The. End. (for now)

I've been thinking about the purpose of this blog in my life for the last few months. I started blogging specifically on technology just over 6 years ago, took about a year hiatus in 2005-2006, and have been writing consistently here ever since. But the time has come for me to stop. Mostly, it's because I've run out of things to say. On one hand, the technology issues I cover are well covered elsewhere. There are some amazingly good blogs out there focused on the use of Drupal and other open source tools. You don't need to hear from me about the newest web tools - you have ReadWriteWeb and Mashable for that, among others. On strictly NPTech topics, I can only say "nonprofits should use open source software for better sustainability," "there's more to talk about than social media," and "all nonprofit software should have open APIs," and "technology won't save the world,"  and "the nptech world should develop open standards," and "nonprofits should collaboratively develop software," so many times. I know that this isn't falling totally on deaf ears, but some days it does feel that way. And I'm kinda tired and bored of sounding like a broken record, so I will stop rotating now. And besides, the landscape has changed somewhat - in some ways better, in some ways worse. I'll still be building websites (and their successors) for the foreseeable future with Drupal, and perhaps with whichever cool, new open source development framework comes next after Drupal becomes irrelevant (it will, eventually). And I'll be Google+ing (rather than Tweeting, which is mostly for my writing, or Facebooking, which is friends/family) interesting Tech and NPTech topics as they come along and are discussed. And when Google+ stops being relevant, I'll find the next thing that comes along to share links and ideas and discuss. But for now, and until I change my mind (I like to keep my options open), this blog will be inactive. Was this blog a success? I don't know how to answer. Perhaps you can tell me in comments. For a good while, I had a lot of fun doing it. I hope I was at least a little helpful. Those are enough for me. For the curious (well, OK, it was mostly me who was curious): There are 409 posts and 922 comments. Since since September 2007 when I started to use analytics, there have been 151,000 ish unique page views, and 106,000ish unique visitors.  The most popular pages are (these are fascinating!):
  1. The home page
  2. LibreOffice vs. OpenOffice.org
  3. CRM and CMS Integration: Blackbaud Raiser's Edge and NetCommunity
  4.  WordPress vs. Drupal... Fight!
  5. What is Cloud Computing?
     

Comments

Your blog was one of the

Your blog was one of the first nptech blogs I read regularly. It definitely helped shape my views and my career in general. I've always loved your "tech is just a really cool tool" de-mystifying, accessible, calm approach to technology.

If stopping blogging here gives you more time and energy to do your other kinds of writing, then I'll just have to follow you there!

Thanks, Michelle, for being a leading voice of nptech reason for so long.

I visited your blog many

I visited your blog many times during the last couple of years when I found myself in the role of accidental tech advisor to a nonprofit client which clearly needed a new CRM and website. Drupal vs. Wordpress was a key post that I revisited several times, and it, perhaps more than any other single opinion or input we received, probably sealed the deal for open source over proprietary, and helped us feel confident that of the open source options, Wordpress was probably the best fit for them. So, thanks Michelle, for making a direct and important contribution to our project!

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