I’ve told the story of how Legal Insurrection got started before, but I’ll give it a little more flavor.
Prior to starting this blog, I was completely non-political. I may have donated small amounts of money to a handful of candidates, but I was not politically active. Like most people, I was more concerned with other aspects of life.
As 2008 progressed, I became increasingly frustrated with and concerned about the mass delusion of Obamamania sweeping the nation, and the blatant media bias.
Yet I still did not become political until very late in the game, and by happenstance.
In early September 2008 I was at the home of a friend and former client, someone I had represented quite successfully in a case before I left private practice. Despite having spent hundreds of hours together, we never had discussed politics.
At the dinner table with our wives, he asked me for whom I was voting. I mentioned that I was voting for McCain, and we got into a big argument, since he was an ardent Obama supporter and suffered from severe PDS.
After we argued back and forth for a while, he said that he never had heard anyone make the points as clearly as I had, and suggested that I should start a blog.
That’s it. No grand plan, just an argument and a dare.
I didn’t really know what a blog was. I didn’t follow the blogosphere much, if at all. So I picked Google Blogger because it was free, easy to use, and free. I was so ignorant of blogging that it never dawned on me to blog under a pseudonym.
My first post, Obama is Door No. 2, still is one of my favorites. Proudly, I was against Obamamania before it was cool to be against Obamamania.
The subsequent two and one-half years would prove to be a roller coaster of emotions and blogging ups and downs. But mostly ups.
And while I often joke about the “obligatory thanks to the wife,” she really does deserve a lot of thanks for putting up with this. It’s not easy being a blog widow.
I’ve met some really great people along the way, and some miserable wretches. The great people keep me motivated; the miserable wretches keep me agitated.
Two and one-half years later, after almost 8 million visits and 10 million page views, I’m moving away from Blogger. I made the decision even before the Big Blogger Blackout of 2011, but that event confirmed my view that I no longer was comfortable relying on the goodwill of Google.
It’s a somewhat frightening process because for all its faults, Blogger was easy to use and free. It’s also free.
Instead, now I’m dealing with issues such as “load” and bandwidth. For those who care, I’ll be using a Virtual Private Server with Media Temple. I think we’ve sized things to maintain very fast page loading, but since I’ve always been on Google’s servers, we really don’t know what the “load” will be until we get there. If you find that the new blog loads slowly, please let me know, I want to hear from you.
I have no illusions that the new website will be problem free, but at least now I’ll have someone to call and will have the ability to make changes.
Late tonight I’ll stop putting through comments and stop making any new posts here. After that the final data will be downloaded, and then uploaded to a custom designed blog, including over 3,500 posts and 32,000 comments. As you can surmise, I’m not doing this myself and had the good sense to hire professional help.
This “blogspot.com” address then will be redirected to the new location (http://www.legalinsurrection.com/); all links should work so that if you click on a prior blog post link, it should direct you to the same post at the new blog. If you subscribe to the RSS feed or via Google Friend Connect or Facebook, there should be no change; let me know if you encounter any problems.
Phase 1, which will take place on Saturday and Sunday, will result in what hopefully will be an even more user-friendly blog. Comments will use the WordPress system; registration will be required but open. It’s not yet clear whether we’ll be able to use the Open I.D. usernames. Comments will continue to be moderated. I’ve opted not to use vendors such as Disqus at this time because I’ll have enough to do becoming familiar with WordPress, I don’t need any more complications.
Phase 2 will take place sometime over the summer, hopefully sooner rather than later. Phase 2 will include the creation of a format off the home page for registered users in which we can focus on specific political races, topics, or candidates independent of any particular blog post. This will be in keeping with my goal of focusing the blog on a relatively small number of races which are flying under the radar in which we may be able to make a difference for conservative candidates, similar to what I tried to accomplish in the 2010 elections.
So there will be a lot taking place here over the next couple of months, and even more so as we gear up for the most important election since the Great Depression.
But first I have to get through the weekend.
Wish me luck.
Updates: Since I’ll likely lose “authority” after the switchover, I’ll note for the record that as of today Legal Insurrection is ranked #14 in Politics and #72 Overall by Technorati, and #2 in Law and #44 in Politics by Wikio.
Also, since I’m unable to post comments (yes, really!) I’ll respond to reader questions and comments here:
@Shaun – blogroll links will redirect, but next week once the new site is live, please use the new url.
@Aucturian – thanks, but we’ve now put up a blank page so no more sneak peeks!
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