For those wanting a back story of the Sierra Saga, I did a series of posts and interviewed some of the players.
Blogging is journalism, even if journalism is not your intention.
Therefore, bloggers get the same treatment that journalists always have.
Ask any old school journo (if you can find one) about the stuff that is sent to them. They all get the threats, everyone of them - not just the police and political reporters, but the sports guys, the financial analysts, the arts and entertainment writers, everyone. The difference is that at the newspaper you work with a lot other people who get the same crap in the mail every day. When you blog you sit in your cubicle/office all by yourself.
I agree completely.
I will miss Dare especially, he was really a different voice that I found useful.
The way the Kathy Sierra story is usually told is tends to be highly sensationalistic and inaccurate, and does a grave disservice to many innocent people who were splattered with mud in the process:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/apr/19/blogging.comment
"Accusations of sex and violence were bound to grab the headlines"
I’m lucky to have met Kathy (I attended her Storyboarding for Non-Fiction tutorial this week at ETech and talked with her a few minutes after) and to have had Dare write a foreword for one of our books. They’re both fantastic bloggers and I hope they’ll both find a way to come back to blogging that is rewarding and comfortable.
I miss Kathy’s blog.
When faced with a threatening situation, whether perceived or real, you’re options are to back down or to stand up. Backing down, especially in the case of threat of physical harm, is rational; it’s a natural response to protect yourself and your family. Standing up is the brave and noble response.
If one chooses to stand up, it’s admirable. If one chooses to back down, it’s rational. You always hope for the admirable, but you can’t really fault someone for being rational.
Saying “everybody loses”, don’t you think that authors of those blogs win as they feel much more comfortable (themselves) after they stopped writting? and obviously they have a right to stop doing it. I think we just must be thankfull for all their posts and be looking for another bright person who is ready to fill this, so dangerous, position
Your comments implied that it was an either/or choice-- either stop working at MSFT or stop blogging. Is that true?
I’m not sure what I said to imply that but it isn’t the case. My job was not on the line or anything as melodramatic as that.
Very little that MSFT employees do on the inside results in anything tangible for me or 99.999% of the rest of the world. Whereas writing a blog is you shipping a product directly to us, with no intermediaries. Why you’d give that up is a mystery to me.
I understand what YOU get out of me having a blog. What do I get out of it? The fact that MSFT customers will have one less b0rg blog from a choice of over 5500 Microsoft employee blogs doesn’t sound like a compelling argument for me to continue investing myself in my personal blog.
“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never–in nothing, great or small, large or petty–never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.” - Winston Churchill
http://www.school-for-champions.com/speeches/churchill_never_give_in.htm
She gave in. She lost. Her readers lost. Her antagonists won.
“Intimidation only works if you let yourself be intimidated; terrorism only works if you let yourself be terrorized.”
That’s a sound bite from the Bush administration that I think is wrong. They also work if you (or people you care about) are injured or killed.
Nice post, and a sad commentary on how a few can ruin things for many. Blogging’s great advantage of connecting people very effectively becomes the challenge of protecting our basic right not to be abused.
I blog - although I’m not nearly in the same league as this blog or dare’s (by two orders of magnitude).
But I blog for me. I find writing is good way to get my thoughts in order and I think it might help others which makes me feel good.
I’ve gotten a few nasty comments whereupon I usually try to see if anything arrogant slipped through. Sometimes I have been on the arrogant side of opinionated and I try to be a little more balanced.
But sometimes they’re just a bunch of whackjobs or they’re jealous.
I also try to follow the “Mother” principle - never write anything in public that you feel your mother would be ashamed of if she read it on the front page of the newspaper.
So Dare, what’s in it for YOU? Only you know that. If you do it - do it for YOU man.
Christ if everyone gave up after a lot of negative comments -we’d still be living in caves. Did Bill Gates, Michael Dell, Ted Turner ever listen to the complainers? Hell no!
You’ve got ONE life to live YOURS - on your deathbed will you be proud that you said your piece and it will live for eternity on the internet or will you regret that you gave up?
That’s your call. Blog anonymously if it helps. But do it for YOU.
-Frank
p.s. death threats are a whole 'nother ballgame. But Salman Rushdie didn’t stop! Although he does have a bodyguard 
Why is it that the acts of a few deranged/dishonest/misguided/uncivil/plain nuts peple, lead to putting more locks, discourage free speech, and give a hard time for the rest of us who want ideas (constructive ones, bright ones, clever ones, not obnoxious ones) and people to flow freely?
Think how petty office theft leads to locks, people coming in late lead to clock punching, terrorist attacks lead to thousands of people-hours lost to security checks, nad of course the sense of a violation of personal space inflicted by threats, which serious or not hinder our core freedom, to feel at ease in our familiar environment.
The many, losing because of a few.
"I understand what YOU get out of me having a blog. What do I get out of it? The fact that MSFT customers will have one less b0rg blog from a choice of over 5500 Microsoft employee blogs doesn’t sound like a compelling argument for me to continue investing myself in my personal blog. "
what do you get out of it? the very thing why you started a blog at the first place.
bloggers are like indy bands. at first they have a small following and as their popularity grow, they get more fame and exposure. all that comes with more ciriticism too. as long as you keep your ego in check you should do fine. many bloggers get this “internet supertar” syndrome that eventually make them lose sight who/what they really are. internet is a good place to foster false accomplishments.
once you stop blogging, fewer people who remember you and fewer will even know what you did. they’ll just move on that’s just the reality of thing these day in a world of short attention span.
And don’t always write friendly posts that will please everyone. My favourite ones are the ones where there’s plently of disagrement. I remember one guy once saying "Jeff, you are no longer relevant to computer programming, I have deleated you from my rss feed, goodbye."
I’m impressed you keep going - seriously don’t stop man.
Being a draft Kathy movement. I miss her writing too. I never met her, but I learned a lot by reading her blog.
Thanks for the post.
Yeah Jeff, we miss her too. Doing the right thing is not always easy and its sad to see that alot of them give up.
@Andrew
"1. Author starts blog.
2. Blog becomes wildly popular.
3. Author takes the fame to heart and starts to pontificate at every opportunity, now that they are suddenly Important.
4. Author can’t be bothered to think up posts any more, decent or otherwise.
5. Auther gets better job and/or something better to do with his time.
5. Everyone loses."
Then there’s the 3 steps of being the guys who drive bloggers off the 'net.
- Author gets jealous of popular blogs’ success.
- Author posts snarky comments.
- Author notices too late that he’s made a stupid error when counting to 6 and spelling Author, and is mocked for it.
“It’s been almost exactly a year since Kathy stopped writing. And the world is, in a very small way, a lesser place for it.”
I disagree. The world went on moving on. When things change like this, the initial surprise or dissapointment is felt. It soon subsides and the we all move along. The world being a lesser place is quite an overstatement.
As for bloggers being harrased. Shut off comments. You’re leaving the door open to anyone and some are bound to come in an shit on your carpet.
Atwood and Obasanjo - who is better? There’s only one way to find out: FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT!!
Hilarious.
In my experience, the rise and fall of a popular blog goes something like this:
- Author starts blog.
- Blog becomes wildly popular.
- Author takes the fame to heart and starts to pontificate at every opportunity, now that they are suddenly Important.
- Author can’t be bothered to think up posts any more, decent or otherwise.
- Auther gets better job and/or something better to do with his time.
- Everyone loses.
As a (very) long time reader of your blog, I’m afraid that IMHO you now hit 4 out of 6 of the above points, Jeff. But the same process goes for most popular personal blogs, unfortunately.