Tuesday, February 01, 2005
YOUR DONATIONS AT WORK
Andrew Sullivan pulled in close to $80,000 during his 2002 pledge drive. By some estimates, he raised another $120,000 during other annual drives. Those who’ve donated (I’m among them) may therefore be a little disillusioned by this:
After much hemming and hawing, I’ve decided to put the blog as you’ve known it on hiatus for a few months. The Dish will still exist, the site will be updated weekly with new feature articles, and I’ll still post when I feel like it. But it won’t have the regularity or content of the past four and a half years. Why? The simple answer is that I want to take a breather, to write a long-overdue book, to read some more, travel to Europe and the Middle East, and work on some longer projects. Much as I would like to do everything, I’ve been unable to give the blog my full attention and make any progress on a book (and I’m two years behind) ...
I’m going to turn this into a far more occasional operation for a while. I’ll keep posting when the feeling grabs me; but I’m no longer going to promise the kind of daily attention to the news that I have practised so far.
Planning his vacation, Sullivan thanks readers for “the financial support that has kept this blog alive and well.â€? (Two hundred grand and he still couldn’t afford a blogroll? Way to share the bloggy wealth, Andrew.) Other sites—many other sites—have done more with less.
Sullivan’s massive blog earnings have ended up funding a Euro-Middle Eastern stroll with time off to write a book. His next pledge drive might deliver a substantially lower return.