Unfettered Blather

On May 31st, 2009, I will be pulling the plug on Unfettered Blather. This is not a decision I entered into lightly. In its heyday, this site used to draw over 500 unique visitors a day. I have been linked on Instapundit and was linked once by Major Nelson. I’ve never had the most popular or renowned website, but for a brief period it was doing exactly what I wanted it to do. The purpose of this site was always a means to foster discussion. Unlike a forum, by posting topics of interest to me I was able to be exposed to instant differences of opinion, and sometimes validation of my beliefs. I primarily talked about videogaming here, which is my primary hobby. I love discussing games. As a software professional with a decade of experience, videogaming is interesting to me from the perspective of both design and business, and I was always interested in talking about either aspect. I’d much rather discuss the storytelling approach of Fable II or the design decisions that went into it then discuss whether or not the game was “good”. Sure, I’ve had some discussions on what is “fun”, but sometimes a game can be very good and still not bring much joy with it.

Without too much effort, this site easily draws 200 unique visitors a day, which is enough to get the occassional comment and rare real discussion going. I seem to bring in an inordinate amount of spammers as well. A lot of bloggers scratch their heads over how to increase traffic, but it’s really not that hard, it is a lot of work. To me, an audience was important because this was a place to interact, sometimes be told outright that I’m wrong. I was sanguine with differing opinions. I’m willing to have my mind changed. However, getting that audience and maintaining it? I just can’t do it right now. Without that interaction, this place is just a digital soapbox for me, and I lack the sense of self importance to post routine rants about how wise I am and how messed up the world is. Let me break it down like this.

Games or blogging?
If I mostly talk about gaming, what good does it do for me to blog instead of play games? I’ve been in this situation before and it led to a year long hiatus. You can’t write about what you love and not do what you love anymore. Between the longer hours at work and studying for my certification I know I’m going to be looking at a choice once more. I play games to relieve stress. I write to clear up the clutter in my brain. I have other means to accomplish both, but I’d rather spend the time playing games then writing about games. I could write here and there, but that’s only going to drive my numbers down and turn this place into yet another digital soapbox, another voice adding to the cacophony. No thanks.

I need to focus on my career.
I spent most of my time at my previous employer leading software development teams. Not as a manager per se, but usually the guy right below. I loved this role and it helped me decide how I wanted to proceed. I knew I would end up in management some day, but I got there about five years earlier than planned. Now that I’m here and the economy sucks eggs, I really have no choice but to plow forward. I need to focus on getting my Project Management Professional certification and maybe after that I might try to learn more about .NET so I can share more common ground with the team I lead.

People are more important.
While I want to focus on my career and enjoy my hobby, the other distraction is my team. I made a commitment when I became the manager of this team that I would set and example, be honest about ways I could improve myself, and look for ways to grow them in their jobs and careers. I care about these people. They are not my friends, but I don’t think of them as employees. They are my teammates, the people who I rely on everyday. I owe them my best. Focusing on blog articles, formulating ideas, trying to schedule with Buddy, these are all activities that take my focus away from people who rely on me to lead them and stand up for them. We had a layoff this month and I take it personally that some members of my team lost their jobs. Did I really do my job to the best of my ability? Was there anything I could do to make our business better? I don’t know that there was anything I could have done to prevent what happened, but I do know that I have an obligation to make sure my team is always doing there best, because their jobs depend on it.

Family is the most important
I’ve routinely put my family before blogging, this was never a choice. Certainly they are not causing me to give this up now. However, I won’t lie and say that they are not yet another reason I need to give up this site. All told, not counting domain registration costs, this website costs about $14 a month. Pocket change compared to my gaming budget. Still, with the economy being what it is, every expense we don’t need is simply a drain. I want to be out of debt this year, I don’t know if that will happen. At best we’ll be done by November, at worst we’ll be done by February. Once we’re clear, I will have an extra $800 a month to fall back on. That is a huge chunk of change to me. I need to get this financial pressure off my family. It’s not good for my wife because she stresses. I’ve been out of work before and with the recent layoffs at my company it makes her more nervous. Mentally, I need to focus some of my energies on the house in addition to my career and my team. I haven’t been writing as much because I simply lack the concentration.

All that said, I am not turning the website over to Buddy Pine. While Buddy is a good friend, his business is booming and he has about as much time as I do. We talked at length about this last week and both agreed that neither one of us can continue the site.

I’d still like to write about games, but I can’t do it as a one man show. I’d consider a writing gig on the side, guest blogger, volunteer work, whatever. I just can’t do it five times or even three times a week anymore.

I loved running this website, I loved writing, and I loved it when a real discussion cropped up. I’ll miss doing this. I won’t promise that this is my last post on the site, I’ll see if any follow-up is needed. However, if this is not the last word here, it will be even lighter than normal until May 31st finally arrives.

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