Million Euro Wiki Doubles It’s Productivity
Posted on October 9th, 2007 by John Cow under The NetIf you are new here then you will want to CLICK HERE to enter to WIN a Brand New Amazon Kindle!
These last 12 hours have been quite hectic for us as we were forced to make a hard decision. We have sold the Million Euro Wiki.
Because of some personal stuff that appeared in real life, we found ourselves short of time to commit to keep managing MEW to let it grow to it’s full potential. Since this would not benefit anyone that’s currently active in the MEW community, we made the choice to let new management take it to the next level.
We had emailed all the wiki page owners 12 hours ago with the following message:
-
Hello,
You are receiving this email because you are currently an owner of a
page on the Million Euro Wiki project.
The site is going to be sold. Because of unforeseen circumstances in
our personal life, we currently don’t have the time and bandwidth to
manage MEW. Because this project has great potential, we’ve decided
to get someone in the community to take over. You as a page owner are
obviously aware of what the wiki can do for everyone in the right
hands, otherwise you would not have purchased a page in the first place.
Because we’re not in it for the profit, we’ve decided to make it a
private auction for you guys in the first place. Starting bid is the
same price you’d pay for 1 page –$100. With minimum increments of $25.
This includes the entire site as you can see it now, with all the
customized code and design. Also the forum setup and blog attached to
the site will be included. We’ll be happy to host for free until you
get you own hosting sorted.
We’ve included the rest of the million euro wiki page owners on CC
and ask you to reply to all with your bid so we can all see what the
highest bid is.
We hope you understand that this wasn’t an easy decision to make as
we’re really excited about MEW and it’s potential. It just needs more
attention than we can give it right now.
Kind regards,
www.millioneurowiki.com support staff.
As to be expected, a slight panic occurred and some people had an early knee jerk reaction, which raised concerns if this was not a scam. We won’t post what some people said due to privacy issues, but here’s our next reply:
- Hi all,
First of all, I don’t see what all the commotion is about. You bought
a page on MEW and what you bought is still there isn’t it? It’s still
being promoted, the affiliate model is still in place which
encourages people to promote it themselves. I will still endorse the
program on my blog, being it as an affiliate. As shall the other big
blog names out there. They promoted in because they are affiliates in
the first place. I don’t see them stopping any time soon.
I’ve kept every promise I made, paid every penny earned by the
affiliates, gave away the $400 ipods, paid a lot of money on PR and
getting the script just right. Do you really think that with 73 pages sold,
I have put $7300 in my pocket to walk away with? Well think again.
After the prize-money, affiliates fees, PR costs and initial setup, my “profits” are very slim.
By setting up this private auction, I’m certain to find a suitable or
even better person to run the site because it’s in all our best
interests. If I were to “scam” you folks, I’d be trying to sell off
the site online somewhere for a couple of thousand dollars wouldn’t
I? Or just drop it all together. Not caring who would end up buying
it.
Right now I can screen whoever is committed enough to follow
through. The $100 is a joke in terms of what the site is really
worth, but it keeps the people who’ll just say yes, “I’ll take it”
because it’s for free, from the people who will say yes, “I’ll take
it” because they really care about the project.
I hate to see people already assuming the worst and not having any
faith in the new person that’s going to run things. I will still be
freely available for any kind of promotion, which would serve in my
best interest with the affiliate program in place. One way of
securing the site’s success is for me to keep on to the domain name
until the buyer has proven him or herself “worthy” in your eyes of
running and managing the site. If anything goes wrong, I can take
action to redirect the domain to a mirror site I’ll be running.
Just because there’s a new name running the project, doesn’t mean
it’s not gonna work. My guess is that the site can even become better
with a person who can dedicate more time to it. As I said, I’ll be
available to help out with any questions the new owner will have.
Trust me when I say that this was a hard decision to make, but some
times “real life” gets in the way of things. The people that know me
know how enthusiastic I am about the site and the amounts of work
I’ve put into it. This isn’t about money for me, this is about people
can work together as a community to achieve bigger things.
Kind regards,
www.millioneurowiki.com support staff.
Well the “auction” worked, we managed to find not one but two people from the MEW community who seem to be not only extremely dedicated to take MEW to the next level, they also come with a lot of experience. Also, we wanted to keep it away from the public eye before the perfect solution was found to prevent bashing and accusations we’ve all seen in the past few posts about MEW. The auctions flushed out the people that are really up for the job. We’ve had a lengthy conference call with the new owners to assure they’d be the right choice. And we feel they are.
Here’s a direct quote from an email after we came to this agreement:
-
Re-assure everyone that with 2 - 4 people (partners included) actively marketing MEW that it will fast become the number 1 Million$$Wiki site
Existing Affiliate program and iPod program will remain for existing customers.
This deal was made on the back of a 1 hour conference call to ensure the right people will now run the site.
We are not a couple of young kids making a quick buck, we are in for the long haul and will constantly strive to ensure everyone get value for money.
Regular updates to Main page
Regular Blog updates
We are on a different timezone to most customers so please understand this difference.
We are open for constructive criticism and will act upon feedback from customers and partners as needed.
We will keep promoting the project as we are convinced this will benefit all that are involved in the long run. We feel that with a bigger, more experienced team to lead the growth of the site, this decision was the right one to make for all of us.
Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments, we know you know how to use them. Cow tipping is allowed, we will however moderate useless bashing replies directed at the project itself, as it’s not our own property anymore.
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You gotta do what you gotta do and nobody can tell you otherwise.
I predict this post going for a record number of comments. So come on, what are everyone’s thoughts?
Congratulations on a great launch, and an even greater sell. Who are the new owners by the way?
Congrats on making a successful site! How much did you get from it?
I’m sure you know I’m not a Cow Basher.
Just curious to know who the new owners are and how they intend to further promote MEW.
On a separate track, i would understand how difficult it is to run several heavy lifting projects, couple that with commitments on the real life end and this could really go into overload. Hope you finally got the real life part balanced out.
I heard Terry Wogan was the news owner.
Now, thats funny…
was wondering why CashQuests jumped ship…
PropertyIreland: Here’s an email we received from CashQuests 2 days ago:
show details
Oct 7 (2 days ago)
Quick question: If I were to sell my MEW page, would the new owner get a free coupon code and could I still keep using mine?
Thanks,
CQ
Before you start your silly little games again, this timing was a pure coincidence.
She actually more than doubled her investment on MEW.
At the risk of having my comment deleted for being a “basher”… you say you’re not in it for the money, but then you turn around and run an auction to squeeze the highest sell price (for the site) out of current page owners. How is this not hypocritical?
Also - hanging onto the domain name so that you can redirect it in case the new owners “do something wrong”. How is this different to selling a car but keeping a copy of the key - so that you can repossess if down the track you don’t like the new owner’s driving?
Not meaning to bash. But this is a blog about making mooney, and transparency in the long run is better financially than this subterfuge.
I see Matt Jones of Blogging Fingers is also trying to sell his page again along with CashQuests - does that mean that you are ALL running away and, if so, why?
EuroSkeptic: The auction was to flush out freeloaders. People commit to something they pay for more than something they get for free. Like we said, if we were in it for the money, we would have tried and sell it for a couple of thousand dollars elsewhere. Why “squeeze” out of just 70 people instead of the whole Internet?
As for hanging on to the domain name, that’s to make sure the site goes the way it was intended to go, not that it will be flipped shortly. We’re confident we’ll like the new owners driving as you put it. It’s been set in place for the pageowners, not us.
As far as transparency, how more transparent do we need to be? We’ve showed you all the ins and outs.
Scam: Matt Jones was trying to sell his page since the day he got it. Has nothing to do with MEW now being under new management.
JC - thanks for a straight-up response, your points are noted.
One of the things about the sale I think people will be uncomfortable with is the perception that MEW has been dumped because the originator has turned a quick profit from the initial surge of interest, and is now letting it go to become someone elses problem, along the way breaking any commitments about how far their 75E would go.
I accept the new owners are keen to make a go of it, and yes you have an ongoing financial interest in seeing MEW do well, but MEW no longer has “the cow” truly behind it.
I don’t see an easy solution. You’re entitled to your privacy and I don’t think it’s reasonable to demand the “why” of the personal circumstances which led to the sale. I’m just pointing out this perception can become a serious PR issue longterm for both JC and the new MEW.
Euro Skeptic: As in every change of management, people will be uncomfortable of what things lie ahead.
The fact that there is now a bigger, more experienced team behind MEW means that the site will grow bigger and better.
Like we said, we will keep supporting MEW with a full 100% and this decision shows for it. We could have kept it, spending less time on it and making it mediocre, or recognize what the site needs to flourish and hand it over to someone that can and will commit the time and effort it needs.
You’re right, it’s not an easy solution, but it’s the best one for all that are involved. We truly believe the new owners will take MEW to the next level. Change isn’t always bad.
In my first post about the Million Euro Wiki I said that it was just launching and that people should cash in on the initial buzz. The next post explained how the affiliate program had just launched and that it was a money maker. Then I explained how to actually monetize the page, send traffic to it and outlined my plan about how I was planning to make a quick profit, flip the page and make an exit.
I have explained step by step and extremely openly about what I was doing - not only that but I also explained how you too could make money in a similar fashion.
PropertyIreland and the other doubters have done nothing but criticize and knock the MEW the whole way. I made several hundred dollars from it and if they had followed my lead instead of spending their time trying to bring MEW down, they may have made some money too.
To accuse me of “jumping ship” and “running away” is insulting to your own intelligence.
It’s called “having a plan” - that’s how you make money. I did - they didn’t. Who you gonna listen to?
As johncow said I have planned to sell my page all along. There is no “jumping ship” going on here.
The “Blogging” page is desirable and I knew it was only going to increase in value as the MEW gains backlinks and momentum, the plan has always been to sell it at the right time for me and the advertiser to get a good deal.
Selling it now gives me the benefit of this ‘mini-buzz’ about a change in ownership, and for the buyer they get the peace of mind that the new team is committed to marketing the MEW.
My B.I.N price is very reasonable given the experience of the new management team.
Cow, I really don’t want to get into this nonsense again, but what silly little games did I ever play?
all I ever did was express my own critical opinion on the project and still wished you well with it each time.
if anyone is playing silly little games, i’d say this award would have to go to you, selling out your supporters who bought into this project. If you really still did believe in it, would you really auction off a potential $1,000,000 (your original aim) starting at $100?
CashQuests, I read your blog out of interest, not to follow your every word and treat you like some kind of guru!
Well done for making money on this, i’m still of the opinion that you did jump ship though and you probably annoyed a lot of your readers, just the cost of making you a few $$ i suppose.
@CashQuests
I’d like to correct you on one thing - If you think are making *good* money & you are someone people love to listen to, then its a pity that you YOURSELF ARE INSULTING YOUR OWN INTELLIGENCE. Also, anyone out here who thinks that you are some sort of a guru in making money online are also insulting their own intelligence.
How many times people have bashed you in comments left on johnchow, or for that matter your own blog, for some stupid remarks you make on other people?
If you were *real* big then you wud not have written TONS of crappy paid posts on http://kumikosuzuki.blogspot.com for as low as 5 & 10 dollars. And when you noticed people making fun of you on what you did, you directed the blogspot blog to CashQuests, a couple of days back.
And hey, i make MORE money than you, so its so f***ing stupid to read your tagline on cashquests that says “Better than you at making money online” (no wonder someone must have bashed you AGAIN and you changed the tagline)
You know what?
Fact Number 1 - I make MORE money that you do!
Fact Number 2 - I am better than YOU in making money online
Fact Number 3 - I don’t go around commenting on each money making blog passing remarks to other commentators saying that “i make money, you dont”
& lastly
Fact Number 4 - Have some manners!
I’m open to comments on this comment
I’m not sure Mr. Cow wud publish this comment, but still!
You will never be a success in business unless you plan out your exit strategy from the start. EVER single webpage I ever make is with the intention that I will one day sell it, not keep it and let it grow thats for other people to do.
Kudos to JC for recognizing that to unlock the potential of any site, time must be spent on marketing, building buzz and traffic and having a quality team behind it to ensure ongoing success.
I think the decision here is a good one because it gives the site over to the community that supports it. Whether or not he made a profit is honestly none of our business. He bought the domain, the hosting, spent money marketing it, gave away two iPods…what more does he have to do? As JC stated, selling it would weed out the people that wouldn’t be truly motivated to succeed.
I won’t say much about what everyone is saying as I know everyone will have their own opinion about what’s going on. However I do believe that “shit happens” in life and for better or worse, or for legitimate or lying reasons, whatever the case may be, the site is going to be sold. You may or may not like it, either way, it’s not going to change the fact that it’s going to be sold.
Realistically it is a tough decision on the Cow and he has try to convey that it wasn’t going to be easy on either side. I choose to give him the benefit of the doubt simply because I believe in the type of person he is. Those who don’t know him personally will obviously jump to their own conclusions. I may not know him in person, but in the short time I’ve known him online, he’s kept his words so far. That goes with giving away the free iPods, the money he chose to give out, the contests he’s honored, the whole nine yards. I firmly believe if it was all about the money, he could have made more elsewhere. Whether you like it or not, you don’t need to go bashing on him for what he is doing.
If you feel that the MEW being sold is a bad thing, sell your page to someone else who might want it. Afterall, being one of the first people to get in, you should have gotten prime real estate right? If you were in his shoes, and things happen that you never predicted would occur, what would you do? Try to cut the guy some slack.
I love the way people like to think they have the authority to challenge Bob. He did what he thought was best, and given his personal circumstances, he thought he had to get rid of the site. I think he has done this in a very open manner. So kudos to him and I wish the new owners luck.
(not that I will be buying a page in the near future, personally I think it’s a bit too risky)
Good website flip I guess. The purchase price would be very interesting. I hope the new owners get back their investment as do the current page holders.
I just hope the new owner will handle this website well… Else all the marketing efforts will go down the drain… All the best!
@The Truth
Those “crappy paid posts” paid more than I think you realize thank you very much. Actually I didn’t notice anybody making fun of me (please send me some links to that if they actually exist…) and the site was redirected because PPP was lacking advertisers and it was more profitable to have an entire PR5 site pointing to the new domain.
You make more money than me? Wow…you must be psychic too because I don’t publish my online earnings.
It’s funny how you didn’t like my “better than you tagline”. Funny because you’re reading my site and I’ve never even heard of you. I guess the tagline was pretty accurate.
Congratulations on your manners - it’s good to see that the poor can still be polite to me…although I do question your rather vulgar language. Have a great day!
FFS.This is going to descend into farce soon. Oh wait, here it is, my double helping of, “STAY ON TOPIC.” I don’t care how much money any of you make. I am here to read this blog and not to watch some juvenile pissing contest about who has the most pocket change.
And the truth is, serious people don’t leave anonymous comments.
@cash quests
“because you’re reading my site and I’ve never even heard of you”
What sort of a logic is THAT? Please don’t give desperate replies. You get thousand visits per day. Do you know EACH & EVERY person who reads your blog? How do you know them? You didn’t even allow comments on your blog for months! You wont be able to count even 100 people who read your blog!!
What were you thinking when making such a statement?
And yes.. you don’t publish your online earnings. Is that enough to hide how much you earn? Its so silly of you to say that. One can easily make how out much you earn by -
Number 1 - the number of ad banners you have on your site + the amount you charge for them
Number 2 - the number of paid links you have on your site + the amount you charge for them
Number 3 - the number of paid reviews you have on your site + the amount you charge for them
Any blogger can easily estimate how much money a blog is making. If you don’t, then you’re not even worth blogging about making money online.
And regarding your “crappy posts” reply, no matter you are making 5$ or 50$ per post, what matters is the fact that they ARE crappy. Nobody’s reading that blog, and nobody cares. Infact, the desperation to make money by writing such crappy posts describes how much of a genius you are in making money online!
@angel,
Its definitely not about whos pocketing more money. Maybe you should read both of my comments twice!
The Truth, what about blogs CQ author that you can’t see?
Great idea. Either this is a great publicity stunt, or a profitable idea. Either way, congrats on the success.
Great flip. You’re going to catch up with Shoemoney soon.
When’s this site going up for sale?
Good luck with the sale. Personally, I think the spirit of MEW is broken if indeed it is being sold. If I were to have bought a page, part of it would have been because of person (or people) running it. The buzz from the owner would have made the page worthwhile.
The Cow is making the right choice by selling if he can’t properly manage the site.
If he can’t manage it, that’s really his only option. I can see how some of the initial buyers of a MEW page may be upset though.
you guys need to stop arguing and just move one. jeeze.
The commander should ALWAYS be the last to leave the ship!
Excuses like “I wasn’t able to manage it properly” shouldn’t come from a “how to make money” priest.
Cow, do you realize that this sale can affect your blog too?
Loredan:
The commander should ALWAYS see if someone else can do a better job if he recognizes his situation. and who’s a “how to make money” priest?
Jorge they might be upset but they can’t really be that upset. There is a very good chance that the new owners will do a better job of promoting the site and taking it to the next level. This could be the best thing to happen to the page owners, look at all the buzz that has been generated just from the sale.
This damn million euro wiki is causing all types of bad karma! How much did it sell for dammit?
Cow,
I thought this is a “how to make money” blog and with so many workshipers you might be a sort of priest or guru or whatever. Obviously I don’t know you that much so I might be wrong. Mea culpa!
“The commander should ALWAYS see if someone else can do a better job if he recognizes his situation” - very much true but I disagree. And you know why? because when it comes to building communities things are much more complicated and most of the time people follow their leader as I’m pretty sure there were people who bought a page just because they liked you more than anything else. I bet those people are dissapointed now. Imagine a battlefield and the commander say just before the battle begins, “Hey guys, I think the general will do better than myself so I quit”
I might be wrong but this is my opinion
Cheers
loredan: This is a parody blog on JohnChow in case you had not noticed, which happens to make money online.
As far as your silly comment about battlefields and Generals. A good commander will quit and let his general take over, if it means that the number of casualties will be significantly less when he does.
And now before you reply again Loredan –think about it and make it a good one please. We’d love to chitchat with you all day but we simply don’t have the time.
When management changes, oftentimes there is significant change in the direction of the underlying product. I guess the wiki customers will have to wait and see what happens and whether the pre-existing hype machine will still be there to promote it.
For example: If craigslist were bought out, I’m sure there would be a panic among those accustomed to the free service it offered.
The bidding for my page is still going up
Keep the bids coming!
The Jerry Springer of Blogs LOL
Talk to the hand.
….because the blogosphere isn’t listening!
Nice flip Cow. You didn’t cash out as well as Shoemoney did with auctionads but still decent for a month old project lol.
For those that worry, the cow already did all the hard work on the wiki. Now it is just up to promoting which the new owners will obviously do so they can earn their investment back and the page owners will still do for the same reasons. All those still involved have a stake in it and it succeeding. Might not have the same personality attached the same way but still has the roots needed to snowball as much as something like that can.
Cow, just be careful about starting any other projects anytime soon or the trolls will come out of the woodwork asking how you have time for more projects but didn’t have time for MEW. The same types of people that don’t really know how much work can go into something like that.
Hey.. who purchased the pages “John Chow” and “Make Money Online” was it John Chow himself?
I guess the hard work for the wiki is just starting for the new owner. Just type million euro wiki in google and you will get a lot of the word SCAM in it. That is surely not good for busines! Other than the wiki is not rank on any near the top page of search of its own name.
just my humble opinion..
All those site linking to MEW with the words scam are at the end of the day LINKING to MEW.
Hey how much did it sell for?
My account/pages are gone, where to contact the new owner? Not happy about this.
I noticed about a dozen pages on MEW that have been reserved for pro bloggers, such as Pro Blogger, Tyler Cruz, Carl Ocab (sp?), and so on. What’s the deal?
I have always thought the set up to be a bit strange from the day it was launched, which is why I didn’t get a MEW page.
But who are these the truth@cashquests and cashquests@thetruth who keep bickering? Which one is the real cashquests?
My page sold for $90. Broke even + some free buzz exposure from here and Cashquests