Phil of PTMoney and friends did a superb job putting everything together.  All aspects were very well organized and very professional: the social events, the programs, the takeaways, everything.  First class from start to finish.  Amazing work Phil!

There was lots of great content in the scheduled presentations, of course.  Those were awesome.

The part of the conference that I was most excited about, though, was being able to meet everyone face to face.  Dozens of attendees I had known online for several years.  (A couple of the guys, Flexo and FMF, I had known over six years, which is a long time for this niche.)  Until this past weekend, though, all but a small handful were “online-only” colleagues.

What a genuinely nice, smart, and friendly group of people!  As well as humble and generous with what they know.

It truly was a pleasure meeting everyone, and I look forward to doing it again soon, and being a better blogging colleague with the added personal dimension.

Thanks guys!

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• Time to get back to basics — a post on the ABC’s of finances
• Allowances for allowances — on the many different ways to handle children’s allowances
• Getting to “no” with a child’s buying habits — “no” shouldn’t be just for parents to say, after all
• Our big spending weakness — you didn’t think I was perfect, did you?  Of course not
• What I did when my wife lost her wallet — an ounce of prevention and quick action go a long way
• Don’t worry about hitting the next tax bracket — it’s probably not as painful as you think

The complete interview is here. Chris has a nice schedule of shows lined up as well, so be sure to check the schedule and listen to your favorite bloggers and other money experts!

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My ranking at that time was 132,955, which means that precisely 132,954 sites were hipper, cooler, better, and more popular than mine on October 8th, 2010.  (Well, not really, but Alexa would like you to think that.)  In reality, the Alexa rankings can be manipulated to some extent, but there probably are meaningful traffic differences between logarithmic differences in Alexa ranking.  In other words, factors of two probably do tell you something, which is why once a website cracks the magical 200,000 threshold, the next Yakezie goal is to cut the Alexa ranking in half.

Anyway, that doesn’t really matter now.  What is interesting is whether I won or not — that is, did I get my Alexa ranking below 100,000 in time?

Well, darn it, no, I didn’t.  It’s currently 119,009.  My one-month average has been below 100,000 pretty consistently for a couple of weeks, but the 3-month average is the one that’s quoted as the “official” ranking.  Them’s the breaks.  I’ve kept with a higher posting frequency than I did in the middle of last year, but getting into five figures on the Alexa front requires more than just posting more often, and I didn’t do enough of the “more” part.

Nonetheless, I enjoy participating in the Yakezie forums and have made some new friends.  (I’ve also maybe made some new enemies; I’m not always the cuddliest person to be around, nor am I always a cheerleader. )

There continues to be a lot of good things going on over at the Yakezie, so consider checking it out!  I’ll keep on keeping on in the meantime.

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1. Wise Bread
2. Get Rich Slowly
3. The Simple Dollar
4. All Financial Matters
5. Frugal For Life
6. My Money Blog
7. Five Cent Nickel
8. Frugal Dad
9. No Credit Needed
10. Free Money Finance
11. Stop Buying Crap
12. Not Made of Money
13. Consumerism Commentary
14. Budgets Are Sexy
15. Hustler Money Blog
16. Being Frugal
17. Blogging Away Debt
18. Gather Little By Little
19. Credit Panda
20. GRACEful Retirement
21. I’ve Paid Twice for This Already
22. Bargaineering
23. My Budget 360
24. My Two Dollars
25. Lazy Man and Money

Happy New Year!   Be wise with your money in 2011!

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Since I have only a week left to be included in the current Yakezie Challenge, it’s time to make a decision.

Allow me to paraphrase some dialog from a movie from my youth:

Either you Yakezie do “yes” or Yakezie do “no.” You Yakezie do “guess so,”   — SQUISH! — just like grape.

Yakezie do yes. Alexa ranking currently 132,955.  Looking for five digits by January 10, 2011.  Game on.

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Anyway, of much better impact were these posts from the past week:

• Bargaineering discusses the extension of the estate tax.
• Generation X Finance shows some things he does to organize his finances.
• Five Cent Nickel hosts a guest post about whether cash is making a comeback or not.
• Consumerism Commentary wonders where the office gift exchange is this year.
• The Millionaire Nurse asks about what your budget-busters are.
• Tough Money Love says that people think it’s the season to be saving.

I also welcome and thank Fiscal Fizzle for participating in Cash Commons for the first time this week!

Have a great weekend!

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The short version is that bloggers are required to be explicit about their relationships with advertisers so that you can take it into consideration as you evaluate the opinions I present to you.

This post spells out how I handle these disclosures.  There will be a prominent site-wide link to it.  I may also refer to this post on other blogs of mine, as the policies there will be the same as they are here.

• Are there advertisements on this site? Why, thanks for asking!  Yes, they’re are ads on this site.  Like most personal finance bloggers, I earn money through advertisements, and I think they’re pretty easy to spot.  The FTC guide, though, is really all about disclosing things that aren’t obviously ads, so I’ll address that now.
• How do I handle paid posts? I’ve only done a very small number of paid posts, and I don’t believe I’ve done any over the past year.  (Basically, you’d have to dig to find the ones I’ve done.)  How I handled them before (to the best of my knowledge) is that I’ve stated that the subject of the post was a sponsor of the blog, or I’ve disclosed the third-party review broker that paid me for the post.  This is how I will handle all future paid posts.  I’ll state up front that I’ve been compensated for making a post.  Otherwise, you can assume that I have not been paid for writing that post.
• Are guest posts paid? No.  Guest posts are not paid posts, ever.
• How do I handle product reviews? On occasion I will receive a product (usually, but not limited to, a personal finance book or some personal finance software) free of charge in exchange for consideration of writing up a review.  If I write a review of a product, and I received a review copy free of charge, I’ll say so, as in: “The author’s PR firm was kind enough to send me a copy of X.”  (To the best of my knowledge I’ve mentioned it this way with the reviews I’ve already done.)
• How do I handle affiliate programs? Some of the links to various online sellers and service providers from this blog and other blogs of mine are affiliate links.  This means that if you click on one of these links, the merchant (or a third party designated by the merchant) records that I sent you to the merchant, and if you do something — like sign up, or buy something — I get paid for facilitating that transaction.  I haven’t gone to great lengths to point out each and every affiliate link in the past for a few important reasons: (a) I only will have affiliate links to products or services that I already use myself or would use myself, (b) it sometimes ends up costing you less to click through from my site than if you had gone there directly because of special promotions that the merchants were offering at the time, and (c) it will never cost you more than if you had gone to the site directly.  Many of the links from this blog to Amazon.com, EBay.com, Restaurant.com, MyPoints.com, LendingClub.com, ING Direct, credit card offers, MrRebates.com, Intuit products, Prosper.com, and almost all of the links on my coupons page are affiliate links.  If you have particular questions about affiliate links, you’re welcome to contact me, but here are some ways you can identify which links are likely to be affiliate links:
  • The address of the link reads like alphabet soup and doesn’t look like the website you’re being sent to.  (You can see the web address before you click on the link by hovering over the link with your mouse pointer, and looking in (usually) the lower left of your browser window.)
  • The address has the form http://www.mightybargainhunter.com/r/SOMETHING or http://www.mightybargainhunter.com/ref/SOMETHING.

Again, if you have any questions, you’re welcome to leave a comment, or contact me.  Thanks!

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Mighty Bargain Hunter,

Thank you for your recent write-up about Restaurant.com. I appreciate your thorough thoughts and critical look at our site, particularly with your financial savings expertise. I wanted to reach out and address a few points in the piece to clarify our services for you and your visitors.

First, thank you very much for using Restaurant.com. I’m just sorry to hear that you found a favorite restaurant only to discover that it was no longer participating in the program. If your issue was not resolved we will follow up and take care of the matter immediately. Our policy for any similar instance of a restaurant no longer taking part in the program is to issue credit to customers holding their unused gift certificates. That credit can then be applied for thousands of other options on our site. Again, I apologize for the disappointing experience and please do let me know if it’s still unresolved.

Second, a binding contract is in place between restaurant owners and Restaurant.com, requiring restaurants to honor our restaurant gift certificates. The contracts allow us to promote their restaurants and obligate them to honor the certificates. We need a restaurant’s permission and cooperation before ever including them within our program. As long as diners are using the gift certificate according to the stated terms, the restaurant is required to accept the gift certificate. We never like to hear when restaurants fail to hold up their end of our agreement and it’s neither our policy nor our practice to allow restaurants to breach their contracts at the expense of our customers. If there’s ever any doubt, customers can always reach us at 1-800-979-8985 or at info@restaurant.com.

Finally, you are correct to point out that one gift certificate is valid per restaurant per month. This term and others are stated before, during and after purchase. Terms of use are a very important part of using our gift certificates. We post them conspicuously in the following locations:

• Main “Terms” link at the footer of each page
• Within each specific restaurant micro-site page
• On the actual printed gift certificate

I hope the above information answers some of the questions that you raised. I also hope that we can get you back to visit another Restaurant.com restaurant soon!

[ ... ]

Thanks again,

Jeff

Jeff Conlin
VP, PR & Corporate Communications
Restaurant.com

A couple of comments on his note:

1. First, it was not the case that a restaurant failed to honor a certificate that I had printed out because they had dropped out of the program.  The restaurant dropped out of the program entirely, which they are entitled to do, which meant that I could not exchange my Dinner of the Month certificates (essentially uncommitted dining certificates for particular restaurants) for that restaurant anymore.  Every certificate that I’ve printed out for a specific restaurant has been honored.
2. I wasn’t sure about the one certificate per restaurant per month rule, but Jeff clarified that this is true.
3. I’m very satisfied with Restaurant.com and the fact that they took the time to write a note to me improves my feelings about them.

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Now that the hosting platform is in open beta, so am I …

… Please allow me to introduce Cash Commons!

Cash Commons is a place for asking any and all questions about money. Personal finance, debt reduction, student loans, debt consolidation, banking, mortgages, investing, saving money, spending money, and earning money, of course, but also coins, currency, games about money, books about money, money and the Bible, money gurus … anything about money.

I’ve used this platform elsewhere and it’s simply the best knowledge exchange platform I’ve seen.  It’s a joy to use, and it works extremely well at getting the right answers to the top, completely naturally.

Registering is a piece of cake (and you get lots of goodies with your registration, like reputation, badges, stats, the ability to track favorites, etc.), but you can also ask questions without registering if you like.

I’ve already posted a few questions of my own over there, like:

• How to deal with receipts without discarding any of them?
• When are federal income tax rules for a given year firmed up?
• What’s the purpose of a mortgage offset account?

There aren’t any answers (yet) but that’s fine.  I have gotten answers to others, like:

• What are the consequences of having a loan go into forbearance?

These are real money questions I have. I’m not just posting stuff that I know already.  I’d love to have my questions answered, and if you know the answers to any of them, I’d love to hear them.

But presumably you have money questions as well that you want answered, and you can ask, too!

Everyone has the right to use the questions and answers on Cash Commons how they see fit, as long as the source is properly attributed.  This is in accordance with this Creative Commons license.

(I mentioned that this is a beta — meaning that the platform is still under development (as is the website as a whole) so things might not look, or run, exactly right yet.)

What I’m hoping for with Cash Commons is a place for getting rapid, correct answers to all kinds of questions about money, and that we can all learn from one another.  Everyone is an expert in something, and everyone can learn something.

And for now, you’re guaranteed that if you post a question over there I’ll take a crack at answering it.   Care to join?

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