PostSecret -- One more rant

Hi --

As I posted earlier, Frank Warren of PostSecret is fine, he is on vacation, I know this because I called the cops .

As I also mentioned earlier, I can't get on PostSecret anymore because everyone sharing their secrets, and wondering where Frank was, and yelling at eachother, has either caused the server to crash, is just so chock full of delicious word that my computer can no longer download the page .

Now I am the biggest Luddite in the world. I am the last adopter. I work in the technology industry, and my cell phone is so old that it is being held together by a twist tie for an outdoor garbage bag. When I am with colleagues and have to make a call, I literally run and hide. I started this blog the week after the NY Times said blogging was over, then rarely posted to it.

Even I know that 4,000 posts to a website with no advertising on it (meaning no cash behind it) is going to crash its servers, or be so chock full of delicious words that it will crash it's users browsers, rendering it unreadable.

So even I know, that unless Frank Warren's intention was to crash his own site, or my web browser, he probably didn't mean to leave the comments on, as so many people -- many of whom talk about him as if he is Jesus -- have said. Soooo many people went on and on about how Frank meant to bring the site to the next level, meant for everybody to share on the comments board, meant to let the great social experiment get even greater.

If that is the case, then Frank didn't know that 4,000 posts to a website with no advertising on it (meaning no cash behind it) is going to crash its servers, or my damn web browser, or both.

I don't know what it is about the blogsphere that makes so many people feel as if they can assume what other people's intentions are. I have a tremendous admiration for Heather at Dooce, who puts her life out there every day and then deals with it when people make comments about her parenting, her appropriateness, and why she does what she does, when it isn't anyone else's business.

But the reality is bloggers aren't people you know, uh, unless you're reading the blog of someone you know. Der. Readers don't have the right to assume they understand what's going on with bloggers, or project their own feelings onto them.

Do you agree, or is this just part of the deal of belonging to a community, that the person putting their opinion out there has to accept the labels, taunts, attacks and misperceptions of others? Because most healthy people, if presented with that in real life, would walk the hell away.