Adam1222

I'm not loyal. I unsubscribed over a year ago based on your FT conduct and the lack of quality. Not going to go back and give you the benefit of another page view, since you'd count it as "proof" of high quality. But either your English is so bad you can't in retrospect go back and see obvious grammar errors, or you're just too stubborn to admit fallibility. Perhaps a little of both?

(P.S. A comma is not the proper punctuation mark in to follow "It's funny" in your reply. Maybe Randy can spring for a few copies of Strunk and White.)

Flamenguista

I enjoy reading a lot of these points blogs, including your blog, so I'm pretty neutral here. I'll preface this by saying 3 things:
1) I'm an engineer, so my writing is horrendous.
2) I'm fluent in another language and realize how hard it is to write and express yourself in a 2nd language.
3) I never complain about anybody's grammar, whether formal or informal.

However, with all do respect, I have a hard time getting through your articles. I find myself having to go back and reread many statements, then pause to try to decipher the line of thought. I would consider actually taking the advice of some of the posters on Flyertalk (regardless of the tone they use), instead of constantly defending your writing skills in a very irritating way.

Astrophsx

I realize that the conversation in this thread is dominated by a few individuals, but this is feedback that a lot of blogs (not just Rene or travel blogs) need.

I have no idea how much money it costs to hire an individual or service to copy edit, proof read, or whatever... but if I had genuine feedback about my writing skills and was making enough of an income off a blog I would seriously consider spending some money on improving the product that makes me money.

Rene has pointed out that his numbers are growing. Which is great for him. It shows that there are people that are returning to read his content and his following is growing. I'm not in the business of writing, but if I were... and I was given awards based upon readers voting for me... I would continue to do as much as possible at improving the quality of my content and the quality of my writing. I'd feel like I'd owe it to those people who take the time to read my content. Who invite their friends to visit my blog, click my links, share my stories, etc... One of my favorite parts of my work is getting feedback. I love when people appreciate the work that I do and I also enjoy negative feedback because I want to grow and I enjoy a challenge. Hopefully Rene is the same way.

foreigncontent

But then i think you get in the issue of Quality vs Speed. René seems to have updated with the mass shooting approach, at the cost of some quality. If that brings him the level of people he wants, and makes him happy to be number 8, who are we to judge. we just won't be in his numbers.

Mountain Trader

Sad to see such poor use of English. I guess your 'loyal readers' don't care (or perhaps don't know better).

Adam1222

Who are we to judge? Educated consumers? Sophisticated readers?
There will always be people who like cruddy products. That doesn't invalidate contrary opinions.

Moreover, and to the point suggesting that my post had an improper "tone," Rene has brought the tone and criticism upon himself by repeatedly insisting he has a high quality product and that he is intellectually and morally superior to basically everyone on the planet. If he either (1) ignored or (2) graciously acknowledged criticism, we wouldn't be talking about him. But he knows that people end up clicking on his links to see how awful it is. I thought about printing out a blog post and using it for an editing exercise in a 6th grade writing class, but Id have to visit many of his pages to find one that the errors weren't too easy to find. Maybe his other readers use his blog for the same purpose.

Renes Points

If you notice my post you will see I purchased two of them. Will be sure to review once I have them in had and am using. Deal is dead btw.

tom911

But you have not yet road tested it and owned it for weeks/months to offer a perspective as a "user" of the product. Your recommendation, from what I see, is solely based on the great price. Do you own any other Gatcepot products? Have you found them reliable and safe to use with your devices?

Amazon, if you want to rely on that, offers 20 critical reviews (of 91 total) of the product. The first negative one that came up for me was about the item falling apart when unplugged. Just too many negative reviews there for me to want to touch it. Only 67% of purchasers there give it 5*.

I'll be looking forward to your review, either positive or negative.

Astrophsx

Didn't someone point out in the comments that this is the typical price for the listed item throughout the year?

Also, doesn't Lucky earn a referral commission on whatever someone purchases from Amazon within 24 hours of clicking on the link?

tom911

So does Rene lose revenue when another blogger publishes his Amazon deal, whatever it is? Wouldn't they use their own affiliate link so they get the commission, versus using Rene's?

josephstern

I think you mean "loyalty" readers as in this quote:

"Thom also shocked me during the part when he mentioned he (or Marriott) felt someone who stayed 100 nights a year was loyalty to Marriott."

Ironically, the end of that same paragraph has this sentence:

"Maybe he is not quite carefully reading the qualifications for SPG Platinum."

Apparently, careful reading is something that René does?

In any event, I just recently added this blog to my Feedly, but it's been a struggle to read it for a few reasons. Now, seeing that my FT brethren are not finding a lot of value here, I'll delete it. There's a lot of good content out there and never enough time.

nineworldseries

He is so [redacted] that he just posted about how there are "dedicated HATE sites" [sic] out there on the web conspiring against him.

http://renespoints.boardingarea.com/...ance-3cpm-bbq/

sbm12

There is a twitter parody account out there.

Adam1222

I believe the Southern Poverty Law Center keeps track of hate sites.

MCIUnitedGuy

I'd be worried I wouldn't be able to tell....