Re-Group - Let's Try It Again?

I have done some thinking.

I am not normally a quitter. I am not normally the type to back down. Why did I quit Yuwie then?

I have close friends on Yuwie. People I care for and respect. Some of these friends and I spent a week exchanging emails after I left the site. I was hearing how a particular member on the site was gloating, saying I had been permanently banned by the administrator. Since this was untrue, I mulled over the possibility of returning to set the record straight. I asked myself if I could keep my cool and deal with this as a person of character.

I tried going back incognito first. This is easy to do as most online profiles are not based fully on truth but on a bit of fantasy and fancy. I would not have created a paying account with false information, so I used a family members information (with permission) so as to avoid being recognized. I found that going back this way made me feel like I was lying. I have always been myself online, freely speaking my mind and heart. Nope, this did not feel right.

So, after a day of mulling it over, trying to decide if I wanted the stress back, I deleted the 'fantasy' profile and rejoined as ME.

I made a commitment to blog about things that mattered; something I'd drifted away from on my previous account because of the continuous controversy going on around me. I also decided that I would make it clear what I was there for. I addressed the rumor/lie that I had been deleted by the administrator first. Then I posted that I would NOT be seeking referrals and chasing page views. If I 'earned' any random referrals for my activity on the site, I would give them away. I had rejoined to express my talents and my views on issues that matter to me. And most importantly, to spend time with those on the site who matter to me.

There was also no way anyone could try to intimidate me if I was not participating in the race for page views. I could freely speak my mind. I felt liberated!

During my short absence, the administrator added a Twitter feed. I had been avoiding Twitter for a long time just on principle. I gave in and added my profile to the feed as a way to get my writing seen by more people. It seemed that the administrator was attempting to make the site more attractive to the masses. Unfortunately, he still doesn't have a handle on the egos and many members remain skeptical about his abilities to get the revenue sharing rate back up. We will see if it works.

Am I still trying to get things to change on Yuwie? Yes I am. One friend add at a time. Do I get involved in the controversy still? Yes, when it's brought to my inbox or profile. It is not my nature to keep quiet. But I will not blog on it again. Instead, I will voice my opinion a bit more subtly and with more finesse. Instead of exchanging angry words, I will try to speak with more understanding and expect nothing less than respect in return.

Have I learned anything? I've learned that when you put over half a million people in a social situation where money is concerned, you get trouble. If you give an ego-maniac a voice and thousands of referrals that must back him up, you will have trouble. Will Yuwie continue to grow? Probably. But it will not achieve greatness like we long time members had hoped. Not if they continue to encourage the page view mentality over the people that are generating those page views. Oh well, some people are content with daily comments and a few pennies.
If you can keep your mind free of greed and avarice, your ego under control and your heart open to differences...you just may make some real good friends on Yuwie....not much money, but great friends! Just avoid people in tights. LOL.

A EUREKA MOMENT!

After reading Why Guy's 'Pyramadness' blog, a light bulb went on over my head. I realized what exactly had happened to my Yuwie dreams of riches early on in my experience with the site.

I must have intuited the impossibility of making any kind of money.

Early on in my use of Yuwie, my motivation switched from the money/page view chase...to a motivation to meet and get to know all the interesting folks I was finding on there. I also saw a huge potential for getting my ideas and opinion read and commented on. In short, the site presented a way to learn and grow.

Reading the explanation Why Guy so eloquently presented here, also made me think about the members on Yuwie who have allowed their greed for the possibility of riches to over shadow their ethics. Like I said, GREED rules Yuwie.

I sit here wanting to go into the details of my experience with these 'dark side of Yuwie' members, but it would feel to much like gossip. Instead I will relate to you MY last experience with blogging on Yuwie.

A friend of mine had been locked for posting notices on the board disagreeing with the newest 'game' to be implemented on Yuwie. Administration had added 'Member's Market' as a way keep members from leaving out of boredom.

The Member's Market allows you to buy and sell other members and earn 'money' in doing so. The member who disagreed, along with others, felt that it was demeaning and unethical to participate in this game. Someone took exception to her opinion and they BOTH posted notices, and sent messages to one another which involved name calling and some cursing.

When I asked her why she was locked she responded by sending me what administration had sent to her as an explanation for her being locked. The letter said: For constantly bashing Yuwie and not keeping social networking 'fun'. This was the administrator's reason for locking her!

I was shocked!

If she had been locked for the name calling, I would have shook my head and gone on. But there was nothing said in administration's letter, of the obvious problem with the notices, the name calling that went on between the two of them.

So, I wrote a blog built around the quote:

"I may not agree with all you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

I wrote the blog as an open letter to the administrator, hoping he would respond to concerns I and others had about his censoring those who disagreed with him.

(We had been told to take down blogs, previous to this, that contained negativity about Yuwie Radio and I had refused.)

He didn't show up to comment on my blog. But many members came by in support of the blog.

Many also came to personally attack me for being 'negative'. The leader of what I call the 'dark side' made it a point to come by several times, never once mentioning the subject of the blog. His purpose for commenting seemed to be his opinion of ME as a person and was not 'positive' to say the least. I wondered to myself...who possibly can have a problem with advocating free speech?

The blog was submitted to digg and a link to it was also submitted to Facebook by a friend of mine. It accumulated almost 400 hits.

I was actually optimistic when the attack came. This, I thought, could show the true nature of this man. Others will see it and open their eyes. It did open up some eyes, mine. The differences between the two sides became very apparent, very quickly. But no one spoke to the idea of free speech, and no one saw the true nature of my adversary. My attempts to keep things civil crumbled.

I deleted the blog when mayhem broke out between the person who inspired the blog and a loyal friend of the 'ringleader' of the dark side.

I then deleted my account.

I came to the conclusion that there was no saving Yuwie.

Why?

How can you save what doesn't want to be saved? How can you teach others how to behave ethically, when they have only greed in their heart?

I have seen what people are capable of when given free reign and a promise of getting rich.

Yuwie's administrator started Yuwie with the promise it would be a 'family' site. In the early days people were locked for showing to much skin, now they are locked for 'not keeping social networking fun'.

What he means by this is; "If you don't agree with my decisions, leave." I can't count the number of times I have been told this when I disagreed with site policy.

I have seen the difference in how the two groups are treated. Those who bully and harass others are promoted because they have massive down lines and those who may not have the following, but are active and vocal are told to go back to MySpace.

The members with the numbers can get away with flaming, ethnic jokes, gender slurs, sexual innuendos and cheating with the explanation of 'not enough proof' when screen shots are sent to the administrator. He has chosen his wallet over his 'family values'.

If you are thinking that this is just the way of the world and wondering why it bothers me, I would say to you that the world is the way it is today, with all the acceptance of greed, avarice and hatred (especially on the net) because decent people are shouted down and laughed at. Rather than stand up and expose this, many shut up and sit down. This is unacceptable to me.

Who wants to stand up and speak for values and character in any part of our society, when those who do stand up for what is right and good are targeted by bullies and penalized by authority?

I quit using my MySpace account when cliques and bullies took over there. I quit Yuwie for the same reason.

But I will not be silent. I encourage all who read this to defend honor, ethical behavior and decency on the Internet. We are given a grand tool for communication here. And my hope is that we don't squander it by allowing our dark side to over rule.

Pyramadness

I'm sure all of you recognise this shape. Yes, it's a square based pyramid. This particular one has each face in a different colour, That's because I'd like to show you the four separate faces of the pyramid. Most people only ever see one. Well, that's not strictly true. You do see all of them but you don't necessarily recognise them as such. Hopefully, by the time we reach the end of this blog, you'll be able to see them all much more clearly. You're going to have to do a little bit of maths, nothing complicated, just some simple multiplication; and a little thinking outside of the box, so to speak. Are you ready? Then let's start with the first face; the easy one.

Mystery

This is the one that everybody sees, the face of Mystery. The most famous pyramids in the world are those which stand on the Giza Plateau in Egypt. Beloved of mystery fans and conspiracy theorists the world over, more has probably been written about these ancient structures, than any other buildings in the world. And yet so little is truly understood. Nobody really knows for certain who built them, why they were built, or how they were built. You can search the internet for weeks and find countless theories from the worlds of archaeology, astronomy, astrology and loads of other -ology's. Are they tombs? Are they acoustic generators? Are they observatories? Or are they portals to other dimensions? Who knows, but my money says someone out there does. They're just not telling. Or maybe we can't read their writing?

Of course, these aren't the only pyramids in the world. You'll find them everywhere, even in Australia! All these are from the ancient world, but there are also many modern ones scattered about. This is only to be expected, as the pyramid has a high visual impact when used in architectural design, like the one in front of the Louvre in Paris.

Then there are the ones you don't notice, and the ones you see all the time, but have become part of the background. Okay, enough of this one. You can have a look at all of this at your leisure. Now it's time to take off the tin foil and put on your thinking caps. Here's another face of the pyramid to look at.

Illusion

This one's closer to home. In fact it's right under your nose, staring you in the face, but you can't see it. Why not? Because this is the face of Illusion, where the magicians deceive you with their sleight of hand. Ever wondered what goes on behind David Copperfield's curtain? Trickery, that's all, simple trickery. This face of the pyramid is like an optical illusion, where your brain tells you you're looking at one thing, but in fact it's something quite different. So let's pull the curtain back and take a closer look.

Does this look familiar? Where have I seen something like this before....

To view this illustration of how pyramid schemes can become unsustainable, in it's original context, then go here. Or you can find another explanation of them here. And if that's not enough for you, then ask the US Federal Trade Commission for their advice. Yes, I can hear what you're thinking - "But we aren't in a pyramid selling scheme, we haven't invested anything and we're not selling anything." Think again.

1. You are investing a lot of your time chasing pageviews and referrals, time = money; or don't you value your time? This may not be in monetary terms, but in terms of other things you could be doing with your time.

2. You are selling promises of financial gain to all your referrals, by telling them they can earn money.

There is a mathematical proof of why most people in pyramid schemes lose money, and you can work through it if you like.

If you're finding all this maths confusing, let me try and simplify it for you. According to a certain promotional video, all you need to make $1,000 a month, is a referral tree of approx 80,000 people (numbers rounded down for convenience and assuming an RSR of $0.50), and even if you're only 10% successful you'll make $100/month from 8,000 referrals.

Happy with these figures? Okay, lets take a closer look behind the curtain, at all the pyramids you can't see. What, you thought there was only one pyramid? Oh no my friends, that is the illusion. You each have your own little pyramid. As each sign up can only be included in one person's referral tree, then every member has to have their own little pyramid of referrals. Are you with me? So lets assume a membership of say 500,000. For each of these 500,000 members to earn $100/month, they all must have their own little referral tree, or pyramid, of 8,000 referrals, yes?

Now for some simple maths



500,000 x 8,000 = 4,000,000,000 0r 4 billion.




Any bells ringing yet? They should be. For 500,000 people to make $100/month, the total membership required is 4 billion people. At the last count, the world's population stood at roughly 6.5 billion. So signing up 4 billion people, though technically feasible, is extremely unlikely to say the least. For one thing, you would need a database server the size of a small building, and there aren't enough computers to go round anyway. Oh, and if 500,000 of you want to make $1,000/month, then you'll obviously need a membership of 40 billion. You can juggle the RSR as much as you want, the basic maths are inescapable. For example, let's raise the RSR to $5.00; you'll still need a membership of 400 million for 500,000 to make $100/month. Anyone out there got a radio telescope and a Neptunian phrasebook?

Now, did anyone notice that the last two paragraphs, from "Happy with these figures.. to ...Neptunian phrasebook" were incorrect? My own little sleight of hand, or should I say word. There is a deliberate mistake in there somewhere, if you spot it you can always tell me about it in a comment. I included this little section to show just how easy it is to mislead people with words and numbers, and to have a little laugh and maybe raise a smile or two. But how many of you did I have believing me? Not that you'll admit to it. But beware, there are many conjurors out there who don't have such scruples, never mind morals or ethics.

None of this changes the basic fact that pyramid schemes are inherently unsustainable. They will always reach a tipping point where it becomes clear that there are no more referrals to be had (pun intended). Such a tipping point may be reached for any number of reasons, not just the extreme ones e.g. population or computer limits outlined above. Think, for just a few minutes about the following. When the tipping point is reached and there are no more referrals to be had anywhere, then those on the bottom level of the pyramid will see that they are never going to get many referrals and will leave the pyramid. Now the next level up becomes the bottom and once they get wise to the lack of possible referrals, they will leave. This process will repeat itself all the way up the pyramid until the whole thing crumbles into dust. This is what happens to pyramid schemes in the real world and is the reason why they all inevitably collapse.

The only way in which this collapse can be prevented is by having the lower levels of the pyramid filled with people who cannot see this; or by keeping these lower level members trapped within the pyramid using some form of control mechanism. You may get some idea of how such a control system can be implemented in the next face of the pyramid, but again, you might have to think about it, I don't like spelling things out, I prefer people to think for themselves. But if you can't, or won't see this, I leave you to your referral chasing Pyramadness.

Time to move on, if anyone is still with me.

Here is the third face of the pyramid, it's very similar to the last one. Only this time it's not the curtain you have to move. You have to remove that $100 bill blindfold from your eyes to see this one.

Exploitation

This is an artistic representation of the capitalist system. Capitalism is the most prevalent socio-political-economic system in the world. Capitalism is based on the exploitation of the many by the few. The masses at the bottom do all the work, so that the minority elite at the top don't have to do anything but reap the profits. If you refer back to the second face of the pyramid, and your little pyramids here, then you will see that the bulk of your money comes from the efforts of others below you.

To illustrate what great benefits have been brought to the majority of the people by capitalism, let's use that most shining example of free enterprise and market forces, the flagship of capitalism itself - America.

The top ten percent of the U.S. population owns 81.8 percent of the real estate, 81.2 percent of the stock, and 88 percent of the bonds. (Federal Reserve Bank data in Left Business Observer, No. 72, Apr. 3, 1996, p. 5).

One percent of the U.S. population owns sixty percent of the stock and forty percent of the total wealth. (Hawken, Paul, The Ecology of Commerce: A Declaration of Sustainability. New York: HarperBusiness, 1993).

These figures are old now, so a more up to date picture is needed. Pay particular attention to figures 1. and 7.

American dream? Welcome to real world nightmare.

It doesn't look any better elsewhere either.

But hey, if you're okay with reinforcing the mindset which has produced such extreme inequalities of wealth, and it's consequent levels of poverty, degradation and starvation, don't let me stop you; go ahead and exploit! Get your downline active, get them producing content, while you sit back and tell us all about your referral stats and monthly earnings. Crack the whip a bit if you have to. I'm sorry if I can't join you in this enterprise, but I have things called morals and ethics that sort of get in the way of stuff like this. I'm one of those strange people who believe in making money from their own efforts, and not off the backs of others.

Now it's time to look at the last face of the pyramid, the most elusive of all.

Control

This one is harder to see, because it's symbolic and once again, closely related to the one above - Exploitation. It is all around you.

General

Colonel Colonel

Major Major Major

Captain Captain Captain Captain

Lieutenant Lieutenant Lieutenant Lieutenant Lieutenant

sergeant sergeant sergeant sergeant sergeant sergeant sergeant

corporal corporal cororal corporal corporal corporal corporal corporal

private private private private private private private private private private private

The words are completely interchangeable. You could use: Pope, bishop, cardinal...; CEO, manager, office boy etc. This is a command structure, based on lines of power and control. Orders come from the top and filter their way down. It is man-made, static and inflexible. Power cascades down this face of the pyramid in an ever diluting stream of control, until it reaches the bottom and trickles away. Water does not flow uphill; and neither does power or control. As I said, this is the most elusive of the pyramid's faces, it is always hidden. But it is symbolised in every pyramid that has ever been built. Empire is built on power and control, and wherever you find Empire, you will find a pyramid.

And so endeth our tour of the pyramid. But I haven't finished yet. Now I'd like to introduce you to another structure, an alternative to the pyramid if you like. This one is even more common than the pyramid, and has been around for a lot longer. It has been neglected for the last few thousand years though, and is in need of a good dust down and some serious redevelopment. It, like the pyramid, comes in different sizes. First we'll take a look at the biggest there is.

This image is known as the Ultra Deep Field, a picture taken by the Hubble space telescope, as it focused on a small, insignificant patch of bare sky for 11 days. There are 10,000 galaxies in this picture, each containing millions and millions of stars, each star like our sun. Every one of these celestial bodies are separate, and held apart by gravitational forces. Waves of electromagnetic radiation travel between them, across countless billions of light years of space. This is a small piece of the infinite network that is the universe. A place where stars are born, burn brightly, and in their turn, die, to be replaced by others, in an eternal dance of majestic illumination. If this image doesn't hold you in both colossal awe and humbling insignifigance, then I don't know what ever will.

Now before you get too dizzy, I'm going to take you back to earth. Here is a much smaller version, too small for you to see without the aid of an electron microscope. It isn't so much under your nose, as behind it.

This is a graphic representation of a neural network in the human brain. What you see here are several neurons (nerve cells), each having many branches or dendrites. The dendrites connect with other neurons, and electro-chemical signals are passed from neuron to neuron throughout the network. This enables the brain to pass on specific instructions to different parts of the body, resulting in physical or hormonal responses. Without getting too technical, the system works as follows. When you learn a skill, such as playing a musical instrument, you repeat certain actions over and over again. The more these actions are repeated, the more connections are made between individual neurons, needed to pass on the necessary instructions to make your body perform these actions. This reinforces the particular neural network responsible for controlling the physical responses involved in these actions. In other words, the more you perform certain actions, the stronger the neural network becomes, and the better you become at playing the instrument, as your brain becomes quicker at transmitting instructions to your body. Practice makes perfect. Conversely, if you stop performing a physical action, the connections within an individual neural network become unused and they begin to break. If this situation continues then you will have to re-learn the skill, as the neural network will deteriorate, and it will take the brain much longer to transmit the necessary signals telling your body what to do.

So much for basic neurology. Now let's have a look at a similar kind of network, whose scale is in between these two examples, one you're all more familiar with.

This is a small scale representation of the internet. A bunch of computers, all connected to each other by electromagnetic signals transmitted via cables and radio waves. The net is a huge place, containing many small, individual networks, such as social networking sites, which connect millions of people all over the planet. As you know, there are many of these little networks. To get a better picture of an individual social networking site in practice, here's a graphic produced by a member of Flickr.com, depicting the social structure of Flickr in April 2005. I had to reduce this image but you can view it at it's original size on GustavoG's Flickr page.

Flickr.com is a social networking site based on the sharing of photographic images between it's members. In this picture of the "Flickrverse" are all the individual members, the connections between them are the links between flickr friends, just like other social networking sites. You should by now begin to see the striking similarities between the three networks I have shown you. Two of these are natural systems, while the Flickrverse is man-made. However, it is an almost perfect analogue of those natural systems. Superficially, all three appear random and chaotic in nature, but each individual is intimately connected, either directly, or indirectly through other members of the network, to every other individual, in a deceptively organised, coordinated system. All three of these networks are constantly changing, continually evolving systems, which grow over time in an ongoing, organic process.

Compare them with the static, inflexible, man-made and, ultimately, unsustainable structure that is the pyramid.

Pyramids lie all around the world, crumbling back into the dust from which they came, ancient remnants of unsustainable man-made systems; while the natural networks of the universe and the human brain continue to grow and evolve. And now, out here in cyberspace, where similar networks are connecting together individual humans, in an evolving, collective consciousness, the pyramids are being built again. All over the internet, these structures of power and control, with their faces of Illusion and Exploitation, are beginning to emerge, each one based on that most deceptive of all man's creations - money.

Of course, there is no reason why the members of a social networking site cannot be rewarded financially for their efforts. But it does not have to be by a referral system, which only encourages a pageview mentality, enabling advertisers to receive as many ad impressions as they can get, at the expense of members putting real content on their sites; and viewing that of other members. Maybe a better system would be to reward members, proportionally, for the number of comments on their blogs, pictures and videos, rather than pageviews. This may encourage people to put more real content on their pages; and to spend more time learning about other members. You only have to look around this site to see blogs full of referral stats and monthly earnings. Look at the number of casual comments for the sake of a page view, compared to thoughtful comments on your blogs, pictures and videos. Where are the slices of people's lives, their hopes and dreams, their fears and nightmares? Where are people's opinions on the state of the world and their own personal rants? Where are the blogs informing us of things which others think we should be aware? Where are the funny stories to make us laugh out loud and brighten our day? Buried under a pyramid of business presentations and links to get-rich-quick schemes.

Social networks are powerful things. Not only do they connect people all around the world, but they can unify, and bring together individuals, separated by thousands of miles, into a single chorus, with a voice that is loud enough to be heard half a world away. Some of you have seen this voice in action recently, when members of this and other networks, joined together in a concerted effort to put an end to a so called "art exhibit", which was nothing more than a sadistic peep show. This is the power of many. This is the power that can bring about effective change for the greater good. This is the power that is generated when I becomes we. We the People.

So far, I have asked you to think about lots of things, and asked you to question many others. Now it is time for me to ask my final question. What is the future of social networking - and the internet itself - to be? It is in your hands. You are the people who make social networking work. You are the people whom these sites depend upon for their existence - not corporate advertisers. It is you who provide all of the content. It is you who will determine how the landscape of the cyberverse evolves.

So what would you like to see, when you login and open your window onto the cyberverse? Row upon row of dusty pyramids, or a virtual biosphere of interwoven, interlocking, organic, open-ended networks; where one is all, and all are one?

Well here's your chance to air your views. Vote now

Online Surveys & Market Research

Great Expectations

"Now, I return to this young fellow. And the communication I have got to make is, that he has great expectations."
- Charles Dickens

There are, at the time of writing this blog, 874,841 members on Yuwie. Out of that total membership, there are many who believe that you can actually earn a reasonable amount of money on Yuwie. The question is, just how true is that?

To answer this question we first have to establish what a 'reasonable amount of money' is. This is a moot point so I'm going to offer up the sum of $10 a month as an arbitrary figure. This isn't going to pay off your mortgage but it will get you a couple of celebratory drinks or a meal once a month. Some people may wish to aim a little higher but for now we'll leave it at $10.

Secondly, we need to clarify exactly how you earn money on Yuwie. As you all should know, your earnings are determined by two factors:

1)The number of page views you accumulate, both from your own time spent on Yuwie and that of your referrals.
2) The RSR or revenue sharing rate, which is determined by the site owner, based on the level of advertising revenue generated by the site each month. If you want to know how the RSR is determined then you'll have to ask the site owner.

As the RSR is variable and set by the site owner, you have no direct control over it. The only way in which you can have any influence on it is indirectly - by the total number of page views the site generates overall and the number of times that ads are clicked on, and clicked through. It is fair to assume that the higher the total number of page views and ad clicks, the greater the advertisng revenues will be. This in turn should lead to a higher RSR, ultimately raising the level of earnings of all members.

So that is how you earn money on Yuwie. The next step is how much money can you earn? In theory there is no limit and I'm sure you're all familiar with the table showing how much you can earn so I'm not going to bother reproducing that here. But that is the theory, what about in practice? Now it's time for a reality check.

The graph below was constructed using the data obtained from blogs posted by four members and my own personal earnings and referral stats. All of this data relates to early 2008, so it's over a year old. However, the basic principle behind the graph will, I suggest, remain the same. I am, like anyone else should be, open to question, so if you believe that what the graph shows is not a reasonably accurate representation of the situation today, then I invite any members to send me their current earnings and referral stats and I will gladly construct another from current data.

The blogs used were these:

Christina 1
Christina 2
Thomas 1
Thomas 2
Sherry 1
Sherry 2
Superman

NB The data for Superman was taken from his blogs which were posted when I originally collected the data. As they are no longer up then I cannot confirm the figures for referral totals and rank. But they were for April 2008. The earnings figure however is in his blog above.

The values at the top of the graph are:

1) Refs = total referrals
2) Rank = total views


The x axis shows page views in millions and the y axis shows monthly earnings in $

The broken lines are added to illustrate the approximate number of page views required to earn $10 or $100 a month.

The points on the graph are the monthly earnings relating to the page views, at that time, of the members shown.

Yes it's a roughly drawn graph because I don't have any software that would produce a nice, perfectly plotted one. Yes it's constructed from a limited data set, but as I said earlier, I'm quite happy to use a lot more data if I have access to it. For those who may doubt either my ability to produce this graph or my credentials in handling such data and using it to produce a graph like this, then I offer the following.

I have an academic background which covers general scientific qualifications, higher chemistry qualifications and a BSc(hons) degree in Environmental Science. I have over 7 years experience of working within the Research & Development section of a major refractories producer based in the UK with overseas divisions around the world. I am accustomed to obtaining data from a range of experimental scientific work, analysing it and presenting the results either in statistical or graphical form. Personally, I think I'm more than qualified to produce a basic graph like this, I've done hundreds of them.

So here it is.

Before I go any further I should explain something about this graph that a lot of you may not be aware of. As you can see it is not a straight line but a curve. This is because a straight line graph results from data based on an arithmetric progression i.e. 1, 2, 3, 4, ..., rather than a geometric progression i.e. 1, 2, 4, 8, 16... Because your referrals increase geometrically i.e. 3, 9, 27.. then a graph based on such data will result in an exponential curve like the one shown above. A minor point but I thought I had better explain why it was a curve and not a straight line.

Right, down to the important business here.

What this graph effectively shows is the number of page views you will need to accumulate in order to earn a given amount of money per month e.g. if you want to earn $100 a month then you will need approximately 3,000,000 page views each month. In essence it gives you a rough guide on how much money you can expect to earn based on how many page views you have. I must stress that it is a ROUGH GUIDE because your earnings are dependent upon the RSR for each month. Also, because of the different earnings percentages applied to each referral level, you should not expect your earnings to fall exactly on the curve, they will be scattered around it but will be more or less in line with the curve itself.

So there's your rough guide to how much you can expect to earn on Yuwie, based on the number of page views you receive per month. Now is there anything else you can take from this graph? Yes, there is.

1) You are never going to earn a lot of money by chasing page views. To earn $10 a month you will need about 500,000 page views. To reach this target on your own is physically impossible - unless of course you live on a planet where there are 100 hours in a day - and you would have to be clinically insane to even attempt it. All of this comment ping-pong; you-rate-me-and-I'll-rate-you; post a comment blog and you'll get loads of page views; give me, give me page views etc merely qualifies you for a holiday in the bouncy room.

So why do people (especially those in your 'upline' who are telling you that they're helping you) say that this is the way to go? Because it earns THEM money. Whether they are aware of this or not is either a case of being motivated by greed; or uninformed, learned behaviour; respectively. Judge for yourselves.

2) The only way that you are going to achieve 500,000 or more page views is by signing up lots of referrals underneath you. If you look at the figures for total referrals at the top of the graph, you will see just how many (approximately) referrals you will need to earn a given amount of money per month. For instance, if you draw a straight line up from the $10/500,000 page view mark, you will see that you need to have somewhere between 1,000 and 12,000 referrals. It's hard to say exactly how many without plotting earnings against referrals on logarithmic graph paper. You must judge for yourselves what the chances are of obtaining this many referrals.

3) Now turn your attention to the ranking figures which are based on the total number of page views a member has per month. This is the really good part. My ranking was 777 then (it's now 1405). The site membership then was about 750,000. This means that there were 776 members above me in the rankings, which leaves about 749,000 members below me, all squeezed into the tiny gap between me and 0. This means that all 749,000 of them were earning less than me - $1.62. If you can't see what this means - and I do hesitate to call anyone stupid, but if the cape (sic) fits then wear it - let me spell it out for you in simple terms. 776 out of 749,000 = 0.1%, I repeat 0.1%. Are you with me yet? Okay, I will spell it out. This is the way it is, 99.9% of the membership of this site can expect to earn less than what I'm earning.

4)The main curve is drawn in a solid line and labelled(1). The broken line curve labelled(2) represents the shift in the main curve(1) if there was an increase in the following variables:

a) Page views; b) RSR; c) Total site membership

The broken line curve labelled(3) represents the shift in the main curve(1) if there was a decrease in these same variables.

I have included these to illustrate the point that any variations in the values above, whether positive or negative, has a greater effect at the top of the curve than it does at the bottom. That is because it is an exponential curve, it's in the nature of the beast.

So there you have it, a rough guide to how much money you can expect to earn on Yuwie. This is the business side of the site and what you take from this blog will be up to you, because as y-guy says - "Use this site as it should be used, for social networking and let the money take care of itself."

It should be noted that the same principles outlined above are equally applicable to all other sites whose payment structure is based on a referral pyramid system. These are the reasons why pyramid schemes are illegal. But remember that Yuwie is not a pyramid scheme because you are not selling anything.

From an Ex User of Yuwie

Just a few minutes ago I deleted my Yuwie account.
Just got to tired of dealing with people who are hell bent on destroying the site. Couldn't make myself stick around to watch.

Yuwie started out a great place. It's turned into a not so great place.

Unless you belong to the favored group, the ones with extensive down lines, unless you are one who bring in lots of page views; your voice means nothing. You are expected to tow the party line and agree with whatever the administrator says is necessary. If you shake your head yes and say what the administrator wants to hear...you are rewarded with a radio show and free reign to bash and harass your fellow members.

Cliques, censorship, blame games, cheaters, bullies, and back stabbing galore! Yep, it's matured into a regular grown up social network. Long gone are the days of camaraderie, helpfulness, pleasant people sharing hints on how to succeed. Now we have a microcosm of the bigger, real world...with all it's attending problems. And the administrator can't seem to get a handle on it all. It's a MySpace waiting to happen. Law suits are just around the corner if those who feel cheated out of page views and members who've been bullied off the site do not get a voice and some satisfaction.

Everyone looking out for the other guy has now turned into everyone watching their back afraid of adding the 'wrong' person and getting locked (locked is when you can't use your profile to obtain page views) or of being bullied or cheated.

Greed is killing Yuwie.

There are still those who try and make the site respectable and dignified. Talented and bright, intelligent folks who try to raise the level of fun to something resembling civilized. Those who write poetry and make music, those who write socially conscious blogs and funny folks who write to entertain. Those who try to bring others UP to their level...instead of giving in and wallowing in the cesspool of dirty jokes, sexual innuendo, ethnic and gender slurs, bashing and harassing others. But they are getting fewer and farther between as many long time members leave.



I realize that it takes all kinds to make up what is called society. I mean, we NEED all kinds to keep it interesting. Right? There is a time for light hearted fun, there is a place for serious thinking and I support it all. What I cannot and would not support is the middle -school clique mentality being supported by administration in the form of favoritism.

If you are not making the site any money by bringing in massive amounts of referrals and getting the page views to go with it, you are nothing. You have no voice in policy and at any time you do venture to speak out, the dogs are called on you and you get bashed all over the site. Let's keep social networking 'fun' is the buzz word now on Yuwie. But you are not allowed to question Big Brother!

So what if you got locked for not agreeing with a new policy...shut up, sit down and HAVE FUN!

I guess I am mad...angry! I invested two years and got no where...except new ulcers for caring if it succeeded or failed.

I will post more later. When I calm down.