The internet is a place where just about anyone can speak their mind, give advice, and much more. Anyone can open up their own website or blog. Anyone can read others’ websites and blogs. If you haven’t noticed yet, the key word I’m trying to get across to you about the internet is ANYONE.

For all you know, I’m some 99 year old nut living in the middle of Wyoming writing this article. As many of you know, I’m from Chicago so the story doesn’t apply to me, but you get the point. It’s scary! It’s truly a scary place. The internet is so anonymous that you really don’t know who you’re listening to when you read many blogs.

Of course there are many blogs where the owner will use his name as the domain name (e.g. RickSchwartz.com) or they’ll give a short bio of themselves. But you need to remember, I can tell you my name is Joe Shmoe and I have a Harvard degree, and you really don’t know whether I’m telling the truth. This is why I’m very careful about taking advice online.

I do take advice from well-respected blogs like BruceMarler.com or ChefPatrick.com because they have many supporters and have worked hard to legitimize themselves. But if I were googling something about stocks for example, and someone was telling me to buy Apple stock, I’d be much more careful when considering their advice. For all I know that blogger is that 99 year old from Wyoming that I mentioned before that doesn’t have a college degree.

This all brings me back to my point. The internet is a scary, scary place! I’d love to get your comments on this, so make sure to submit them below.

P.S. When submitting comments, if you click out of the comment box and it erases your comment, just click on the comment box, and then click edit > undo.