At what price?

I’ve always been amazed at the generosity of bloggers. Let’s face it, the average blogger invests an incredible amount of their time and talents to share their expertise — all for free.

Over time, a sense of community develops and the blogger, readers, lurkers and commenters all begin to feel as though they know each other.  That familiarity breeds friendships, new collaborations and more sharing.

Hard to find the downside in that. Until today.

I figured there had to be some petty jealousies and personality conflicts within the blogging community.   I get it — many of the A-Listers are considered celebrities in their own right.  And people love to take pot shots at celebrities.

But it never occurred to me it could go to the extreme that one of the most famous and popular bloggers Kathy Sierra is now experiencing.  Without re-telling her story — she’s (at least for now) shutting her blog down and canceling speaking engagements because she’s getting death threats. (Beware…some pretty disturbing language and images are included in her post.)

Read her story.  Add your voice to the outrage.  Leave her a message of support. 

And then let’s double our efforts to keep building a community we can be proud of.