Letting Go . . . a Little Bit!
Nov 14 '01 (Updated Dec 02 '01)
The Bottom Line I hope this will help answer the e-mails I got asking why I deleted most of my reviews!
Thanks to everyone who ever took the time to read or rate or comment on what I wrote. When I first started writing here, I had very few hits, four or five per review at the most. I thought it was because I had chosen to review all things, fictional and non-fictional, in the LGBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered) book world.
It was slow going at first, but almost two years later I was getting a 100 hits and over for each piece I wrote. My readers were not just from the gay and lesbian community; I had stay-at-home-moms and heterosexual husbands . . . they were people who either knew someone who was gay or maybe had someone gay in their family.
It was wonderful to be read, get great comments and get those VH ratings. I felt accepted. And I became addicted to writing for Epinions. Many a day I hardly moved away from the computer except to get another soda or something to nosh on. One day last week I was deleting some of my very first reviews. It turned out that deleting was sort of like eating potato chips, if I may use that image, and I couldn’t deleat just one; soon there were only two left.
I’ve been seriously thinking about leaving the site for some time. I was thinking of it way before the EBD Wars, but that incident brought everything to a head as far as I was concerned. When we lost the ability to edit and delete, we had our property hijacked; we were locked out! I joined sordid-1 and many other writers in their protest to get back the control of our own property and that’s what brought me to the decision to reclaim what was mine.
I thank Ken (and others) for having the cajones to put the whole rebellion on the map. When we got our E/D buttons back, Sordid-1 wrote a brilliant wrap-up and it was all over. I guess it must have been in the back of my mind to delete everything and silently steal away. Then, I thought of all the wonderful people I’ve met, people who have supported me by reading my works.
As I looked at each piece before I hit the delete button, I looked at the names of the people who rated me it became clear to me that a lot of them had left the site. Many of those early names left before Epinions 2.0 was installed a year ago. Some of them left when the benefits were cut from three cents to a penny a read. Some left because they were bored and went on to other things. I’ve read some wonderful exit essays, but on the other hand, an awful lot of people have stayed and I’m happy for that.
I’ve had a great time writing and getting my ideas out there. I got to know some wonderful people who I hope will be friends forever. I was involved in the first Gay Pride write-off hosted by mshawpyle and caconti in 2000. I hosted the second one with Stephen_Murray in 2001 and it was a great success. I can only hope someone picks up the baton and hosts one for next year.
I sponsored an Aging write-off that got noticed by the National Aging Information Center of the U.S. Administration on Aging. I got a very nice e-mail from them and forwarded it to Epinions who did and said exactly nothing! I wrote a series of reviews on Eccentric English writers including Ronald Firbanks, Saki, Osbert Sitwell, Oscar Wilde AND his lesbian niece Dolly, and scads more interesting and somewhat unknown characters by today’s readers. I expanded my topics to include cookbooks, food and recipes, travel, websites (gay and other) and some product reviews like CallWave, BlueLight, Panasonic and a bicycle.
I don’t intend to stop writing for Epinions.com, but I am going to cut down considerably. I have been ignoring other hobbies and interests I will most likely lose my Top Reviewer and Editor hats, but those were never my incentives for writing at this site in the first place. I wrote at Epinions.com because I had the freedom to express myself and it was a place to try out my newfound craft.
I will try to add a review or two a month, but I will never let my reviews accumulate like they did before. I’ve found another site that I enjoy; there are a lot of current and ex-Epinions writers there, the natives are friendly, so just follow your nose and you’ll find us all.
Thanks again to everyone on my WOT and everyone who trusted me. You are too many and too fondly remembered to name only a few without leaving someone out.
Ed
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Epinions.com ID:
ed_grover
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 - Top 500 |
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Member: Ed Grover
Location: Milwaukee, WI
Reviews written: 332
Trusted by: 400 members
About Me:
Ed's last words for Epinions members and links to tributes are on his page.
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