20
DeafRead is not and never was dead
October 20th, 2009
I’m tired of being “professional”. I’m going to say it outright. DeafRead, no matter how low the numbers are, never dies. It is simply dormant, hibernating. DeafRead is the deaf community’s pulse. Whenever a controversial issue gets on DeafRead, the numbers go up. The hotter it is, the higher the numbers fly.
So when it appears as if DeafRead is “dead” (I prefer the term sleeping), that is the pulse in the deaf community. They almost perfectly mirror each other. When the deaf community is quiet, so is DeafRead. Want to feel the deaf community’s pulse? Check DeafRead. 
In my professional role, I tried to hint at this some time ago. Perhaps the message was lost in the “professionalism” of the post. Here’s the post.
DeafRead reached the mainstream public (at least in the deaf community) due to the Gallaudet Protest of 2006. This was a big issue, hence the big traffic surge we saw. Immediately after Fernandes’ termination, traffic fell back almost to what it was previously. Pulse. We’ve seen this time and time again with various issues over the years. The heart beats. We’ve not shared statistics because ultimately that is not the goal – no matter what you want to believe. We believe as serving as a communication platform on which anything can be discussed. To empower writers, we try to mirror the freedom of speech amendment.
Even you can detect the pattern. To cite an recent example, the numbers surged when the four finalists for Gallaudet President were announced. Even more recently, the numbers are surging following Hurwitz’s selection.
When people hear of something happening in the deaf community, they know to go to DeafRead. They yearn to read something, to know as much as they can.
Think of a Hollywood movie. No good Hollywood movie would sell if it didn’t contain a climax, a conflict. Human nature draws them to conflicts, drama.
Think of a newspaper. I only buy newspapers when my favorite baseball team wins the World Series. When two airplanes plow into high-rise towers. Otherwise, I don’t pay as much attention to the news. That’s human nature, guys.
If you are interested in statistics, I can share with you. This is when DeafRead is sleeping. So this is the baseline. 900 to 1000 people visit DeafRead daily. That’s on slow days.
tayler | October 21st, 2009 @ 10:28 pm
Wait a minute, gamas. That’s inaccurate information. The evidence we received remains accurate, and not only that, we continued to collect evidence that backed our decision.
JJ the editor you spoke of did not disagree with the evidence. He felt that Rachel wasn’t given enough due process.
Some time later, JJ acknowledged the additional evidence that we gathered. She wasn’t given enough due process, but in the end, the verdict would have stood.
Does anyone remember a few months before Rachel’s boot the DeafRead team fought for CI blogs to exist on DeafRead? It was not about Rachel. It was not about CI. It was about financial assistance that she was receiving from one of the cochlear companies. She disclosed it only after many posts were published to DeafRead. Karma caught up with her.
Linda Slovick | October 21st, 2009 @ 10:46 pm
Well maybe as you guys tell me the history, we can figure out how we got here? It would probably be several different folks remembering several different ways, but if done with rules like Deaf Pundit used in the Matrix discussion, we could maybe come to a sort of consensus on the history?
gamas | October 21st, 2009 @ 11:04 pm
How did she disclose it? I’m curious. I don’t want to get into debate about what a volunteer is and whether a volunteer does get paid. You have this “loyalty” to a product vs actually getting paid to promote. I think I read somewhere that another volunteer of another CI company gets compensated via gas card etc. That’s not commercialism, in my opinion. Not knowing exactly what the evidence you are claiming, short of getting into this debate where I know we’re not going to get anywhere, exactly what did she disclose? If you don’t mind sharing that? If it was a personal conversation between the two of you that you can’t share with the world, then I understand.
gamas | October 22nd, 2009 @ 5:58 am
Tayler,
JJ clearly stated he felt Rachel should never have been banned. See:
http://blog.deafread.com/iwii/archives/30
gamas | October 22nd, 2009 @ 6:03 am
JJ said, at the very minimum, she deserved due process. (at the very minimum) and he also said: “I still feel that she never directly violated guideline #6″ The link above will take you to the site that quoted it..you can check the guideline number six over there.
Tayler, maybe if you provided the evidence(s), perhaps we can lay this matter to rest, no? This will always come up for years, ya know.
tayler | October 22nd, 2009 @ 9:43 am
JJ later acknowledged with the additional evidence that she was tied to the cochlear company via financial interests. It’s more than just gas cards, which I do think is a form of compensation. I just emailed Jared asking what he thought of revealing the evidence. Maybe it’s time to clear our names.
Again, it wasn’t about what she was blogging about. We fought for CI blogs’ right to exist on DeafRead. They continue to exist on DeafRead much to some readers’ objection – and refusal to use the DeafRead Hide feature as I stated in the “Use it or Lose it” post.
tayler | October 22nd, 2009 @ 9:45 am
gamas, Rachel disclosed it on her blog. We don’t have the resources to go chasing after each blogger to ensure they stick to the ethos of blogging. Contrary to what you might believe, we are not out to get people.
gamas | October 22nd, 2009 @ 10:04 am
Two things…
1) Revealing evidence would make you more transparent, although a bit too late at that, although it might help DR’s reputation. I don’t know yet, it depends on the evidence. Your call.
2) When due process is denied, typically in a court of law, the case is dismissed and given the opportunity to be re-tried at the discretion of the person that started.
tayler | October 22nd, 2009 @ 10:26 am
We felt that revealing evidence was petty and unprofessional. Her financial interests were/is her business. Maybe that wasn’t the right move.
DeafRead isn’t a court.
Dave | November 30th, 2009 @ 1:17 pm
Mack -
I am confused here but, at the different angle, I kind of agreeing with you on this one …
You indicated there is “a HUGE difference” when DeafRead first came out and what it looks like now. …. This is true there were many good vloggers or blogger back then. However, I don’t see them vlogging nor blogging lately!
E.g. Ridor’s, Joey Baer’s and others — they’re not blogging anything useful lately.
Ridor’s blog sites are averaging about 15 visitors per day since January 22, 2008
Note: visitor = unique computing device that visited his web site [pager, PC, laptop, et al, each counts as one unique visitor)
Ridor’s last post is September 10, 2009 and the preceding one is June 24, 2009
Observe But Do Not Interfere’s post is April 04, 2009.
How about Joey Baer’s blog? He boycotted DeafRead and his last blog was dated October 27th, 2008.
Yes, that is a huge difference between now and back then. Can you kindly prod them back alive?