A (somewhat yesterday’s news) requiem for passion
KeithHandy posted in Your Soul on June 9th, 2007
In response to the positive feedback I’ve been receiving on the “So You Want…” series, I want to give a brief nod to a now-dormant favorite blog, which helped plant the idea in my head to actually write things that are helpful to you. Had I not been a faithful reader of Creating Passionate Users over its too-short two year and change run, I’d probably still be writing this whole thing in a non-inclusive artist-to-audience “please listen to my stuff” perspective. (Hint: you don’t have to tell people to listen. Just put it on the side somewhere like you’re hosting a party, and oh, by the way, there are snacks over there if you get the munchies.) Okay, so this site is still 90% vanity, but it’s a step in the right direction. I’m trying.
Visual aids in the above spirit were commonplace on Kathy Sierra’s blog, which was initially meant to be a group effort between her and the other co-authors of the Head First series of computer programming how-to books — none of which I’ve ever read, admittedly. Never once, though, did I ever feel out of place as a reader, because her posts were focused on more universally applicable ideas about how to captivate your audience, your market — whatever you want to call them (”users”). And what she hammered home more than anything was the need to provide them with the opportunity to have their own “I rule” experience, as opposed to focusing on how much the product or its maker supposedly rules.
Kathy called it quits a couple of months back because she started to receive some threatening and hateful emails and blog comments, as well as some anonymous obscene photoshopping of her face that was posted to a mean-spirited website. Considering the friendly nature and informal style of Creating Passionate Users, there was nothing controversial that could have incited anyone to want revenge. It could only have been a sick person picking an arbitrary target. In her last few posts, she explained that the experience was so terrifying that she could no longer continue posting in the public eye in the same way. She tossed out some ideas about ghostwriting or using a fake identity, or making the blog private, but I don’t know if she’s since settled on any decision as to how to go forward.
I started reading CPU before there were more than a handful of people leaving comments (there may have been way more than that actually reading, who knows) and watched it grow into a “top 100″ site. Now I can’t bring myself to unsubscribe to the feed because, dammit, I miss it.
