Ok, so here’s the official announcement. I left my job at AOL Tech to go off on my own (for now). Feel free to skip to the end to find out how you can support my move.

Let me say here at the outset that I loved AOL, and I loved my team. AOL was always and will probably continue to be a great place to work.

Why would one leave a lucrative and challenging job they loved to try their hand at a life of writing, blogging and app development? Well, it came down to a personality conflict. After years of enjoying working on blogs like Engadget, TUAW, Joystiq and Massively, the powers that be decided that the brand needed a shakeup. They made radical changes to my work environment that left me dissatisfied with going to work every day1.

Monday will be the start of increased focus on existing projects and attention to new ideas that have been bubbling up. I’ll be writing, including finishing my tagging book and working on the children’s book. I’ll be developing Marked (starting with the App Store version) and adding a couple of smaller apps to the App Store list. I’ll continue blogging, which brings me to a final request.

I need to monetize just about everything I do at this point. After much consideration, I’ve decided I don’t want to paywall any of my content here. I also realized that with all of these projects, I won’t have the energy or time to provide additional content for paid subscribers. So what I’d like to try is offering the same content as always, but making it easier for people who appreciate it to express that monetarily.

From here on out, BrettTerpstra.com is “Reader Supported.” If you enjoy what I write here, including all of the tools and tricks that I share, consider making a monthly pledge to help keep it going. It’s easy, just head over here and sign up with PayPal.

Thanks for reading!

  1. It was “not optimal.” Only a few people get that. ↩