“Can ye spare some cutter me brother?”
In comments Shawn wonders whether we accept donations here at Ye Olde Chuckle Hut.
The short answer is “No.”
I’ve thought on it for the better part of quite some time, because everyone likes to get paid for work, especially if they are me. And a blog, even a dime-store model like this one, is work.
Also, there are expenses. They’re not massive, but still, yeah, money goes out. None comes in.
Nevertheless, I’ve resisted setting up a subscription model, or a tip jar, for a variety of reasons.
First and foremost: The blog and its various side projects constitute a hobby, not a job. I’ve had jobs, and frankly I can’t recommend them. They suck all the joy out of work. And for what? A little bit of money.
Since 1991, when I left the newspaper game and opened my own little free-range rumormongery, I have cashed checks more or less regularly and outlived a number of publications that wrote them.
Over the years editors and publishers occasionally proved irksome, as they will, because they are running what they believe to be businesses, not open-mic’ nights in some dank basement.
Thus the blog, which commenced sometime in the Nineties, I guess, possibly at AOL. A window to shout out of. “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
At the blog I got to be not just a cartoonist, writer, or editor, but all of these things, plus photographer, videographer, podcaster, and publisher. The last four involved something of a learning curve (and still do), and a student really shouldn’t expect to get paid.
As The Patrón told Doc with a shrug in “Sweet Thursday,” “You have to pay to learn things.”
But not here. If you learn anything here, which seems highly unlikely, take it with my compliments (and a grain of salt). The bike magazines, God love ’em — the ones that survive, anyway — haven’t caught on yet; they’re still paying me. And so is Uncle Sammy, until he gets the camps built. Direct your extra pennies to some worthy cause.
* The sharp-eyed may notice that the coin changing hands above is a quarter, not a dime. That’s inflation for you.
Mad Blog Media 