Bill,
Let me be the first to congratulate you on this new venture. I must say, as a regular reader of your blog, that I will miss it. However, I look forward to becoming a regular reader of your new on-line magazine.
Keep up the good work!

Jim

And I thought Sandra Day's retirement was big news!

So, this just proves that your blog was really a front for the Republican Liberation Movement, eh?

Why does the Federal Election Commission think it has oversight here?

Kevin - plenty of other sites, left and right, are covering the O'Connor story.

John, the FEC wants to define what I do here as a campaign contribution, and regulate it under campaign finance reform law.

BalderdaSh.

Just this week, didn't someone over at Nashville is Talking say that they didn't consider your site to be a blog? How prescient.

Bill, I hope you didn't take me wrong - I didn't mean it as a slam.

Your post does prove again how difficult it will be to define, and thus control, activity on the internet.

I, personally, think I shall take the path of civil disobedience when it comes to the FEC and McCain/Feingold.

The line in the sand is drawn...

So, what exactly are you funding???

Good luck with your new venture. If you care to include any articles or essays with an immigration-control slant, let me know, and I'll send you one of mine. And, when January draws near, I'd love the opportunity to inform the public about upcoming state legislation in that regard, particularly since I am now essentially banned by/from The Tennessean as a threat to that newspaper's worldview.

Donna Locke
Tennesseans for Immigration Control and Reform

So if you're not blogging anymore, what will you be doing when you play Joan Rivers to Brittney Gilbert's Johnny Carson next weekend?

God, you're delusional. Everything you have planned for your "online magazine" is exactly what you're doing now. Your mind is so warped it's sad. Good luck with this little "stand" of yours.

Ah, the brave new world of the onlinemagazineosphere.

Nelle:

You obviously have no grasp on irony and satire.

Bill is "re-classifying" his blog as a magazine so as to receive the same first amendment protection that they receive and not be subject to the idiotic moves the FEC is attempting to make.

Euphemism?
I'm for mism.
We all must bephenism!

Congratulations, Magazine Formerly Known as a Blog!

Nelle, nothing personal, but perhaps you'd be happier reading CollectLittleBitsOfStringBlog.com. It may be a little more straightforward.

My sympathy on some of the comments. I know it's discouraging to realize that some of your readers are so obtuse they wouldn't get a point even if was on a stake being driven through their hearts.

But here's a legit question - in order to count as a Real Journalist, will you have to pay yourself a salary? And if you're then an employee, do you haved to have a Real Watercooler that you can hang around, batting the breeze and wasting your employer's time and money? On such trivia does the law hang.

I cried this morning.

I read this and saw yet another giant of the blogging community be forced to run and hide from the evil grasp of the Federal Government.

I wish you well in this difficult time. I can only hope that your online magazine will live up to the standards of your blog. Can we say blog anymore? Is that banned speech?

Bill,

having gotten sick and tired of reading blogs I am thrilled that you have changed over to an online magazine!

looking forward to it!

Hehe. Good one.

Thanks for sharing.

Now, from time to time my Canadian blog comments on American politics often from a pro-Bush perspective...does the FEC have jurisdiction? Can I expect a platoon of Marines at my door?

DO you know of anyone who sells a blog-to-magazine conversion kit? I'd like to do it, but fear that the conversion will be too technical.

Well, as a magazine publisher, you now get:
- A table at Michael's.
- An expense account.
- A clothing allowance.
- A car service.
- An assistant who will go get you Starbucks coffee whenever you ring your bell.
- A minimally but expensively designed office with a view.
- A large ego.
- A reputation not as big as your ego thinks it is.
- The opportunity to go to too damned many conferences in Florida.
- A new hostility to those things called blogs.
Enjoy.

That onlinemagazineosphere could end up crowded in a hurry; all the nonconformists are headed that way. See ya there ;-)

As posted on the Jeff Jarvis blog:

"I don't understand this too well. I guess it must be difficult to have the courage of your convictions when faced with taking on the government's bureaucrats, but it seems to me that freedom of speech is an inherent right and worth fighting for."

The irreverence, satire, et al., is all well and good, and fun at that. But when it comes right down to it, the "name game" (is that a song from 60s?, or is it the 70s?) is irrelevant.

If they decide to regulate/put conditions on how you're compensated for what you say; what you call the platform from which you say it will mean absolutely nothing.

Please don't be mad at Nelle. As any parent knows, children don't grasp the concepts of irony, satire, or sarcasm until they are 10 or 11 years old.

Bold move, Bill! I hope you'll be remembered as a true pioneer of journalism.

I have to assume that like Slate and other new media enterprises, you're getting a generous amount of venture funding from certain "non-partisan" groups? Something in the range of 6-7 figures I'm sure. How can you possibly run a succesful magazine for less and still be considered serious journalism?

Great post.

Bold move, Bill! I hope you'll be remembered as a true pioneer of journalism.

I have to assume that like Slate and other new media enterprises, you're getting a generous amount of venture funding from certain "non-partisan" groups? Something in the range of 6-7 figures I'm sure. How can you possibly run a succesful magazine for less and still be considered serious journalism?

Great post.

Where's the masthead? They may get you on that.

There are different ways to fight, Noel.

I'm fighting back with sarcasm and satire to make a point.

I'm fighting back by reclassifying my blog as "not a blog" but not changing anything else about it, merely declaring it to be a "magazine" to make a point: it doesn't matter what you call the medium that carries the message, the message is still free speech and should be protected as such under the First Amendment.

My blog, and now my online magazine, are not political contributions to a candidate or a cause, they are me excercising my right to speak.

Journalists - and I was one for a long time - should get no extra protections, privileges or rights than any citizen who speaks or writes or broadcasts or paints or podcasts or blogs or sends up smoke signals.

Great thinking Bill....you have circumvented the powers. Congratulations!
I'll keep reading and enjoying!

Same software, same URL, same author, same interactivity, same archives...

So realistically, there is no change. It's just a glorified redesign that includes a little change in terminology ( from "blog" to "online magazine" ) to cover your ass legally.

I can't believe you can be so biased and have an online magazine.

Sorry, Bill. I thought sarcasm was dead and therefore looked for an alternate explanation. I'm really glad to hear it's alive and kicking!

Bill: As publisher of a new online magazine, will you have a policy forbidding your employees from blogging?

Jeff Jarvis wrote:
"- An assistant who will go get you Starbucks coffee whenever you ring your bell."

I get the Starbucks for mere blogging, but for magazine publisher I'd expect Intelligentsia, Castille, or maybe even Sweet Maria. You should contact your lawyer ASAP. I'd also expect to have my assistant ring the bell for coffee service.

Does this mean you can now use "undisclosed sources" and sources that don't have to be verified ?

Brilliant!