This Is Serious Business

From the looks of it, this blogging thing can earn you a living--that is if you are on the A-List. Wired notified its readers that one of the prominent bloggers Jason Kottke has decided to quit his day job and devote himself exclusively to his blog. How is he going to make it? With 25,000 visitors a day, he is hoping that he can ask for "contribution" from his readers (he prefers the word "contribution" to that of "donation" because to him donation means you give without getting anything in return and contribution does not have that connotation--I tend to agree). In any event, $30 per year subscription from 25,000 people is... umm... carry the ten... $750,000! A fraction of that would probably be equivalent of his previous salary as a web designer.

Kottke is not going to advertise--which I applaud. Given the givens and possibly hims changing his mind, one can see that with the additional advertising revenue, the guy can make killing! Of course that is if all goes well and that at least a fraction of his readers decide to pull out their credit cards or sign onto their Paypal accounts and contribute to his cause.

All this does not sounds very far fetched or out of reach--at least for Kottke.

One thing I can find on his site--and it may be just my incompetence--is comments by his readers about what they think about it. There are a lot of blogs who have announced his decision to their readers, but I do not see any direct comments from them; but, according to Red Herring: " Longtime Internet blogger Jason Kottke asked readers Tuesday to pay to keep his site going, sparking responses ranging from “attaboy” to “no way” from his visitors."

I suppose time will tell whether the transition to full time blogging can be made smoothly and without a hitch for Kottke . Meanwhile, should you want to contribute...