Free Money Finance

Welcome

Welcome to the Money Blog Network!!!!!

Two Great Blogs Join the MoneyBlogNetwork

As most of you know, Free Money Finance is part of the MoneyBlogNetwork, a group of money blogs which includes:

• All Financial Matters
• Blueprint for Financial Prosperity
• Consumerism Commentary
• Five Cent Nickel
• Mighty Bargain Hunter

There have only been six of us in this association for some time now. Until today. Now we're up to eight. Here are the two latest additions to the MoneyBlogNetwork:

• Get Rich Slowly -- One of the biggest (if not the biggest) personal finance blog out there today, GRS is written by J.D. It contains viewpoints on money very similar to those here at FMF, though J.D. writes mostly completely original articles while I tend to take nuggets from what others have done and add my commentary/experiences. To find out more about Get Rich Slowly, check out his about page.

• No Credit Needed has turned getting out of debt into an empire. Not only does he run his main blog, but NCN also has the No Credit Needed Network and No Credit Needed Podcast (boy, he's a busy guy!) As you might expect, he writes a lot about getting and staying out of debt and is known in blogging circles as "Dave Ramsey Junior." :-)  To find out more about No Credit Needed, check out his about page.

Welcome, guys! It's great to have you both on board!

Mighty Bargain Hunter Joins the MoneyBlogNetwork

I am pleased as punch to announce that the Mighty Bargain Hunter has joined the MoneyBlogNetwork. MBH is the founder of the Carnival of Debt Reduction and writes about "finance, saving, spending, and bargains." I personally spend a lot of time on his site and recommend you visit as well -- lots of great stuff there!

It will take us a bit of time (though Flexo's pretty fast on the tech side) to get Mighty Bargain Hunter all set up on the MoneyBlogNetwork site, but soon you'll be able to read his posts there as well.

Congrats to Mighty Bargain Hunter. It's good to have you aboard!!!!!

Star Money Articles for the Week of January 23

My favorite posts this week from the MoneyBlogNetwork members and beyond:

• AllThingsFinancial has lots of stuff on net worth -- one of my favorite topics!!!
• Five Cent Nickel discusses a guy who was scammed out of $15k. Ouch!
• Blueprint for Financial Prosperity talks about how the income tax system will collapse in 10 years.
• Consumerism Commentary bemoaned the fact that he is going to owe income taxes this year.
• Boston Gal's Open Wallet talks about The Diamond Ring. I've got her pegged as a heart-breaker after reading this post. ;-)
• Personal Finance Advice said Americans have no extra money. No shocker there!

And as a reminder, if you want to promote your personal finance blog, check out the details on the MoneyBlogNetwork's Blog of the Week program. It's free, it's fun, and it could drive a bit of traffic your way!! ;-)

Promote Your Personal Finance/Money Blog for Free!

For those personal finance bloggers out there looking for some free promotion for your site, the MoneyBlogNetwork has an opportunity for you.

We're naming a Site of the Week every week -- a spotlight on one specific personal finance blog. If you want to be considered, stop by AllThingsFinancial and email JLP. He's collecting the applications.

Speaking of AllThingsFinancial, I have to say a public thank you to JLP. He's answered a few tax-related questions that FMF readers have had and he's always done a great job -- very thorough. Thanks, JLP!

Finally, AllThingsFinancial has a post on how Ameriprise Looses Data on 230,000 Clients and Advisors that you may want to check out. Here is an overview:

Ameriprise Financial, the investment advisory unit spun off from American Express last year, said today that lists with the personal information of about 230,000 customers and financial advisers were potentially exposed to fraud.

The breach occurred in late December after a company laptop was stolen from an employee's car. It contained lists of reassigned customer accounts that were being stored unencrypted on a computer in violation of Ameriprise's rules.

The information on the laptop included the names and Social Security numbers of more than 70,000 current and former financial advisers and the names and internal account numbers of about 158,000 customers. The data was being stored in separate lists, but it is possible that there could be some overlap between the two.

Are these companies crazy!!!!???? This info is on a laptop -- in a car -- unguarded? When will they learn????

Add Ameriprise Financial to the identity theft blacklist.

Introducing the Money Blog Network

It's my pleasure to announce the formation of the MoneyBlogNetwork. Here's the word from our official press release:

Top Personal Finance Bloggers Unite to Launch MoneyBlogNetwork

January 23, 2006 – Five of the top Internet personal finance bloggers today announced they have banded together to create a first-of-its-kind personal finance blog network designed to put personal finance wisdom, best practices and commentary just a mouse click away. 

The new network, with headquarters online at www.moneyblognetwork.com beginning today, will be composed of the following top-performing personal finance bloggers:

• JLP of AllThingsFinancial
• Jim of Blueprint for Financial Prosperity
• Flexo of Consumerism Commentary
• Nickel of Five Cent Nickel
• FMF of Free Money Finance

“We’re confident the MoneyBlogNetwork will be the top ‘one-stop shop’ for personal finance information upon its introduction,” said FMF of Free Money Finance.  “Combined, the five founding members get more than 4,000 daily visitors and more than 10,000 daily page views, and their work has been recognized in Newsweek, BusinessWeek, The Wall Street Journal, The NY Times, Yahoo Finance, PC Magazine and others.”

The new network will begin with the five founding blogs and may elect to add others over time.  Readers can subscribe to its high-quality information for free using an RSS feed, which can be accessed though the network's home page.

Blogging networks have seen growing success in the past year.  In October 2005, America Online announced the purchase of Weblogs Inc., a network of Web sites focused on a wide variety of topics.  The deal was estimated at approximately $25-million, though financial figures were not disclosed.

I'm sure this answers a lot of questions for many of the personal finance bloggers (and likely brings up some new ones). For now, we've certainly got a lot to do, to figure out, and to work on, but we look forward to making the MoneyBlogNetwork something that benefits personal finance blogging, the blogosphere in general, and, of course, all of our readers.