Oops, we did it again

I’ll keep the blah, blah to a minimum today. You know why we’re doing this: blogging doesn’t pay much and we have expenses to pay. We’ve already made a lot of improvements but, as yesterday showed, when we get slammed by traffic, the servers we’re on still struggle to keep up. At one point yesterday, this piece was getting over 500 hits per minute and the server said “screw it” and shut down. Poor thing. The next step for us will cost money.

So, that’s why we come to you four times a year to ask you to ask for your help. Every little bit helps. If you get value from what we do at Eclectablog, please consider making a donation. Details are after the jump.

Think of it as an investment

Hi, folks. Thanks for your patience as we make our way though fundraiser week. I listen to Michigan Public Radio every morning and realized that we’re running competing fundraising drives this week. Ironically, judging by the Alexa scores — a rating system for website traffic — Eclectablog actually gets more traffic than MichiganRadio.org.

Here’s the thing: you don’t have to donate a lot of money to help out. If a significant number of our regular readers were to kick in $5 or $10, it would go a long way toward paying our bills.

Details about how to donate and about the prizes you can win for donating after the jump.

People talk…

Today is Day Three of our week-long fundraiser at Eclectablog. We’re asking those of you who get some value from what we do here to contribute just a small amount back to help us keep the lights on and buy us the occasional beer.

I have asked some friends of the blog to share why they think what we do here is worth supporting and the response was phenomenal. Today I’d like to share them with you (after the jump.)

I know what you’re thinking. We’re in the middle of an election. I’m not even maxed out to President Obama yet how can I donate to a blog? But I also know something else about you. Something strange is happening in America. While 81% of Republicans say the economy is getting worse – despite improvements in the job, stock and […]

Support your local bloggers

It’s that time of year again, when we come to you, hat in hand, asking you to support what we do here at Eclectablog. Make a $25 contribution this week and be entered in a drawing for one of five signed two-poster sets of Anne C. Savage’s photomosaic images of President Barack Obama.

Details and some of the highlights since our last fundraiser after the jump.

We lost our little guy today. Rudy was a Senegal Parrot and was 19 years old. He was probably the smartest animal in our house. He rolled over, asked for peanuts, and knew tons of words and phrases like “What the…?” and “Would you like a beer?”

And “Peek-a-boo”. Video proof after the jump.

Forward (and south)

Anne and I are heading out this morning for the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina I am an alternate delegate for the Michigan caucus and we are both credentialed media for Eclectablog.

The list of speakers is impressive. Michelle Obama, Elizabeth Warren, Jimmy Carter (via video) and Bill Clinton are the ones I’m most excited about.

On Wednesday, I have been invited to a roundtable discussion with Governor Howard Dean and American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten with 10-12 other…

I apologize if you were unable to access the site earlier today. We once again hit the front page of Reddit (with this post) for the second time in two days. Our servers simply couldn’t keep up. At one point we were getting nearly 200 hits/minute which is a pretty outrageous level of traffic. We seemed to have figured out […]

A face for radio… Just a quick note to let you know that I’ll be on the First Shift with Tony Trupiano at 7:00 a.m. tomorrow, Monday, August 6. We’ll be talking about the fake Democrats in Michigan (past posts HERE and HERE) and the state Supreme Court decision on the repeal of Public Act 4 (post HERE.) You can […]

Geez, it had to come to this?

After my post about Trevor Thomas was trolled most of the day today by a staffer for his opponent, Steve Pestka, I revealed the identity of this person and they then threatened to sue me. I have since removed their comments (and mine revealing their identity) and banned them.

This was the final push I needed to create a Comment Policy which you can find after the jump. I have also created a very obvious link to it at the top of every page.

The eagle has landed. I repeat, the eagle has landed

If you’re reading this, then all is well and the transfer to the new server has gone smoothly.

A big shoutout to my pal Charles Gaba at Brainwrap for his work on this. We’re happy to have found a new home that can accommodate our explosive growth.

Obviously, along with these growing pains come new expenses. While I don’t expect to make a living blogging any time soon (though, of course, that would be the Holy Grail), I’d at least like to break even.

You can help with that by making a contribution to Eclectablog. How? Two ways. Details after the jump.