A year ago today I started as a solo blogger. Unlike my previous group blog Catallaxy I’m not being written up in books about the media, but I do get media enquiries and writing requests based on blog posts.

Some of them are very unexpected – I would never have anticipated being asked to debate the door policy of a gay bar with an American philosopher of sex in a British philosophy magazine, but that’s where this post seems to have led (it should appear sometime in the next month).

And in contrast to the general impression that the inhibition-dropping nature of the blogosphere makes it a polarising place, my criticisms of people sometimes lead to positive and thoughtful responses, both in comments and in person. I hope it is because I (mostly…) stick to the spirit of my comments policy and keep my posts calm and polite. (Andrew Leigh seems to think so, anyway).

Luckily almost all commenters have also kept to the civility rules, and I think the comments thread is much better for it. There have been some good debates in comments threads, and from my perspective plenty of useful additional information, corrections, suggestions, and criticisms among the 5,354 comments so far. Our lurkers offer more of the same in email, by phone and in person. So thanks.
Continue reading “My blog is one today” →