original aborted fetus avatar his community members have grown like crazy. Best part is it’s a great thinking person’s blog so good move.

Reply to this comment
Paula Neal Mooney said on February 17th, 2007 at 2:25 pm

Cool beans, ilkeryoldas…but I wish you’d show the world your real pic.

I hate fake avatars!

Reply to this comment
ilker said on February 17th, 2007 at 3:40 pm

Hey it is not fake.. look at David Temple’s avatar, it’s blinking!

Reply to this comment
Paula Neal Mooney said on February 18th, 2007 at 5:18 am

You’re right, Ilker, it is a real picture.

And you’re an absolutely excellent blogger. You’ve got great content that’ll keep me coming back daily.

I’ve added you to Google Reader!

I found your post about a black Google yesterday very intriguing.

And I can’t wait to see the results of what we e-chatted about…

Congrats and much love,
Paula

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soho said on February 18th, 2007 at 10:55 am

THat’s really cool btw, i read interesting article about bloggers making best lovers. I wonder if it’s true.
http://dating-me.blogspot.com/2007/02/why-bloggers-are-best-lovers.html

Reply to this comment
ilker said on February 25th, 2007 at 7:35 pm
Bernard said on February 25th, 2007 at 11:08 pm

Congrats, Ilker.. I like to read you too.

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sauerkraut said on February 26th, 2007 at 10:14 am

I have a great dislike for the guys who use female avatars to drive traffic to their sites. A dislike that’s almost as great as for the guys who use female avatars and then get upset when I still ignore their site. A dislike that is almost as deep as that which I have for the spam that they then send directing me to a post on their site in which they blah blah blah about their choice of avatars.

I’m a cranky feller. I make sure my avatar clearly signals that attitude. The guys who use female avatars are either sexually confused or too cynical for my tastes.

And that robotic blinking fingerpointing thing ilke uses now pisses me off. I detest people who put blinky flashlights in my face.

Reply to this comment
ilker said on February 28th, 2007 at 12:12 am

Funny.. you weren’t complaining two days ago reading my blog :razz:

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Shane said on February 28th, 2007 at 5:06 pm

I wrote an article not too long ago about changing my avatar to that green thing to see if it drew attention. I promise it does. Standing out from the crowd always helps. Content keeps them there but you need other things to get them to see your content. I like pretty girls as much or more than the average guy but most of the avatars are not really the blogger or they took the best picture ever shot of them to represent them. Jane is a perfect example. She by no means is ugly but not quite the 18 years old cutie suggested in the photo. Her content is great though.

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