Sunday, June 16, 2013

Farewell to Pam's House Blend


Pam Spaulding, a blogger of the old school, who has acquitted herself with honor and  skill and passion for nine long years, is shuttering her blog and moving on for the most understandable of reasons:
All good things must come to an end, even after numerous awards and accolades, it’s time to acknowledge that I cannot continue to run on fumes alone. The Blend could continue limping along, but my health and well-being come first; over the last few years burning the candle at both ends with a full-time offline job and PHB. It has taken a severe toll — most readers have learned that I am dealing with chronic pain conditions — fibromylagia, and in the last couple of years, aggressive rheumatoid arthritis.

My decision to close the blog is just as reality-based as its content has been. If I cannot produce material at the frequency or with the same level of quality, enthusiasm and effectiveness, it’s really time to close the doors to this coffeehouse — and work to ensure it continues to have a life as an archive, a snapshot in our digital political history. Pamshouseblend.com will redirect to archives.

Looking back, I churned out pieces at an incredible pace — up to ten posts a day– many long-form pieces, commentary, curating news articles I thought my audience should check out, and occasionally (and increasingly) doing citizen journalism at news events and conferences. All of this while holding down a full-time day job with no connection to politics or activism. And most of of those posts were done in the wee hours, so I didn’t get much sleep over the lifespan of this blog.

Political blogging changed mainstream journalism in many ways. Save for a few who were able to monetize their blogs or who were cherry picked to help traditional outlets get their feet wet in new media, the vast majority of citizen journalists and opinion-makers toiled with little hope of quitting that day job. 
... 
 Why not go over and say "Thanks"...

1 comment:

zombie rotten mcdonald said...

All things must pass, I guess. I've been following her health issues on the Facebook machine, so I don't blame her.

On my way over...