Discussing and Remembering Dewey

[Maw Books]

It is a sad week within the book blogging community. Dewey from Hidden Side of a Leaf passed away this past week. To say that she leaves behind a huge void is a understatement. Not only was she a prolific reader, reviewer and blogger but she was also the founder and organizer of Weekly Geeks, the Bookworms Carnival, and the 24 Hour Read-a-Thon. And I'm sure I'm unaware of many others. We have all been influenced by her amazing energy, creative juices and bringing the community together. She was a wonderful friend. Florinda at The 3 R's: Reading, 'Riting, and Randomness perhaps summed everything up best on this well thought out post. She already has a list of bloggers willing to help.

There has been a lot of discussion on many blogs and twitter about how to cope with that loss.

Some of that discussion has included:

1 - How to best express our condolences to Dewey's family. Many of us have her address in which to send cards/packages. It's been mentioned to donate money/books to her local library, donate money to have her family plant a tree in her name, gather all the online tributes to make sure that Dewey's family doesn't miss them all, send flowers, etc.

2. - How to best carry on the amazing community building events that Dewey started. Many have already expressed interest in taking up some of these projects, includes challenges, Weekly Geeks, the 24 Hour Read-a-thon (this has gotten so big, it probably should have a dedicated blog), secret santa (with Nymeth), and the Bookworms Carnival. Dewey already had a lot of help on many of these projects so I'm sure many feel more prepared than others to step up to the plate.

3 - Raych from Books I Done Read has asked for a RIP button to place on our blogs.

4 - Keeping Dewey's husband in the loop. He mentioned that he would like to either see Dewey's blog continue or just let it rest. Either way, I think he should be in the know how.

So what now? Let's figure it out! Ideas, like to help, etc? I thought that we should get a discussion going in just one place, so it's not spread out among everybody. This certainly doesn't make me the "moderator" here. I just want to be able to talk amongst ourselves. What have I missed?

And if you're reading this discussion that get the word out and direct traffic over here. I'll set up another discussion to list links of our remembrance posts.

[Florinda]

Yes, a lot of people were either interested in Weekly Geeks specifically or in helping out generally. I don't know how many people on the WG group/team might be TOO many, and no one has volunteered to take the lead with that yet, so it's still open...

I don't know whether it matters if the groups set up on Yahoo or Ning, really. But someone suggested to me earlier that the group blogs might be easiest to set up Blogger, and I think she's right - it's very easy to have multiple authors set up on blogs there. However, the leads for each project will probably choose the blogging platform they're most comfortable with (which hopefully won't be Typepad, since they're not free).

[WordLily]

FWIW, It's also very easy to set up multi-author blogs on wordpress. And on self-hosted. But yeah, I'd say the leads can decide that.

[Becky]

I'd like to be part of a team--as long as me being a part wouldn't be too many. (I agree that we probably don't need a million team members.) But I didn't want to jump into a leadership role with WG if there were others really super-eager to do so. I don't really want to be the "leader" of the project. I really think it should be a team effort because it would be a lot for one person to try to manage and decide. (Some tasks I'm more comfortable with--more experienced with--than others. So I'd love to contribute where I can best help out. But organizing and leading aren't really my gifts.)

I personally find Blogger the easiest to work with. Though there are pros and cons to it. The layout is a plus for me--it's easy to play around with, there are lots of features that can be added to the sidebars, and it's relatively easy to add on features to the side bar that weren't blogger-created. I've got a Wordpress blog but find it a bit more trying. I haven't found it as easy to change the design, add pictures, add goodies, etc. I've not been part of a team-blog on Wordpress however. It may work great. I just don't know. But I've been on plenty of multi-author blogs for blogger.

I do think that the platform should easily and rightly be left up to the person who ultimately leads the WG team. With some input from other team members if they're opinionated and want to share.

The platform won't really effect how participants interact with the site at all. Wordpress does eat comments more than blogger.

[Amy]

Darby emailed me and suggested we do a group read of the last book Dewey had as currently reading on her blog. I thought this was a nice idea, we could do it after the holidays and discuss it here. Does this interest anyone?

[Maw Books]

I would love to do this. It interests me.

[WordLily]

That sounds like a fun idea, I agree.

[Tracy]

Lovely idea. In fact I just found the discussion here, thanks so much Natasha for starting this.

[Trish Collins]

I think this is a great idea. For a reading challenge with Dewey's name, the challenge could be that you read x number of the books Dewey read in 2008 (which she lists on her site).

[Maggie]

This is sad. I'll do whatever is agreed.

[Valerie Russo]

I was deeply saddened by the news of Dewey's passing. I actually wept at my desk. Dewey last emailed me the week of Thanksgiving and it was very difficult to learn that she is no longer with us.

I and the rest of the online marketing team here at Hachette Book Group; Kelly Leonard, Miriam Parker, and Anna Balasi, lament the void left in our community. She was truly special and we will miss her.

We have made a donation to firstbook.org in her honor and have sent a letter to her husband to inform him of the donation in her memory, which will honor her passion for books by bringing books to disadvantaged children in her name, and to send our condolences and thoughts.

Please let me know what the outcome of her blog will be - she had collaborated on a holiday giveaway with me that is already listed at her site and would've ended on 01/01/09. I would still like to send her loyal winning readers their prizes on her behalf.

I think she wou'd've loved to see the amazing outpouring of love and remembrance from her online friends. I'm really touched by the messages, tweets, blog posts and more I am seeing in her memory. It's truly lovely and well-deserved.

[Literary Escapism]

Hey you guys, I'm thinking we should stay away from Yahoo Groups and do something on Blogger or even on wordpress. I can start the blog going for the Bookworms Carnival without a problem.

Personally, yahoo groups is nice, but I don't think we should do anything that would require someone having to join something in order to find out what the topic is. You know what I mean? The greatest part of Dewey's page was anybody could see it and you didn't have to be a member to participate.

[Amy]

Jackie, the yahoogroups would be for the organizers of the blog...so they could determine topics etc. and then post about it on the blog. For example, we have one for the bloggers writing for Buy Books for the Holidays, where we share ideas and concerns.