In future you will have to pay to read this blog

Some people will pay and others won't but it's really important to understand that, for me, this blog represents a journey and, more, the primary place I use for my writing. In January 2006 when it started I had just enrolled in a media degree at university. That took two years part-time to complete and the blog continued to exist afterward, through the years of the GFC and the economic recovery that has sputtered and lurched along since then. In early 2009 I quit technical writing and started working full-time as a freelance journalist, with my first story published in September of that year. And year after year I tried new things, such as adding titles for each post - in late 2011 - that have led to higher pageviews on the blog. I stopped freelancing in July 2012 and looked to the blog as the primary vehicle for my writing which led me to add, in May 2013, a 'donate' button where people could easily select to give me an amount of money - if they wanted to. But noone did. Not a cent has been received and as a result I am determined to take further steps to monetise the blog.

The result is that the blog will cease to be hosted on Blogger and will, instead, be part of my personal website (matthewdasilva.com). In addition, I am going to implement a paid-for model so that people who want to read posts on the blog will have to pay to do so. Of course, pageviews will drop significantly but I am fully prepared for this outcome. What I look forward to is receiving a quantity of income from the writing that has taken me so many years to develop to a level where it would be acceptable on any website in the world - or so I think.

To this end I will be working with my longstanding web developer, B-Side, who have done work on my website in the past to such a high standard. I hope that some of my readers will continue to read the posts that go on this blog. The name will not change, just the location, and the general tendency and subject matter of the blogposts will remain the same. The main thing that will change is my own understanding of the value that my writing represents in the broader scheme of things. And I also hope that my taking this step will encourage other writers to do something similar. For my part, I know that my writing has improved to a great degree since the first blogpost went up on 22 January 2006. The improvement will not stop but if there are certain things that you particularly enjoy about this blog let me know below. In the meantime I will be taking on new challenges - including the redesign of the blog - in my search for a decent livelihood from writing. It is what I love doing. See you down the track.