lucho

I don’t see the point to make me register to a newsletter, I get the rss feed, it should be enough. I won’t go the extra mile.

Rise

Yesterday itself I was thinking of emailing you to ask what exactly is the purpose of sending newsletters and not posting the ’secret’ information on the blog. And now since you wrote about it, I have to know now.

Why having ‘newsletter subscribers’ important? Why ‘feed subscribers’ are not given the information that is in the newsletter?

If I sound offensive then I am sorry. That’s not my intention. It’s just that I am ignorant and still learning about blogging stuff.

And no, I have not yet signed up.

Rise

“Guys, not everyone is technical and uses RSS feeds”

Ramit, so ‘technical’ people don’t get to read what ‘non-technical’ people get to read?

I am still trying to understand why few things are ‘exclusively’ for newsletter?

I think we ‘goons’ are taking it too far.

You don’t need to give explanation if there is none .

Keep the good stuff coming..

Dirk

Ramit: do you have a privacy policy posted somewhere? I’d like to read your newsletter but no way in hell I’m signing up just to have my email address sold to the penis-enlargement folks.

brad

unsubscribed from your rss feed. Between the 6 part stories and this email newsletter crap you severely devalue your blog. if wanted to put up with traffic/click gathering gimmicks there are 100s of other sites I can get that from.

Graham Kaplan

…and yet I’m still going to sign up for your newsletter. What? I’m curious
what the secret is!

Doug

Unsubscribing

same as 11

moom

I haven’t got a clue how to do this RSS thing and yes I like e-mail newsletters. But then I am 42 years old

Robin

Relax guys, it’s just a newlsetter, don’t sign up if you don’t want to.

RoolD

I echo every one. Really lame! Did you go to some “internet marketing” seminar where they told you how to give newsletters away for free, and then eventually get people to pay for them?

Your brand image just fell down the shaft for me! Good bye!

Rise

We love Ramit. That’s why complaining.

Otherwise won’t even bother.

Allen.H

For all the witty saints whining about Ramit’s decision to release this only to email subscribers:

Ramit wrote some stuff here that I can’t value in dollars, so in return for the value he injects into my mind, I understand he’d want at least something in return.

No, I’m not going to subscribe to the newsletter and will probably miss “the secret”, but you know what? as long as Ramit continues to provide the value to your lazy-ass brains, he’s got the right to promote his interests as well.

Cheers,
Allen.H

JW

People sure do get upset when you offer to send them a newsletter, which proves a little something about the Internet that I call “John’s Law:” – People on the Internet will whine about anything, anytime, and should usually just be ignored.

Nickolas Means

There’s plenty of services out there that’ll take an RSS feed and distribute it as email. Feedburner.com’s probably the most popular. Why not do that instead of making me, already an RSS subscriber, sign up to something else to get the “secret”. If anything, I should get something extra for being an RSS subscriber!

If you don’t want to use feedburner, I’m sure your blog guru could whip something like this up for you in nothing flat. If he doesn’t want to, I know I could! Ping me if you’re interested.

Jonathan

I’m gonna start handing out tranquilizers.

Sri

Here is another secret for a really big ticket item.

If ur buying a home:
Go to Upromise, see the realtor they recommend in ur area. You can get up to $3000 back in commissions coz Upromise will charge the realtor a 20% fee.

My realtor hates upromise so much coz they charge him 20% of the commission that he made a side deal with me to bypass Upromise;)

Sara

Um, why are some people being so hostile? Because Ramit is advertising for his free newsletter on his free website where he gives free financial advice? I read this blog not only because the topics are interesting, but because Ramit is funny and sarcastic and sounds like one of my friends, not stuffy and inaccessible like a lot of the other financial blogs out there. I’m sure there are other people who agree, and don’t think the content has gone “downhill.” If you don’t like it, go elsewhere and stop criticizing. Geez.

frane

I haven’t see this stupid way time age to subscribe to foolish newsletter. I protest against it

Rita Bradley

Chill guys

imelda

I wish people would stop saying that because this site is free, no one has the right to complain. That’s a bull**** attitude. First of all, it’s not as if Ramit isn’t earning something from this website. Second of all, I would hate to see that principle applied elsewhere in life. (i.e.: you don’t pay to read the ‘Metro’! Don’t complain when we publish ads for the KKK.) Money is not the end-all, be-all, folks.

I signed up for the newsletter, because I like Ramit’s advice, and I say the more of it, the better. But I definitely understand others’ annoyance–why be forced into subscribing for something we’ve been getting without commitment? It’s natural to resent something that is slightly manipulative.

James

I’m going to have to agree with Jeff above…I just don’t see any benign reason for making people sign up for the newsletter.

If I got a clear answer as to why Ramit is insisting on this, then I might sign-up and add more clutter to my inbox. Is it to have another way to gauge the number of repeat readers? Are there ads in the newsletter that you’ll be getting money from? Or, as has been suggested, are you considering having a “premium” newsletter where people must pay a subscription fee?

And finally, I too have been somewhat disappointed with the content lately. And everyone else, give me a break, of COURSE we have a right to complain and voice our opinion. Isn’t that part of the point of having a blog where you allow comments? I know I can stop reading at any time…and if it doesn’t improve, I might very well do that. But, perhaps it would be helpful to Ramit to actually hear what people are thinking in case he feels like rectifying the situation.

Wigberto

I forsee an angry RSS reader posting the entire newsletter in the comments section.

zam

i register for your newletter, i hope can learn something new.

Iwillteachyoutobeatool

Unsubscribe. You blow chunks.

neil

bye-bye. I used to love this blog. But now I decide to leave.

1, You spend less and less time on this blog.
2, No value. I skipped all your 6-part-buying-car story.
3, There are many better blogs I am interested in. For example, thesimpledollar is the best personal finance blog I have ever seen. 6 articles every day. It covers different aspects of our lives.

I do not want to waste my time to read you blog.

Mike

I’m in. Just signed up for the newsletter with my brand new email address. So if I start getting “increase your manhood” spam, I know where to point the finger. Thanks, Ramit, for your enthusiasm, insight and humor.

Jer

I think the main problem here is the lack of an apparent reason. It takes little extra effort to post things on the site, so why would ramit intentially not post them here?

I could understand and respect it if he told us it was for advertising revenue or some other explanation. It’s a little baffling however why he would make all rss users have to go out of their way for the content without supplying any reason beyond essentially “just because”.

The biggest and most popular bloggers generally have very open policies when it comes to decisions with their blogs for good reason.

Cameron

To those who are complaining about the complainers:

Most of these people aren’t complaining for their own sake. It’s very easy to leave the site and never come back. They are complaining because they care about the site and want to offer constructive criticism when it veers off the path, so Ramit can steer it back on track.

Karl N

I agree with most everyone here. This is lame, bye.

Sara

Of course everyone has a right to complain, but a lot of the complaints here aren’t constructive. (Hilarious – Iwillteachyoutobeatool? But not constructive). There’s a big differene between, “Hey Ramit, I hate newsletters and would much rather you post all your content on the blog,” and “This blog sucks! The content is lame and all other blogs are better! I’ve only been here 2 weeks and I’m gone! Bye!” Other bloggers besides Ramit have pointed out how valuable subscription newsletters are for gathering info on readers (and not necessarily for selling), so that’s probably his “ulterior motive.”

Zack

The “You don’t have to subscribe if you don’t want to” folks have it all wrong when Ramit starts using the front page of the site to advertise the newsletter. There was no content in this post. It was just one big ad.

I’ve been an RSS subscriber for about four months now, but I’m getting tired of Ramit’s narcissism and use of 11-o-clock news teaser tactics. Stay tuned for more posts! Whatever. There are 10000 good personal finance blogs out there. I’ll find another.

Unsubscribe.

Hawk

I’m going to say the following:

1) I think this ‘newsletter only content’ thing is just not a good thing. Why would you want to do that?

2) I’m not going to stop reading this blog. Why? Because it’s a damn habit, it just happens when I go to do ‘the rounds’ at lunch. I tried an RSS reader… it just wasn’t the same.

3) Please don’t comment in a blog that you’re going elsewhere like it’s a threat. “I hate your site, I’m gonna unsubscribe!”. Do you really need to say that? Are you really going to stop visiting the site, or are you going to ‘wait and see’ if anything comes of it? Just because you think someone (ramit in this case, I guess) is playing games with you doesn’t mean you should play them right back.

Ben Cruikshank

Well, the promise of a secret is something that I’ve never been able to resist, so you got a new signup. Now let’s just hope it’s a good’n

Ben
IdleProfit

noah kagan

This reminds me of how Yahoo is recently making people sign into Flickr with their Yahoo id, http://thomashawk.com/2007/01/theres-some-mighty-pissed-off-flickr.html

Honestly. Stop and think about what you are complaining. Ramit takes HOURS out of his life to give you great things to improve your finance.

How many people who are reading my comment have benefited from something they read on this site?

EVERYONE, trust me I know!

What have you done in return? What has he asked in return?

NOTHING.

I am not trying to be mean but this is a simple thing.

Ramit has the right to do what he wants and if you don’t like it stop reading.

Bottom Line: He is really not asking for anything and if you don’t want to do it just continue reading this great FREE content and enjoy.

luke

1. I agree – an explanation for why you aren’t doing a double print (both newsletter and blog) would be nice and I feel is necessary to make complete sense of this move (but then we’d stop arguing – so where’s the fun?)

2. Do you really not trust Ramit? How many moves has he made in his 2+ years of blogging that would make you think he would do something truly (or even slightly) “unethical” in any way with this “please sign up for my newsletter” request? If you don’t trust him in this move to blatantly ask for sign ups for a freakin’ newsletter, then why have you been trusting him for financial advice for the past 2 years (or 2 weeks *cough*)?

3. Aside from a seemingly unwarranted lack of trust, I have one word: “barriers”

4. This is a request to be “inconvenienced” for 10 seconds by Ramit for reasons he, at least at this point, has chosen not to adequately enunciate. Assuming you actually do trust Ramit enough to to implement some of his suggestions with your money – what other reason do you have outside of “I don’t want you to inconvenience my life for 10 seconds” for being upset about his request? Even if he does benefit from this experiment outside of satisfying simple curiosity of how a mass of people would react to it (which is his job at PB wiki btw) he wouldn’t do it to your personal detriment (or at least he has yet to up to this point. And if you honestly think he’s going to start now, I doubt he’d be anything short of glad to see you “unsubscribe” – as well as equally curious as to why you were reading his financial advice in the first place).

Outside of a selfishness, and/or a feeling of entitlement, I can’t come up with anything to add to the seemingly ridiculous reasons I explained above….but I’m sure there are plenty more pissed off people out there – so either set me straight, or give me the “real” reason – or both.

…and no, I’m not some die-hard BFF of Ramit that’s been reading his blog since day one. I don’t even read this blog that often. I just figure you either trust a guy or you don’t (especially with money), and you base that trust on a track record of previous actions….right?….and if he’s asking for 10 seconds in return for his 100’s of hours of help – the same trust rule would apply in deciding whether or not to do him this “favor” (that’s assuming you’re also not lazy, selfish, spoiled, etc.)

M

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^

One more reason to turn off comments.

solong

Actually maybe the newsletter will be worth something. So far I’m not too impressed with the blog.

But you know, everyone beneifts from different readings.

I can tell u my secret for getting good deals on luxury items. Buy from family and friends and give yourself kickbacks.

Hea. How hard is it to become salesman for a week, get great buys for your friends and quit. LOL

Jonathan

Ramit, you have the most crybabies read your site that I’ve ever seen. I’d hate to see your email box.

Hmm, I think I’m going to complain about Barnes & Noble. They sent me a 20% off coupon, but they want me to DRIVE TO THEIR STORE to use it. AHHHH! THEY’RE MANIPULATING ME! UNSUBSCRIBE!

Jeff Webb

I don’t mind the newsletter (nor understand the violent reaction to signing up for one – is this some HUGE personal offense that is unforgivable?). BUT how can I get it if I didn’t sign up by 2/9?

If you’re going to have a newsletter that’s fine but please allow me to read the archives.

Jonathan

Has it been sent yet? I have not received anything.