It is quiet and windy in Iceland, so here are few things that I have been thinking for the past few days.
Donations – Support
I have received a lot of donations over the years and for that I am truly thankful. For without them this site would not exist in it’s current form. I love writing and I love earthquakes and volcanoes, so it’s a good mix for me, for my fiction you can go here or buy it as e-book once it’s ready. The people who took my offer long time ago about free e-book if they supported me are going to get an e-book once I have something ready. I have not forgotten you. This is also something that I love to do. But that sadly does not pay the bills for me, for that reason I depend on donations since during quiet times in Iceland I do not have a lot of traffic when it is quiet in Iceland and that means less advertisement income. I have extremely little income from Amazon Advertisement at the moment, since it is 5 – 10% of the price of an item when people buy something from Amazon. Clicks do not count or extremely little with Amazon.
I’ve been into volcanoes and earthquakes since I was 10 years old. So I know a lot about them, since I have not been afraid to collect information and read about the volcano activity in Iceland. So my knowledge of this subject is the one of an expert, even if I am not educated by official school in Iceland in this field. So I can’t have a job in it, since hiring non-educated people in certain fields almost never happens in Iceland. It is just part of the quality standards that are in place in the world. I see nothing wrong with this, since I can and do attend to this subject in my own way.
My main income comes from social welfare in Iceland. That income is however low based on current exchange rate of ISK to DKK (~22,00 ISK = 1 DKK) so I remain poor here in Denmark. I would also remain poor in Iceland (due to higher prices on everything) if I had the slightest interest in living there (I don’t, just to be clear on that). So supporting me helps me to do my work here and keep monitoring the volcanoes and earthquakes in Iceland.
Storms – Windy
Winter storm period has started in Iceland this year. It was later this year than last year, but the strength of the storms is around the same. For this week they are predicting at least one storm tomorrow and maybe a second after that. This leads to lower detection threshold on the Icelandic Meteorological Office SIL network and my geophone network in Iceland. This also means that sometimes many of my geophone stations look like this.
The bad weather does not rule out that something might be taking place. It might however rule out technical ability to detect it on the SIL network or my geophone network. Since strong wind noise is followed by strong ocean wave noise on the SIL network and my geophone network (mostly in south Iceland). All that can be done is to wait for better weather to see what is going on in the crust.
Quiet period in Iceland
Currently there appears to be quiet period taking place in Iceland. It has already lasted for around 3 weeks now. Based on the data it is impossible to know when it ends. Bad weather is also making it difficult to know if anything interesting is taking place. Since minor earthquakes get drowned out by the wind and ocean noise on the SIL stations. Since I write mostly about current activity in Iceland this type of quiet period do not leave me with a lot to write about. But if it gets prolonged I am going to try and find something to write about in Icelandic geology.
Please…if u put the same amount of effort into writing some interesting stuff about volcanoes as you put into asking, no begging for money 24/7, people might come back to your site. As it i s now, all I ever read is a lot of whining about your financial situation..not alone you know. Hint for free, get a job..end of money issues bro
I am sorry not that this blog is not to your liking. I do put effort into writing interesting stuff and analyse when something is going on. But sometimes there is nothing interesting going on and nothing to report. I put a lot of work in into this blog for a pay that is currently low and not self-sufficient as is. That might change once something starts to happen in Iceland.
I still have to pay my bills and buy food (you know, I have to live). Working as an writer is a full time job and it’s not easy. If I had to take a second job as you suggest, I would not have time for this blog. I did so in the year 2011 after I moved back to Iceland from Denmark. It did not work out, I did manage to write about what was going on at that time (two minor eruptions during the summer), but just barley and with great delays publishing informations on what was going on.
I also dare you to say what you sad to me to Fraser Cain. He also works writing for a website, it’s just about space not volcanoes and earthquakes (more wide then my Spacewatch website – http://www.jonfr.com/spacewatch/).
http://www.universetoday.com/95221/donate-become-a-member-dont-see-ads/
You don’t have to read my website, it’s free and optional chose to do so. You also don’t have to support me, that is optional too. So if you don’t want to support my effort that’s fine with me.
Just don’t complain to me when I am asking about support to keep this website and other websites that I run in order to keep them and my self running. You don’t have the right to do so and I am going to tell you way.
I am providing you and everyone else this material for “free”, the only thing you have to deal with are advertisements from Google Adsense and Amazon. Some of you actually don’t have to deal with the advertisements since many people use Adblock on this site and many other sites and by doing so reduce my advertisement income at the same time.