I will prefix by saying that nothing in this post is intended as a criticism, express or implied, of anybody who has participated in this forum in any way shape or form. It is an attempt to share some thoughts to possibly (or possibly not) help with thinking about this challenge.

I have gone through a paradigm shift in my thinking about SMC in the last few weeks or so. You see, I thought I was a part owner (See note 1 below). I always thought of SMC as a kind of club which was owned by its members and that Keith, Aaron et al were kind of like a voluntary committee that kept it running on our behalf.

But it isn't a club, or at least it has become evident that I am in a minority in seeing it as such. Keith owns it. He can do whatever he wants with it. If he decided to throw a banner ad across the middle of every page he could. I don't expect that he will because if, as I have come to believe, he sees it as a commercial property then he would only be devaluing his property by doing so. Because while Keith owns the domain name and the web server and the pipe that the 0's and 1's flow down he does not own the only really valuable asset that this site has. It members. This site is only commercially valuable because of people like tod and Steve Clardy and Mark Singer and Jim Becker and Marty Walsh and... and... and... They are the people with knowledge to share and a spirit to share it. (Everybody else's name should be in the list as well but I can only type so fast - if I missed you out don't be miffed). Basically, if Keith makes the place uncomfortable then the talent (all of us) is liable to walk leaving him with a historically interesting domain name and not much else.

On that basis I am not excessively worried about what Keith may decide to do in the future, either here or on "satellite" sites. If he does anything to massively change the tone and style of this site he will be damaging his own interests. I don't think he is foolish enough to do that. If he creates "Son of SMC" and I don't like the way it looks, works or runs I won't visit it. If it effects the way that SMC itself is managed then I have the absolute right to stop visiting here as well, as does anybody else, again to the detriment of Keith's commercial interests. This isn't any kind of threat. It's just a realisation that Keith being able to realise a commercial income from his contribution to this site is not a source of risk, it is a source of security. Similarly any putative advertiser who tried to strong arm "editorial policy" would simply risk reducing the range of the audience that he was trying to reach.

Note 1 - I feel the need to clarify that I am not a $6 a year contributor and that is why my User strap does not say "2006 Contributor". From where I am paying $6 costs me about $8 in bankers fees etc. I made a multi year contribution in 2005 because it is the only way that makes economic sense for me. So my belief that I was apart owner was financially as well as contributionally founded.