Sunday, September 15, 2013

A Complaint About Mike

Those who frequent this site have probably observed that I don't blog much on weekends--I'll try to do GRE columns at least one day, and other than that I kind of limit things to promoting my articles and announcements of radio appearances.

I want to take a moment to address something I think needs to be said, resulting from this post over at SSI. Mike highlighted a comment, complaining about Sipsey Street content and some other things made on another post Mike did on my latest GRE.

You can read the complaint at either of those links.  I also posted a comment, which I'm going to copy and paste here, because I think it's appropriate:
I could never have written this post that Mike linked to without his outstanding original work both in front of and behind the scenes. With all that he's got going on, the folks who see the iceberg tip at SSI have no idea of the demands on his time, and couple that with health issues that would have sent most of us to bed and sap all initiative, it's a minor miracle he is able to produce what he does.

There is value in being an aggregator to point people to what they need to keep their eyes on, and then offer a comment about a principle that often isn't stated or obvious. And when Mike does write an original piece, which takes more than most realize, because it's not just sitting down for 15 minutes and free-styling opinions, it's a unique gem.

If he failed to thank for a voluntary subscription--and if you gave one or more, thank you, because most will let him starve and expect their daily read--I'm sure that's a matter of too many balls in the air at once combined with life factors and attendant disorganization that comes with that. Now that it's been brought to his attention, I'm sure he'll be able to organize things a bit better on that score, but then, think about this: The guy has to field hundreds of correspondences every day on top of everything else, and when we send a contribution to GOA or some other group, do we expect a personal "thank you" note, or are we acknowledging they are doing work on our behalf that it is our part to help sustain?

I look at contributions to Mike as our way of saying "thank you" to HIM.
Just fyi,I'm going to be away for the afternoon, so my suggestion is, if you have comments, leave them over at Sipsey Street, because I won't be here to moderate things for several hours.

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