Do I have to come right flat out and tell you everything?
By So I was looking over what I’ve written for this site over the last 14 years and 10 months, and the answer is 4,919 posts, including this one, that collectively contain about two and half million words, which is about three times as many as in the entire Bible.
Every now and then I get down to the end of the day and I’ll just stop and ask myself why I’ve done it. And the answer is complicated: because I do have something to say; because I want to hear my own voice; because interacting with commenters often feels like much more of a real community than some of the communities I’m a part of in the so-called real world. But I can’t justify any of this, ultimately, without getting paid something more than nominal to do it (not a whole lot more, but still . . . ).
Without getting into too much detail, balancing family life, my day job, and blogging isn’t that easy (again 5000 posts/2.5 million words). That balance is a lot easier to strike when the “content providers” as they say in the biz are getting paid something, as opposed to nothing or next to nothing.
As Rob said, this blog started out as a labor of pure love, and pretty much remained one for many years, but at some point Moliere’s dictum inevitably kicks in: “Writing is like prostitution. At first you do it for love, then for a few select friends, finally for money.”
That’s too cynical — hey he was French — as there’s still a lot of love driving this, well beyond the modest lucre we collect. But the money does make a very big difference at the margin.
If this blog means something to you, please give what you can. I know some people can’t, but those of you who can give even a little, give a little, and those who can give a lot, please help support this enterprise in a way that makes it available to your less fortunate community members. We’re not not requiring that everybody give according to their ability to do so — after all, we are not communists (except for Erik). But we’re asking that you do so, in a spirit of solidarity and community that becomes harder to find in an increasingly harsh and atomized world.
Thank you.