Employment

This guest post is by Jamie Harrop of BloggingZest . Like you, blogging often scares me and repeatedly takes me to a point of stale conversation and blocked fingertips. Tonight, I want to share my story with you; the story of how I admitted and overcame a fear so strong it stopped me blogging for six months… I sit here tonight with the ever dimming light of day flowing over my garden behind me, and for company the slight bronze glow of my desk lamp and the 30 minute chime of the cuckoo clock on my office wall. It’s approximately ten years since I started blogging at this very desk. And tonight, I realized something that has taken me those ten amazing, fun, and delightful years to discover. I deeply fear your rejection My readers, I fear your rejection. I fear my ideas aren’t worthy of your eyes or your opinion. I fear others have written before me what I wish to write. I fear you already know the lessons I wish to teach. I fear the conversation my articles provoke, should they by some ...

Google launched its Groupon-killer, "Offers," in Portland, Oregon , about a month ago. And now it's gearing up to launch in San Francisco and New York . Could Offers become a massive new revenue stream for Google--the "second huge growth engine" that Google has long searched for in vain? Could Google's entry into the deals business clobber Groupon and other deal providers like Living Social? To begin to answer these questions, we spoke to representatives of merchants who have signed on to offer Google Offers in New York. We also spoke with Google's Eric Rosenblum, the lead engineer on Offers, and Google spokesperson Nate Tyler. And it turns out that Google Offers does have a few key advantages over other deal providers that could shake up the deals industry and force Groupon, at least, to change the terms of its deals . In other words, if Google makes a big commitment to the deals business--a big if--its entry into the market could hurt the businesses ...