… as if thousands of bloggers cried out and then were silenced.
Turns out that bloggers who had their websites hosted on weblogs.com for free (about 3000 total) had them shut down today without any notice.
I know very little about Dave “Darth” Winer, apart from his associaton with Radio Userland. I have been to his website on occasion. I do understand that he was providing the service for free and feel that he is completely within his rights legally and morally to stop doing so. I just think his decison to pull the plug without any notice was wrong. I thought of this analogy:
You are looking for a place to store some of your belongings. A fairly well-know person in the neighborhood says that you can store them for free at his place and get them at any time. He does this for quite a few other people. Then one day, you go over to his place to pick up some of your possessions and find out the door is barricaded shut. There is a sign saying that the host has decided not to offer storage anymore. The sign says that you can get your stuff if you leave a note saying you still want your stuff, but you will have to come back in two weeks for them.
While no analogy is perfect, I think this one is pretty close. While the owner is certainly within his rights to ask you to remove your belongings, locking you out from them without any notice is wrong.
Hat Tips:
Jeneane Sessum at Allied