Taking a Break
April 7th, 2008 by Syd
My friends,
After ten years of publishing News from The Sight M1911, I have decided to take a break, perhaps forever, but at least for a while. This decision has not been easy. I have come to know many of you personally through our e-mail communications, and I appreciate every supportive and encouraging message I have received from you. I will not close this e-mail address and I hope you will continue to shoot me a message from time to time and stay in touch.
There are stages in life when times and priorities change. I have done this for ten years, and I feel good about what I have accomplished with the sites and the e-mail bulletins. My mind is a restless one, and I have grown weary with reading all of the gun crime stories, the law stories, and the endless arguments about the Second Amendment. My commitment to the cause has not changed, but my intellectual life is leading me in some different paths. I need to be investing the 6-8 hours per week that I have put into the newsletter in some different areas. Honestly, I am tired of spending the first six hours of every Saturday composing and broadcasting the newsletter.
Also, the spam problem on the Internet has reached such a level that that people are employing layers upon layers of spam filtering. I have been blocked and blacklisted more times than I care to think about. I don’t believe there is a grand conspiracy to silence me; it’s just that spam filters tend to flag emails with a lot of links in them as spam. It gets more difficult every week to send out the emails.
When I began the newsletter, there were no blogs and few if any regular e-mail broadcasts on gun rights. Now there are many. Scores of excellent blogs exist now that give hour-by-hour updates on what’s happening in gun rights. They can roll the stone down the road a few more miles. I will maintain this blog too, but I have some new hills to climb, and I need the time.
So, thank you for your interest and attention. Hopefully, we will run into each other on the range.
Syd
Best of luck Syd, you’ve done a great job.
Thanks for all you’ve done, and thanks for the links that sent some traffic my way. I know how you feel. Even though mine is only a very obscure blog with little readership, I’ve been thinking of hanging it up and turning my energies elsewhere for quite some time.
Whatever you do, I hope your work is fruitful and satisfying.
It is a loss for all of us, thank you for you hard work and dedication. I can’t blame you for the need to take a break for however long if not forever. You will be missed greatly, I have to admit that your info letter is my favorite. I always had to tear through it and read each and every story.
Good luck to you in what ever you do.
Semper Fidelis
Mark J Cpl of Marines
Hey Syd;
Thanks for all you have done and good fortune in your future endeavors. Your sites are a great source of quality information, and your work had been appreciated.
SAY IT AIN’T SO.
I have found both you and your website to be a treasure chest of quality accurate information and analysis.
I have also found you to be rock-solid in your appreciation and support of our Second Amendment.
The online 2A community will suffer from your absence, and those of us that had the honor of associating with you will remember you fondly.
If you’re ever in Atlanta give me a call and I’ll take you out for steak and a fine single malt scotch any day you want.
Good luck Syd, in whatever you do. the example you set has been a beacon to us all. Godspeed.
*sniff*
Good luck and Godspeed, Syd. Please leave the snubnose library up if you can as it’s a great resource for a great gun.
sad to see you go but i understand the time constraints…
Syd,
I’ve never read your log before; only started periodic review of Xavier’s Blog about a month ago. If he says you’ll be missed, I tend to believe him.
I’ll have to look back to see what I’ve been missing (and hope you do return one of these days).
Best Wishes…
I will miss you and your writings while you’re gone. I will leave your link open on my blog, as a homage if nothing else, to the excellence that your site has been, and hopefully, will continue to be.
If you find yourself in Michigan, hit me up and we’ll go put a couple hundred down range.
Stay in touch and take care my friend.
Warthog
Syd, Thank you for your excellent efforts. Best Wishes in whatever direction you go. Perpster
You have been so kind for having shared your grand passions and interests with us for so long.
I thank you.
Take care of yourself. If you are ever on the Olympic Peninsula, call for cheer and chow.
Gale Holbrook
Sequim, WA
I can definitely understand where you are. It takes a lot of time, mental effort, and care to consistently put together a good blog/site, and ten years is a long period to be doing it. Those who have never tried it have no idea the amount of work that goes into putting out a quality product, and you have put out a quality product.
I can also understand that while you still support SA rights, you get tired of it all. As difficult as it may be for people to believe, there are other things in life to think, read, and write about. This is the point I reached, albeit slowly, over the last couple of years. Sure, I still go shooting (in fact, I’m on my way to an IHMSA match now), and I still am a SA absolutist, but too much of a good thing gets old.
Best of luck to you in your future endeavors and thanks for all of your past hard work.
—357
I totally understand.