Gresham’s Blogging

Quality most important.

Johnson at Counter-Currents is so closely mimicking the trajectory of Guessedworker at Majority Rights that it is uncanny; indeed, the similarity is so marked I suspect that there may be an ethnic-genetic underpinning to the behavior. In both cases, we observe poor judgment, shortsightedness, a poor understanding of costs vs. benefits, a dismissal of the consequences of editorial decisions, and zero consideration of the concept of Gresham’s Law as it applies to blogging.

The Sallis Groupuscule is a single individual writing a couple of blogs, read by whomever is reading them. Counter-Currents (and Majority Rights, etc.) in contrast is a dynamic community. It is a community because it is composed of a group of writers and a readership that includes an active commentariat with a number of fairly regular commentators. It is dynamic because the pool of writers and the composition of the commentariat (and the readership as a whole) changes over time.

Thus, just like comparing the USA of 1820 with that of 2020, the illusion of superficial stability over time masks the reality of dynamic change. A blog name is stable, the same person may be in charge, and the number of posts, page views, and comments may be stable or even increase. However, the people writing the posts and the people writing the comments will change over time, for better or for worse. Typically, it is for the worse. Gresham’s Law of blogging is that bad quality people will drive out good, unless there is a concerted effort to maintain quality; indeed, if the blog owner actually enables the degeneration, the rate of decay can be very rapid. That is a decay in quality. The quantity may look the same or better, masking the decline in quality in the "minds" of the simple-minded or delusional.

These people see and celebrate an increase in page views, but they ignore that the people viewing the page views are not from the quality, informed readers that they (at least originally) ostensibly desire. They ignore that the posts are of low quality, written by childish hacks. They console themselves that, yes, some of their most valuable writers and commentators are gone, but they can always dig up some warm bodies to fill the spaces, however inadequately. They look at the number of posts and comments, but do not see the coarsening of the discourse, the displacement of the highbrow by the lowbrow.  Their blog looks like it is thriving on the surface, but it is completely decaying from within.

At some point, the decay can no longer be masked and the over-inflated growth collapses like a burst balloon. The exhausted blog become a wasteland, and the people in charge seemingly do not understand why. They don’t understand that by always going for quantity over quality, by always pumping up page views with cheap controversy, by tolerating juvenile and superficial discussion, that they are wrecking their blog’s reputation for seriousness and are alienating quality writers, readers, and commentators.

This basic principle also explains why the “movement” is full of defectives, freaks, grifters, infiltrators, retards, etc. – the emphasis on quantity over quality. The Quota Queens, completely lacking any understanding of prudent management and conservative growth, fail to comprehend that having ten completely reliable and competent people is better than having a hundred freaks, incompetents, and informers.  To the Quota Queens, more is always better – more page views, more money, more people, more, more, always more.  They constantly fail to question their “more is better" mantra. They always fail to observe that low quality people always drive out those of high quality.

Is that because they themselves are of low quality, and are in positions of leadership for reasons other than merit?