"Lock the doors and close the blinds -- we're going for a ride..."

Let's get it out in the open:  Mindsay is only a memory of the community it once was.

So -- what happened? Why did people leave? Why did I leave?

Let's start with that one: I left for a few reasons. The general gist of it all: Mindsay, as much as I loved it, wasn't allowing me the control that I wanted in a blog:

• Non-Mindsay members could not comment without registering for a Mindsay account. When I began my BlogTalkRadio show and started interacting with people in different communities, I told them where I was blogging. They mentioned that they were readers, but they didn't want to register for a whole new platform.  Understandable.  Having my own blog elsewhere -- even through one of many platforms -- would allow visitors to comment simply by entering a name and an email address. That's it.  Furthermore, I could find out if someone commented via email. Simple as that.

• I could have more control over who could comment on my blog. Yes, Mindsay allows the "screening" of comments, but it's all or nothing: if I want to give laughwithme full permissions to comment but not give that privilege to allaroundpsycho, there was no way I could do this. It's a trade-off when I want to have my blog remain active without me having to control each reply as a gatekeeper but also want to keep out the SPAM, trolls and other annoyances. I switched to a platform which gave me more control.

• I wanted to find out who, actually, was visiting my blog. Yes, I know: it's possible to mask one's IP address in this day and age. Proxies are available all over the place. But knowing who visited, when my visitors came, and to which posts they were directed -- that intrigued me. I suppose I could have embedded small images in each Mindsay post to determine this, but other pastures are greener with this type of control.  And I could see a running total of visitors per day, which I can only do on Mindsay if my visitors number less than 11 or so.

• I wanted my own domain name. I love shiny.mindsay.com,  don't get me wrong. But the allure of my own domain name? Something for people to remember that much more quickly? "Shiny's Takeout" seemed to do the trick. How do you know what the web address is? Simply type shinystakeout.com. Easy.

• I wanted to backup my own data. We used to have this feature on Mindsay; it hasn't been available since v3 was rolled out. If Mindsay were to disappear tomorrow (and although I'm hoping that the Mindsay administrators wouldn't let Mindsay fall by the wayside like this, it's certainly always a possibility), I'd like to know that my content is safe.  With my own hosting, I can back up my content regularly quite easily.

• I wanted my full posts to appear in an RSS feed rather than just the first few lines. That's how I do the majority of my content reading nowadays online...
  

• I wanted more exposure.  Even though google apparently crawls (crawled?) the pages, the number of hits on my independent blog from search terms far exceeded the same from my Mindsay blog (or so I'm guessing).  I had new visitors every week. As someone looking to expand his audience, Mindsay was a bit limiting for me for this purpose.
  

The community at Mindsay has been wonderful. (I mean, except for brandre who was a total rectum.)  The community had its high points and low points like every other community. There were times that people left because they felt that the membership was becoming too militantly religious, and other times when people left because they felt that the membership was becoming too godless. There were times when people were engrossed with other people's drama, and times when people manufactured drama to exacerbate others.

But you know what? This type of thing happens in all communities, not just Mindsay. People sometimes have knee-jerk reactions to the balance of a community, and they might depart of the community does not suit them at a certain time. While the climate might change, that person might remain gone. I like the notion that Mindsay is a play where I can pop my head every so often. And feel welcomed -- even if I've been gone for a while.

Thanks to all of you for making it such a place for me.

And tomorrow I'll make the post much funnier. I promise.