Nothing in the world is permanent, and we're foolish when we ask anything to last, but surely we're still more foolish not to take delight in it while we have it. If change is of the essence of existence one would have thought it only sensible to make it the premise of our philosophy.
-W. Somerset Maugham (1874 - 1965) -
Weekly Geeks started in April 2008. Its brainchild was an effervescent and energetic blogger named Dewey who envisioned a weekly event which would unite the book blogging community. She posted a weekly assignment - a question, a task, a theme - to be completed and posted on the Geeks' individual blogs and linked at the main assignment post. It turned out to be wildly successful.
And then a heartbreaking notification appeared on Dewey's blog on Tuesday, November 25, 2008. The person who seemed to be everywhere in the blogging community, the quintessential community cheerleader who everyone seemed to know and love, had died - leaving a huge hole in our ranks. In the spirit of keeping Dewey's community efforts alive, several bloggers got together and decided to give Weekly Geeks its own space and carry on what Dewey had started.
Over the last nearly three years, the team keeping this blog running has ebbed and flowed. Mostly we've tried to be consistent in posting each Saturday and doing a wrap up each Friday. But, over the last several months not only has our focus as a team struggled, but participation in the weekly assignments has slowed to a trickle. There are those bloggers who come back week in and week out, and sometimes we see some new faces in the links, but overall attendance has sharply declined.
So after some discussion, the Weekly Geeks team has decided that it is time to end this event. We believe that Dewey would approve - she was never someone who hung onto things that were not working. She was willing to look critically at her own inventions and change them up or simply let them go if the community did not seem as excited about them as she was...and so we are taking our direction from the spirit of the person who started this event.
A great deal of thanks are due those individuals who have in some way stepped up over the last three years to help out here, or give us ideas, or participate by posting to their blog one of the assignments. Without the book blogging community behind us, this event would have closed down a long, long time ago.
This is probably also a good time to announce that Weekly Geeks was nominated for the BBAW Best Meme award for this year. The Weekly Geeks team is incredibly honored to be recognized in this way - thank you to those who submitted a nomination!
This blog will remain up, at least for awhile, so that those who wish to may browse the links or read the assignments - perhaps find inspiration for their blog.
This will be the final Weekly Geeks "assignment"...share one of the following on your blog:
- If you knew Dewey - a favorite memory of her, or one of your favorite "events" which was Dewey-inspired.
- Browse the topics here and re-post one of your favorites