It’s the writing, stupid.
More than 60,000 hits in its first three days.
“The Audacity of Despair,” David Simon’s blog of past writings and current musings, hit the web with absolutely no fanfare or marketing effort whatsoever. There was some little blow up over a comment he made in an interview, and as I had suggested years ago that he purchase www.davidsimon.com for his own use someday, it seemed time to get something up so he could, when he liked, speak for himself.
And so it goes. It’s a wonderful blog, full of somewhat random but always interesting prose, and though he doesn’t write often, it makes for a great read.
In terms of design, I pretty much got to do as I liked, which meant following my personal aesthetic: simple, elegant. For a former newspaperman who will always be, in some ways, just that, black and white seemed appropriate. And for the “Audacity” header, Poe’s Raven seemed the right touch, a bit Baltimore, and a bit stark. I’d like to see that design on a coffee cup…
But the rest is all David, unadulterated, through and through. I like to joke that it was the fastest most successful blog launch I’d ever been a part of, but in truth, it was years of work, all his. A 20-year “overnight success” simply by doing what he does best: think, and write. Congrats, my friend.
