Who Killed East Boulder’s Blog?

Yesterday a friend who believes in dreaming, traveling and growing, killed his blog. Actually, he just closed the doors. Vituperation and silliness killed his blog - anonymously.

Dan Powers is the creator of a company called TripData - and he’s the Community Affairs Manager for the Boulder Chamber of Commerce - and he’s got about 37 other various irons in various fires.

Besides all that, until yesterday, he wrote a blog about East Boulder county politics. You had to live there.

You see, he felt it was important to get discussions going about local political issues that don’t always get the attention they deserve. Wasn’t a money making thing. He did it because he felt he should.

Yesterday, he wrote these words in “Epilogue:”

“And so it comes to an end. 15 months, 416 posts and over 8000 unique daily visitors were part of this blog…”

It seems that anonymous folks were poisoning the blog with nasty comments and ugly language. There were even people posing as elected officials. You can read about it in yesterday’s Boulder Daily Camera - “East County Virtually Silenced.”

I can’t help but think that losing Dan’s blog is a tragedy. But, it’s more than that. We’re losing something even more precious. We’re losing civility, respect for others and, most importantly, a willingness to listen. Further more, the anonymity of the Internet is helping us go down this rocky path.

My brother and some journalism friends write a blog called “The Same Rowdy Crowd.” Their stated purpose is to:

“…to make a difference, spark clear communication, have some fun and raise some hell.”

They were recently taken to task when they pled with readers to keep the discussions civil. Seems that some of their readers would rather yell.

Go ahead, raise some hell, neither Dan Powers nor Bruce Benidt would have any objections to that. But, when you scream, attack others personally, and pretend to be someone else, you’re not raising hell. You’re killing communication. You’re silencing those who are willing to risk these types of blogs in the first place.

For heaven’s sake, be yourself. Stop hiding under a trench coat of anonymity. I don’t care what you say unless you are willing to sign it.

Who killed East Boulder’s blog? We’ll never know.