In a move that has stunned the literary world, a post on the website SEOCashLeads.Biz advising on how to leverage social media has won a 2010 Pulitzer prize, writes Hard Jackson.
The awards are usually handed out to reporters, investigative journalists and photographers.
But the Pulitzer jury broke with tradition this year by awarding a prize to Brick $toch, for a post on his search-engine optimisation website. The writer changed his name to $toch to advertise an affiliates scheme he runs on the web.
The post, which detailed $toch’s tips for using social media platforms to network with like-minded peers and potential link-buiding partners, won the new Pulitzer Prize for SEO Tips Writing.
Stoch, also known as The $tochmeister in SEO communities, lives in Palo Alto, California and said he was surprised by the award.
“Sure I’ve heard of the Pulitzers,” said $toch, who is shown on his website holding up a cheque from Google for $488.
“But I never dreamed of winning anything for my SEO writing, apart from tonnes of free cash” continued $toch, who lives with his cat and collection of Manga.
“To be honest, I just cut and pasted from a few different sources around the net and stuck in a load of links with anchor text around my site.”
$toch’s post consisted of vague advice concerning active listening, sharing, responding and transparency in online media, illustrated by a stock photo of a black woman and asian man holding hands.
Pulitzer judges defended the award, with one calling $toch’s post a “powerful rumination on alienation and disconnection in the modern age that nevertheless displays a relentless optimism and offers a new paradigm in our perception of the world and our mortality.”
The award is $toch’s second, following an award from the website SEOtricksandskillz.com for winning an SEO competition that involved optimising the phrase ‘Walrus of Rassilon’ .
