Squidoo - Why Is Your Lens Locked?

Squidoo’s forum has had several plaintive requests from lensmasters whose lenses have been locked. They ask someone to tell them why. As the lens is locked no other lensmaster can read it and give a detailed explanation. All we can say is the lens has tripped a filter or been reported for abuse and so is probably on the SquidDon’t list.

The very first thing I did before signing up for Squidoo was read their Terms of Service (TOS). It’s what I did when before I recently joined Qondio and even Facebook and Twitter. I like to know what I’m getting into. I also like to know what rights I have, to my copyright for example, and what rights the company insists on having. Make no mistake, when you join any online site, it’s their bat and their ball so they get to make the rules. You either comply or go elsewhere.

Why doesn’t everybody read the TOS either before or just after they join Squidoo? If they did, they would know that spammy lenses about dieting, for example, or any lenses about multi level marketing (MLM) and the other banned topics, would probably be locked because they aren’t allowed. There are so many subjects that people can write about without falling foul of the network’s anti-spam, anti-abuse rules that it’s quite surprising that this problem recurs as often as it does.

It’s not just that people don’t read the rules. It’s also because they want to write about topics they think will earn them big money quickly. They disregard the fact that the web has millions of pages from other people under the same delusion. It’s true, a minority do make a fortune on the internet but they are few and far between. Yet another spammy page on getting your ex back or earn thousands of dollars every week for two hours work will just not do the trick.

Some lensmasters on Squidoo earn a reasonable amount of money from their pages on the network every month. Some enough to replace a full time job, others enough to make a big difference to their regular salary. Some people make just enough to save for a special treat occasionally. Others do it because they love writing even if they never make any money at all from it. What none of these people have done is make SquidDon’t lenses that bring the site into disrepute. Newcomers to Squidoo should take note of this. They should also make a point of reading the Terms of Service and the SquidDon’t page so they know the rules and can stick to them.