News of the day in the blogosphere - Kottke decided to quit his web designer job and dedicate his entire time to blogging. I think it's a courageous thing, though there is a fine line to give up your self (be it objectivity or subjectivity) for potential advertisers (which he excludes from the very beginning). Actually how can money be made by keeping a weblog -- traffic capitalization, advertising or paid content are among the main drivers. As such, perhaps Kottke has more tools than living out of people's mercy/donations.
Anyways, given his popularity I believe he has good odds to make a decent living - though the "such optimism is to be admired, lauded and always avoided" phrase may be a valid point of view for risk averse people. Read the entire thread on the matter over at mefi.
UPDATE: btw, Kottke is not singular in his venture of becoming a full time professional blogger. There's a dozen of others - former FT journalist Tom Foremski's one came handily to my mind since I am reading him on daily basis. Also, as far as I know there's an American guy living in Romania (Cluj Napoca) who dedicated 100% of his time to blogging and who lives from donations from his readers. He signs as Soj and his blog - Flogging the Simian - was nomineed on the Southeastern Europe's best blogs category at AFOE a while ago.
Whatever happens will certainly have huge repercussions for the blogging world. I'm on the skeptical side (as I mentioned in the MeFi thread) but it would be nice to be proven wrong.
I think the death of Suck had a big impact on me. They were kind of an ur-blog, and I remember how surprised/disappointed I was that they failed to turn fantastic content and a devoted core of readers into anything even closely resembling solvency. (And this was still in the days of the Internet boom.) Later, this pattern would repeat itself with a lot of sites. Kottke may have a devoted following, but he also has a lot of things going against him, including the fact that he will work in New York, one of the most expensive cities in the world. If he moved out to the country (or to Eastern Europe!) he could ask for much less and live comfortably.
We'll see, I suppose.
By the way, I had no idea the author of Flogging the Simian was a male. I always thought the picture in the banner was the author. I'd be curious to know how well he's sustaining himself with his site.
I am not familiar with Suck's story, but it may be that the timing and the context were not right at that time - you know, "the market was not ready" type of thing. However, today things have changed dramatically, it seems that more and more micro (nano) publishing channels are making their way, people are more comfortable with going to alternative news channels, it's also easier and virtually free to publish. It is true that living in NYC is not in Kottke's advantage, and, as a plus, he refuses the ads, (I find the contextual one quite decent). It's the winner takes all kind of thing - you bet big, you win big, and hence the impact you mention. As for Soj, I had no idea either he was a male until I read so on his website. From following the blog though I suspect that he is not doing great though - well, he is living in the right spot so he may be doing well on the costs side but the audience is a small niche I guess. But it may be just a wide shot, I have no clue.
Flogging the Simian is another way to say white trash trailer tramp slumming loser in Romania makes up a thousand lies on a blog, and stupid people all over the world assume that this young penniless blowjob queen whore (see the latest news on her multiracial love triangle that got her beat up and thrown in a ditch) has the inside scoop on one of the biggest and most controversial cases in the War on Terror, more than 10,000 miles away in a country with little or no communications. Is there something wrong with this picture? This is the problem with Blogs and and Bloggers that lie and falsify information and destroy lives. Jack Idema was one of them, billed as a criminal instead of a hero, by anti-american bloggers, who led the rest of the blogggers by the nose. If you want the real truth on those American heroes SOJ and most of the other bloggers have painted with fantasy and lies, then check out www.superpatriots.us - Proof with PICTURES NOT EMPTY WORDS. For how some blogs lie and decieve us for their own political agenda see: www.superpatriots.us/flogginfraud/index.htm Maybe its time all the blogs started printing the real story and helped these three Americans....
Dear "alan" whoever you are..... Get a grip. The superpatriots.us site is only one in a long line of Idema trash sites trying to distort the story when he caught. Neither he or his lawyers have come forward with anything. If Idema is such a hero all he as to do is sign a simple statement releaseing his full military record to the public... WHY HASN'T he done that? Of course your probably "jack" or one of his few cronies replying in his place.... get a grip. The bloggers are the ones who uncovered Idema when many others, to include the governments, ignored his lunacy figuring he's go away then were too embarassed to come forward when he "blew up".... I say Good for the bloggers!!! I hope they get some of their buddies who hack into and take down terrorist sites to go after superpatriots.us...... lies are lies.... take him down...
is this really true?? soj is a GUY??
"she" told me "she" was from virginia and moved to romania. I had contact with "her" for years and it started when "she" began "her" blog. I even gave "her' money thinking "she" was struggling to make it over there.
funny "she" once told me that there were a lot of "rip off artists" and "gypsies" over there.
"she" was acting strange last week and i could not figure out WTF was going on!! for all i know i thought it was a cia agent
I HOPE YOU NAIL THE CRAP OUT OF HIM HER IT!!
thank you for the info!!
SOJ YOU ARE A SLIME OF THE LARGEST ORDER. I HOPE AL QAEDA GETS THEIR HANDS ON YOU!!