So a few months back, actually now that I think about it several months back, I had blogged about a big decision I was facing. I made it, but couldn’t comment on it and didn’t know when I could. Now because an announcement has been made, I can. Well, kind of an announcement has been made, but not everyone may know about it yet.
*Sigh* Here goes . . . .
As you may or may not have heard, I have in fact sold my site SoapOperaFan.com to one of the companies that advertise on my site. The sale was actually made months ago, I had just stayed on to continue running the site for the time being until they took over. It now seems they are finally going to be taking over soon, and even posted on the site’s forum about the site being sold and what not. It’s not on the main site yet, but soon changes will be made there and it will become evident. Probably within a month I’ll no longer be working on the site anymore, or if I am in a very limited capacity while they take over and get the hang of things.
I’ve actually been waiting to be bombarded with emails about this from the forum, but they never came. Most people who post there asked me questions, I answered them. I had also written this standard explanation right after the sale and plan to set it as the “auto-response” for my email when the time comes and I start getting tons of emails about what happened. Here’s what I wrote . . . .
I’ve been doing my various soap pages (Days, Another World, Passions, The O.C.) for almost fourteen years now. What started out as a hobby essentially blossomed into pretty much a full time job over the past several years.
For well over a year I had been receiving offers from parties interested in taking over or purchasing the page. I turned down initial offers, but a year later when more came along, I was at a point in my life where I had some choices to make regarding my future. As many of you may or may not know, I’ve been in graduate school for a long time now, and I’d really like to finish! The soaps were supposed to be a hobby, not my life and career, but that’s what it started to feel like for me. Due to the fact that I am now on a very strict deadline to finish school, I opted to make the difficult choice to give up the page.
Other issues also factored in my choice. As I have said, it was not an easy choice as the page has been so much a part of my life for almost 14 years now that I couldn’t imagine not doing it anymore. That in and of itself was a major issue for me believe it or not. I felt I was putting too much of my time into the page, sacrificing school, personal time, and well a personal life for the page at times. As many who have been with me for a long time know, I would even keep the page up to date while on vacation. Let me tell you, that doesn’t go over well with those you vacation with!
So all these factors contributed in my decisions to give up the page, and I truly hope you can understand. Again this wasn’t an easy choice for me, but essentially for so long I feel I have put the page first and now it was time to put me first.
Well okay that pretty much is the explanation and reasoning why, but to be honest a little was left out of the story 🙂 I had received my first offers 2 summers ago, but it just came out of the blue, I wasn’t prepared at the time to even enter negotiations of that kind without fear of being taken to the bank. I basically said not at the moment for a few reasons, but would be open to talks in a few months. I figured that would give me time to get my stuff together I needed, and it would give me time to decide if this was something I really wanted to do. They didn’t call back though, I guess they lost interest. Then a few months later came the decision at NBC to cancel “Passions” and remarks were made that “Days” future wasn’t so solid either past 2009. Immediately I thought about the opportunity I had to get out while the going was still somewhat good and wondered “WHAT DID I JUST DO!” I was pretty sure at that point nothing like that would come along again. Of course “Passions” was picked up by DirecTV, but “The OC,” another show I covered, got permanently canned around the same time. I honestly didn’t expect to ever get another offer for the site, imagine my surprise when I got two!
So here I was with two more offers to buy the site. I knew at this point I couldn’t just say I need time, I need to think about this some more. I did that before without even hearing any kind of offers and regretted it, I didn’t want that feeling again. I examined my options, the way the shows seemed to be heading, the fact had I gotten out the summer before I probably would have finally finished school already. What should I do? One option of course was to keep the page and either ride the current shows out till the end, and then possibly pick up some new soaps if need be to keep the page going. I always got emails asking me to cover this soap or that soap, so I knew it might work. However it also meant adding more work on, something I didn’t have time for, as well as the fact that I really didn’t feel like “starting over” with soaps I knew nothing about as is. Plus I had around this time started exploring doing more stuff with primetime shows, as that’s where more of my interest was laying (hence The Primetime Dish was born).
So I worked out a deal to sell the site. Of course the ironic part is now that I’ve sold “Days” is the best it’s been in years story-wise. “Passions” however has been canned yet again, and there is still no certainty that “Days” will survive past this year. No looking back though, only forward to whatever the future holds 🙂 I am keeping The Primetime Dish, and once my dissertation is drafted I’ll probably explore expanding it a bit. Oh I have ideas for it, just no time right now. I also actually have a few other site ideas I have been itching to launch when I get the time.
-Dustin