TEN years on GFY, a whole era ... rant.
 

Wow, time flew by sort of.

I do not have many posts, but i have been here almost daily to just read up on things.
It's true it used to be better, this place is like real life;-)
You visit, meet people, some go, some stay. Before you know it, you're 'the old guy in the club'.

So anyway, i always kept out of pissing matches, just to be on the safe side. Funny because 'in real life' i am know for always having my opinion ready of not being shy of letting it know. I guess i am a "reverse keyboard worrier" ;-).

Ten years is a long time and it reflects on the dreams and livesof people here. For example, in 2001 i was 29. I then was convinced i would be retiring by 30. I still know Quiet's tagline, i had it memorized as were of the same age. His said "29, retired by 30" for years, our lives totally took a different path throughout the years.

He actually lived his dream, retired early, did all he wanted but unfortunately his life came to an early end. Mine went the other way. I did not become rich, i met a nice girl, partied a year and became a single father of a baby (who's now almost 5) who turned my life around. Full time daddy and trying to make lots of money do not go well.
I also bought my house and stocks in 2006-2007. The height if both markets. It's pretty much worth 20% now. The bad luck i have had beyond my control is almost hard to believe, even a psychologist was puzzled the other day, haha.

As you can see, life is life and it happens to all of us. I just gave a simple example of Quiet and me, there's many stories alike on the board.

I really like some older guys here still posting as well. 10 years ago they were old fucks to (40, DAMN) me, now i am almost there and still here also.

Shout out to all the other good people who have died, its a long list. I'm glad i am still here, broke or not. My child is healthy (except for Marfan syndrome) and never sick, passed first year in kindergarden (;-)). If he's doing well, i'm doing great!

My thoughts are also with some of the mums here who lost their sons in the time we were all here, you know who you are. It sure must suck every day still: stay strong!

To all those livin'large: i hope you earned it fairly, almost everybody here got scammed one way or another. It seemed to get worse last 4 years and the attitude of the newcomers bothered me lots. Obviously, as stated, i tend to keep from pissing others here.

Here's to 2021. I hope those here now, are then then sound and healthy.

What up aye

well congrats to you.

still so sad about quiet... truly an inspiration to my daily web stuff. So sad.

who cares what you wrote, didn't read any of it

Congrats on 10 years. Nice to see you still around and wish you and your family all the best.

damn typos ...

What do you do now

congrats on 10 years, things have changed so much, would go back to 2001 any day

Congrats on the 10 years:thumbsup

Congrads - I'm 50 now and have been around for and beyond that time LOL

Here's looking to another 10

Well i registered my company in 1996 and it is still my source of income. Always has been and hopefully always will.

Somehow it gets harder every time, and i do not mean competition only. As we've been around a long time, we are on top of the radar: Google (banned in november 2010 for no good reason, even their lawyer and marketing ceo agreed (but as they stated: "we work for google")), FDA visited in february and much more. This is mainstream business.

Easier to start over iguess. I've been advised that several times already. History gone, clean sheet. Note that I have never scammed anybody oramn on some police radar orwhatever.

Especially since i am so honest, i am having a hard time adjusting to the new way people work. I have numerous examples of big mainstream companies fucking consumers in front of their face and nobody does a thing. Me, small time worker, get nailed for nothing.

I used to think that honesty would pay off. I worked - almost in poverty - for a long time becasue i did not want to scam others for my personal gain. Now , 15 years later, i am leaning towards the other end where i think honesty does not work. Unfortunately, scamming would never work for me.

I'm grumpy, haha.

Google banned you...what happened?

congrats, 10 years is a lot :thumbsup

Congrats on 10 years and a healthy kid ;)

I still don't know, after your reply, what you do??

10 years on gfy myself NEXT year...

But 42 years in the biz in total :) :thumbsup

congratz :)

Listen to this advice carefully:

You cannot go anywhere's in life until you've lived it. Nobody knows how to live it until they can appreciate it, embrace the good it has brought and know what the bottom of the barrel is like as well as what the top of the barrel is like. Now you're living it from what it sounds like. Money is important but not nearly as important as the fact that you have your baby girl (which will be your driving force for years to come and a new eye on the world as a whole), you have a roof over your head (regardless of it's 'worth') and you are not starving.

Congrats :thumbsup
I registered to GFY in August 2001, my anniversary goes next month :pimp

...respect for the OG's

Balls to you! LOL, congrats!

Congratulations and respect.

I get ignored all the time, but I'll still be spewing my vitriol and idiocy in 2011 (if I'm still alive - and if GFY is still here).

Hope yo see you pop in for a quick post or two over the next decade.

e-commerce and a cashback program.

A very well written text, got me melancholic, especially thinking about TexasDreams or Quiet.

Take care, Naughty! :)

is this cashfan you are referring too/ thanks

When i were referring to what? ;-)

Cashfan is ours too, yes. It is not the cashback program, that stands on itself.

Google banned us from Adwords (not Google itself, not Adsense either) for some text on one of our websites that had been there unchanged since the Adwords start in 2003. Suddenly that same text is now no longer excepted - which is fine by us, a simple note pointing it out to us would have been sufficient - and they closed our account without further notice. Took me two months to finally get to talk to their lawyer, (luckily my best friend is an IT lawyer as well, he arranged the number for me), he toldme he agreed with me, as well as the marketing director of google (he happens to be a close friend of a woman i dated recently, so I sent him my reports with her help). However he also said they both worked for google so they had to take Google's side. After that, he no longer accepted my phonecalls or emails. That's Google right there;-)

So much for a long relationship of 8 years, spend hundreds of thousands of Euros on them, followed seminars, had the best adwords campaigns making my business life easy and enabling me to take care of the kid. It's all different now as Google has 94% marketshare here.

The hard part is that we have several stores that had nothing to do with the site that was banned, but we, as a whole, can no longer open an account at adwords.

Exciting times, but it must not take too long.

I'm 28 now. See ya in 10 years :)

I didn't read but congrats man :)

10 years... congrats!

Thanks for your post ... I wish we had more like it.

Congrats and much respect on your 10 years.

that sums it all up right there!