Everyone has heard of Expert’s Column; it’s a place where writers can get paid to write articles, just like Factoidz. There are thousands of users, and people enjoy their experiences there. The whole idea is great, but the site is adequate at best.
Website Layout
The first thing that I noticed when I entered the homepage were the low-quality images used to create the ‘Pages’ links. They look as though they have been blown up four times their original size. It just doesn’t look professional. The layout is pretty amatuer-looking, also. Everything is squeezed together, making it hard to read anything without straining your eyes.
Main Pages
The pages are kind of ugly. They have random formatting, and pictures are just thrown in. But this is just the beginning. Every page has some sort of extremely evident grammatical or spelling error. I know that the creators of the website are not native English speakers, but that is not even close to an excuse. If these people are judging articles written in English, they need to know how tospeak English. This means that anyone who writes anything will most likely get their articles accepted. That is highly concerning.
Content
Similar to the last section, this section mainly focuses on grammar. Most writers on EC write better than the staff and admins. That’s how bad it is. But that doesn’t mean that they write well. Quite the contrary. In fact, I have yet to see a well written, error-free article on the site. That is not to say that they aren’t there; some Factoidz writers are also on EC. Recently, I read an article that was criticizing Factoidz, because ‘they don’t know grammar’. The author was mad because his articles kept getting rejected. Poor guy.
I decided that I would sign up, and i immediately recieved the following email:
HarryHyper,
Thank you for registering at ExpertsColumn.com. As you know we review each and every account before approval, so you need to answer following queries in order to get your account approved with us;
1) What is your main purpose of joining ExpertsColumn.com?
2) What are your favorite topics to write upon?
3) Would you be publishing fresh, unique and original content here or just re-posting your articles available with other sites?
4) What other sites do you write with? Please clearly mention exact links to your profiles with all those sites.
5) Do you have your own blog/website? Would you be re-posting from that also? Kindly mention the URL of your blog
For step 4 and 5, kindly ensure that you have put the following link i.e. “Expertscolumn.com” on those sites/blogs for verification purposes.
Just answer to our above mentioned questions honestly and we would be glad to approve your account if found satisfied.
If you have any queries or doubts just reply to this email.
Regards
Moderator
Expertscolumn.com
I promptly (and sarcastically) responded with the following:
1) I am joining Experts Column, because I see very low quality content. There are grammatical errors, spelling errors, and other issues. I want to create high-quality articles that people can read without saying, “Huh?”
2) You cannot ‘write upon a topic’, which brings me to my next point: even the staff and admins of EC have horrible grammar. Take this quote, which I found on the Guidelines page, for example: “We know that you love to write columns and we also know that you don’t know how to write “Quality Columns”. So we have compiled this writing guidelines page specially for your help, reading which you can start writing “Quality Columns” and start increasing your reader base. Please check those writing guidelines below”. Reading this, I cringed. How can a website whose staff base does not even know proper English run and judge user-submitted articles? I hope that I do not need to point out specific errors in the quote above, because that was almost COMPLETELY illegible
3) If I published ‘fresh, unique content’, than I would be the first. When I look around the site, I see many of the same things, plus there ARE duplicates from other sites.
4) I write for Factoidz.com. And what does ‘clearly mention exact links’ mean? Should I say something like ‘this link goes to a website called Factoidz, and the color of the link is blue, and it is underlined, and the first letter is capitalized.’? Because I think that is what you just asked me to do.
5) Yes, I have a blog, and I may re-post from time to time. CircuitButter.wordpress.com. Now I will kindly mention the link: ‘have you seen that blue link over there? I like it’s hair.’
I am awe-struck that so many people come to EC, without realizing that the staff are illiterate. It is disgusting that you people actually JUDGE WRITING ABILITIES.
Thanks for your time, and I look forward to an approval email!
Instantly, I found this in my inbox:
Dear harrison taylor
thank you for contacting us. We have received your message and will contact you soon, within 48-72 hours. Sorry for any inconvenience.
Subject: Re: Account details for HarryHyper at Expertscolumn.com (pending
From: harrison taylor
Email: harrison taylor
Regards
The only inconvenience that I experienced was reading their emails. It became quite obvious why I have such a strong opinion about this website. I find it very depressing that people actually depend on EC for information.
Reposted from my Factoidz account.
Circuit Butter 