Dear Readers,
I should start by saying thank you.
I read somewhere that there are over 30 million bloggers in the United States. I don’t know if this figure is accurate (and I don’t necessarily think it’s a good sign that our blog-per-capita ratio is so high in this country) but I do know that, whatever the number, I have a lot of competition. Any time you go online, there are millions of blogs, websites, memes, videos, and BuzzFeed lists of 27 Hilarious Autocorrect Fails all vying for your attention. Me and my little site could have been swallowed up and buried in the crowd. My rants and rambles could go unnoticed. This could just be a hobby for me. It could be something I do when I’m not out doing whatever it is that I’d do if I was ever forced to get a real job.
But that’s not how things have played out.
You came along a while ago and plucked The Matt Walsh Blog out of obscurity. You decided to consistently read, share, and comment, even though you might not always agree, even though my posts are usually 2,000 words longer than the national blog average, and even though sharing my content guarantees you’ll be blocked, unfriended, and disowned by your loved ones.
As readers, you have been loyal in a way that is truly unprecedented. You vindicate the hundreds (thousands?) of hours I spend writing and you make the hate mail, death threats, and death wishes all worth it. I don’t want to sound like a pop star accepting a Grammy award, but really, I know you deserve a lot of the credit for whatever modest success I’ve had.
So, thank you.
You should know that your continued readership has opened up many doors and presented many opportunities to me. I’m going to tell you about one of those opportunities now, because some extremely positive changes will be taking place and I want you to hear about it from me first.
Starting today, I will be teaming up with TheBlaze on a very exciting multi-media partnership.
Here’s what that means:
In the short term, I’ll be writing content for TheBlaze.com as a contributor. Behind the scenes we will be working on building a new site — still The Matt Walsh Blog — that will be elevated and amplified by the resources and the platform that The Blaze brings to the table.
Also, this partnership with TheBlaze means that you’ll be cruelly subjected to a weekly podcast (as opposed to the bi-annual podcast I’ve done in the past), weekly video commentaries, appearances on TheBlaze TV, and other things we’ll develop as we go forward.
It’s good to diversify, of course, but my writing will remain my primary focal point. In fact, this move will help me concentrate more closely on writing, as it frees me from many of the things you have to deal with when you’re running a website by yourself.
This new partnership is about amplifying my message, not changing it or subduing it.
I’ve had a relationship with TheBlaze for a long time. In fact, they first reached out to me back in August of 2013 — the first month that my blog attracted any significant readership — and asked if they could do an article about one of my posts. They’ve believed in me from the very beginning, and that really means something to me.
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