I've been shedding a few tears this afternoon over some photos over at The Big Picture in observation of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

If you hadn't seen it before, The Big Picture is an amazing idea created by The Boston Globe, a regular photoblog that curates some stunning sets of photographs from the wire, and features them at huge size. A simple and powerful idea. And today's images of the brave children fighting their battle against cancer (including some who have since passed away) really moved me.

The objective of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month is to spotlight childhood cancer and survivorship issues related to childhood cancer nationally. Donations can be made here via credit card.
Now, go home and spend the weekend with people you love :)

You know, we really shouldn't be joking about this anymore. I'm starting to get really freaked out at the thought that so many people in this country can watch this and not go "WTF???"
Sarah Palin is more like a SNL character than Tina Fey.

About 20 years ago, I tried to get a film documentary off the ground about The Flat Earth Society. It always fascinated me that, in the face of just overwhelming facts about the Earth's spherical attributes, these people really truly believed in something that just COULDN'T be true. It goes beyond denial - it's a conviction to an untenable dogma that approaches - well - religious intensity.

Over the years, I occasionally come across people with similarly steadfast and irrational beliefs - Creationists, 9-11 conspiracists, Bush supporters. People who's ability to deny facts that so abrasively rub them in the face that their intellectual nerve endings become deadened.

And so, today, there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth over on the Clay Aiken messageboards, from the legions of fans who just cannot believe in their hearts that their hunk of a man prefers other hunks of men. Some of the comments over here are just too amazing to believe (remember, it's Clay Aiken we're talking about):

I still love him but I'm having some difficulty processing this information.

You are? Why?

This is a gut wrenching day for The ClayNation. Somebody wake me up, I hope its a dream.

Nope, sorry, but I actually think you've been sleeping too long.

please tell me I'm not the only one who is shocked beyond belief! I feel numb I'm so upset. This can't be real!! How can you guys say this won't change anything? This changes EVERYTHING. I don't even know what to think right now.

Maybe you should think "what the fuck was I thinking?"

I can't look at him the same way again and this is killing me. I want SO bad to feel the same about him but right now I just can't. And the funny thing is I have NO problem with gay people.

Yes, funny thing that. Actually you might want to rethink that whole tolerance bit.

Some of the best 'boyfriends' that I've ever had were gay!

See, you and Clay really do have so much in common.

I have put Clay before God, my husband and my children and friends, often times.

What the... what? Really? I mean, seriously, before your husband and children? Clay Aiken??? i repeat... what the????

And so it goes, for another 70 pages that read like the new testament of the dark underbelly of American pop culture, with Perez Hilton as its high priest. I'm throwing up in my mouth a little even as I type.

I was looking through our back archive, and came upon this goodie, and thought it was worth resurrecting for the new generation of YBNBY readers. Hey, it's not a repeat if it's new to you.

Meet Joel Levinson. He enters into competitions and wins shit for free.

No seriously, that's what he does. A professional contest entrant, he's a man taking advantage of every ad agency's current fad - getting their clients to do Consumer Generated Competitions. And it seems to be working - by rallying a social network of friends to vote for him in competitions via Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube, he scores pretty highly. He's "visited 6 continents for free thanks to contests (if you count Dubai as Asia) in just 2 years" and just a couple of weeks ago, won $100,000 in a Klondike Competition.

I find a lot of comfort in the anarchy he's seeding. By following the rules, and pimping himself out to any and all brands at their request, he demonstrates exactly what they all hope isn't true - that brand loyalty means nothing when you're faced with shit for free offered by a competitor:

"Give me shit for free, and I’ll use your brand.” That’s basically it. For example, there’s good and bad shaving cream, but I will tend towards the free shaving cream over both. And guess what, no matter how good your brand is, I will probably give up on it as soon as someone else gives me better shaving cream.

Joel Levinson, the patron saint of Capitalism. If he didn't exist, The Onion would have to invent him.
Now, go vote for him over here.

OK, we've solved Chop Shop T shirt puzzles, we've tracked down porn stars, we've debated politics. Now I need to all to help us solve a conundrum that actually helps us writers here at YBNBY.

Here's a post over on TechCrunch that gives some new stats about blogs and income, with the following generalization:

Among those with advertising, the mean annual investment in their blog is $1,800, but it’s paying off. The mean annual revenue is $6,000 with $75K+ in revenue for those with 100,000 or more unique visitors per month.

That's my bold, btw. And as you read down the comments, people seem to be agreeing with that - get a site that receives 100k unique visitors a month, and you should be pulling down $75k a year in revenue.

And then we have YesButNoButYes. Which, according to Google Analytics, last month had 250,000 unique visitors. Which is about average (we've maintained that number for over a year now).

And how much revenue did YBNBY pull down from all it's advertising systems COMBINED last month? Before expenses?

$1402.46.
Which means that after we paid our server fees, subscriptions, other costs, and split the revenue between the writers, everyone got a couple hundred bucks each.
I'm not telling you all this to plead poverty - sure, it'd be nice to earn real cash, but we're happy doing this for the love. But after reading that article on Techcrunch, I'm just sitting here wondering, how on earth can we be earning so little from so much?
Any serious thoughts, advice, pointers from the regular suspects, would be VERY appreciated. That is all.

"There's lots of screaming when there's this much at stake"

Very true.

(See after the jump for the original)

Thanks to regular commenter Bigus Dickus for sending me a link to a Wired piece that reveals the inventor of the ☺, which made it's debut exactly 26 years ago today. Truly an auspicious moment, although the history of the smiley is actually a bit more convoluted.

Now, can anyone tell us where LOL and WTF came from?

I am estimating that by about 5pm EST or so today, we'll be welcoming our 15 millionth visitor here at YBNBY. If I happen to notice when the clock ticks over, I'll dig out the stats and tell you all where they came from and what they read. But in case I miss it, hello, don't think we don't appreciate you.

Update: It's somehow apt that our 15 millionth visitor - who hailed from Sciota, Pennsylvania, came in at around 12.45am, and headed straight to Top Ten Female Streakers after searching Google for "Naked Women Athletes".

There's an eloquent and passionate debate going on in the comments of one of our stories, with some poignant and heartfelt comments from our regulars. It covers important issues about democracy, freedom, equality and social and racial injustice. Reading through the comments, I realize that some of the people who frequent YBNBY can write a damn sight better than I ever can, so I advise you all to go take a look. Thanks to everyone who visits here, either as readers or commenters. I'm constantly amazed how many of you love what we do here.

Meanwhile, for the sake of balance, here's a Caption Competition with a turkey gobbling the President's pecker.

Regular writer Johnny Wright has often professed his admiration for Oasis, and while I'm probably not quite so ardent an admirer, this is an incredibly cool marketing strategy. To get the word out about their new album Dig Out Your Soul, Oasis leaked four new tracks. But not in the way you might think.

The band gathered 15 street bands, taught them the songs, and then unleashed them across New York - mainly in subway stations - and allowed each to perform their own interpretations of the new tracks. Each had a sign saying "You are the first to hear this new Oasis song".

Brilliant. Read more of the story at Creativity.

Fifty People, One Question: Restored from Benjamin Reece on Vimeo.

What would you wish for by the end of today? Here's fifty answers in an amazing and poignant film from a very talented filmmaker.

Sometimes you just see a video that makes you go "errr... wtf?" Not since the legendary Parwana have I been so entranced as I am with the Christian-Ska sounds of Sonseed. It's like the bizarre lovechild of The Osmonds and The Specials.

Echowood, this is for you, based on your last post. I first posted this video during YBNBY launch week back in 2005, and I still think it's one of my favorite clips

Thanks to Roger for sending this in.