I am a professional writer who has written for Helium.com since May of 2007. On Thanksgiving Day of 2009, I received an email message claiming that some of the links within my Helium articles were in violation of the Helium rules. I had never recieved any messages regarding these links before. The links were specifically to relevant content which I had created on other websites. Some of the links were to craft templates and images on other websites. I had included these image links because Helium.com does not accept images for upload.

I was ordered, on a national holiday, to remove the links which were perportedly in violation of Helium's rules. Furthermore, one email I received threatened that further promotion could result in full account review, content removal or other administrative actions. The emails further claimed that the violation was "self-promotion." I searched Helium site, and could not find any specific rule against "self-promotion, " nor any clear policies regarding linking. Despite the fact that nobody in his right mind could expect me to remove such content on a holiday weekend, I spent a good deal of time on Thanksgiving Day removing the links from my articles. Nevertheless, on Monday morning of the next week, I could not log into my account on Helium.com. I contacted Helium regarding the problem, and recieved a rude message in response stating that my account had been suspended for "self-promotion" and that due my status as a long time member on the site and my having been a former site steward, Helium believed that I knew that "self-promotion" was not allowed. This, despite the fact that there is no clear rule prohibiting "self-promotion" nor any clear definition of what constitutes "self-promotion" on the site.

Although this email stated that Helium would later decide whether or not to reinstate my account, I have recieved no further communication from the site over the last two months. I am still unable to log into my account, and have not been paid for content submitted or revenues earned during the months from October through today. My content is published on the Helium website, and I have not paid for any of it.

Based upon the experience I have had and the experiences of others which I have read about, I must strongly discourage others from signing up for or writing for the Helium.com site. Thank you.

I knew there were many internet scams out there but I never expected to encounter one of this type. At first glance it seemed to on the up and up with many helpful people encouraging others to write their butts off and also to rate as much as possible. I soon realized that things weren't what they seemed.

I found out some stewards (who were touted as mere members volunteering to do free work for Helium) were paid to push any new rules changes which Helium came up with. If anyone complained the paid cheerleaders would naysay any complaints and talk up the new changes. Some of the paid volunteers are downright arrogant and rude to members calling them malcontents and other names. This was to quell any dissent from members and it works well on some.

But not for me obviously. I emailed Barbara Whitlock, one of CEO Mark Ranalli's main cronies, many times and was lied to on a regular basis about the status of the stewards. After exposing the truth about the steward program and causing Barbara to admit the truth about them getting paid some who weren't getting paid were very hurt and dismayed to learn the deception. I also informed the members about the special rating system the sub-stewards and stewards were permitted to use allowing them to rate in all channels, not just the ones they wrote in like the common members have to use.

The rating system is faulty anyway but allowing some to rate in any channel they choose can skew the rating of regular articles, marketplace articles, and contest entries. This could explain the numerous complaints by members about the rating system. How all of this works is a secret of course. A trade secret according to the cheerleaders. In fact, almost anything important to the members is a secret.

Now a member has to have enough 'quality rates' to have a rating star at the end of the month or the money your articles have earned will go to someone else on the site. Coincidentally, many seem to lose their rating star right before pay out time and lose all the money they have worked for the entire month. And besides, not one person, steward, staff, Barbara, Rex, or anyone else on the site can define a quality rate. Believe me, many have asked. So you see, they are asking members to do something which no one on Helium can define in order to collect their money.

I caused Barbara and Mark to admit their untruthfulness so they banned me and kept my 109 articles which are still making money for them. They are not required to prove I violated the user agreement so they can steal my work and make money from doing so. Pretty neat set up wouldn't you say. There's no telling how many other members have had their articles stolen by these despicable people.

There are some great people trapped on this site who are afraid to speak up about the problems because they have hundreds if not thousands of articles on here they could lose. It is a type of extortion by Helium, holding the writers articles hostage in case they decide to speak out about the corruption on the site. These are bad people running this site with no sense of loyalty to their writers. Stay away from this site.