Daily Bell, RIP

[Updated since original posting; see below]

Effective 16 July 2013 The Daily Bell has ceased publishing new material. It will remain online as an archived educational resource. The editors wish to thank Daily Bell readers and members for previous participation.

With that note in the banner, and a final editorial by Anthony, The Daily Bell is no more.

My relationship with DB goes back more than three years.  I have no idea how I first came upon the site; perhaps something at LRC?  Needless to say, it was an eye-opening experience. Certainly, it was clear to me that things in this world were not as they seemed on the surface.  DB helped me to peel away layers from the onion. 

I had, for a time, felt a desire to write, to focus my thinking, and to develop discipline in my reasoning.  There is nothing like a conversation on the internet to bring out the critics – and at DB, enough of the critics were reasonable and intelligent – sufficient for my purpose.  I learned not only from DB, but also from the feed-backers.

So, after a time, I began posting comments.  Bionic Mosquito was born at The Daily Bell.  But I had a problem – for some reason I couldn’t get more than a few hundred characters through the tube. Very limiting….

For a while I had considered writing a blog.  This was the motivating event.  If my comments couldn’t get through the tube, I would post to my blog and then ask DB to copy from my blog to their comment section.  DB was always very gracious and accommodating in this.

Eventually, I figured out the problem was buried deep in my browser.  I changed browsers…and voila!  But in the meantime, necessity forced me to start this blog.

I truly enjoyed the comment section – as much as the editorials.  Even in this, DB gets the credit – it was the quality of the editorials that attracted quality feedback.  I learned so much through this interaction – aside from a better understanding of the string pullers.  Money, credit, inflation, wars, history, etc. My participation in the dialogue forced me to hone my thinking on these and many other subjects.

Like many feed-backers, my relationship with DB hit a few speed bumps.  I would take some time off from comments, occasionally also some time off from reading.  I never felt the break would be permanent, and it never was.

Saddest of all was when some really good feed-backer would permanently check out – never publicly, just silently.  (Forgive me, as I will forget more names than I remember) John Danforth, Lila Rajiva, Leonardo Pisano, and Adam come to mind.  Fortunately, many stayed on – Abu, gpond, and Dave jr., and Lyn, for example; and new ones joined, like taxes.  Some became quite rare, but still showed up occasionally, like Bluebird and Weeble (in all of his forms).  Always present and active for as far back as I can remember was Bill Ross.  And I can never forget my personal foil – Ingo!

I also remember some of the trolls – Al Kyder comes to mind, a real terrorist towards Lila as I recall.  Say his name with a New England accent and you will see my point.

Eventually, I settled into a nice place with DB – a sign of my development more than anything else.  And because I was forced to take a step that I procrastinated – starting a blog – I began to write more.  In this, I have been truly humbled, with many posts picked up at LRC, a few at EPJ, and even one at Mises!  All of this began with my writing at DB.

But now Anthony tells us that DB is no more.  No surprise: just as when DB stopped taking comments for a time, no reason is given.  Anthony certainly doesn’t owe one, although he developed a site that came to be a community for many.  I suspect there are many that would like to hear something about this decision.

In the meantime, we move on.  Daily Bell, you have provided a valuable service.  You will be missed by many.  Rest in Peace. 

Update: I have received several emails in the few short hours since initially publishing this post reminding me: just a few days ago, Anthony wrote an editorial, promising bigger and better things to come at The Daily Bell:

Here at the Daily Bell, we're positioned to be an honest broker within this emergent market and we'll do our best to fulfill this role in terms of consulting, advisory work and by providing other resources as necessary. We'll certainly make the most of this opportunity on behalf of readers and those who wish to actively advance their interests within the context of the avenues now presenting themselves.

We'll do our best to keep faith with you and to be the same honest broker that we've been regarding the news and analysis that we've provided all along. We're not changing ... just getting better. And bigger. So stay tuned.

There's lots to come.

The sudden shut-down yesterday is even more confusing in light of Anthony’s statement to “keep the faith with you and to be the same honest broker….”