07 December, 2012

Comments disabled

It makes me sad to announce this, but I am going to have to deactivate comments entirely on this blog. This means all previous comments are now unveiwable and no new comments are going to be accepted for the foreseeable future. I have disabled non-member comments. So all previous comments will now still be visible.

Even though the blog employs Google's CAPTCHA service I recieve on average 2-3 emails every day from crappy companies based in the UAE trying to cash in using SEO techniques and thereby reduce the quality of content already on this blog. This is on top of the dozens of CVs (thanks but I don't even have a job at the moment and I have no idea where people got the impression that I was employing?) and marketing/SEO offers that I receive too.

The number of legitimate comments is practically 0 and almost no posts/comments get made here anymore.

Again, I'm sorry for having to take this stance; but I don't want to watch what was a pretty successful blog get completely destroyed by greedy companies flooding the comment section with crap solely aimed at making a quick buck.

It wouldn't take much to get the blog active again, just a few legitimate posts a day from someone with a bit of passion. Unfortunately I am not based in the UAE anymore and I do not have the time to post anymore, I believe the majority of people that used to have some interest have all moved onto twitter/facebook.


If anyone is interesting in taking the reigns of this blog I am more than happy to pass it on. You can email me with a proposal to sam@samurai-sam.com


I am not interested in handing on the blog to someone with a commercial interest in it. This blog has been run ad-free for the past 7 years and despite the time needed to moderate the site (which numerous other people have also contributed to) its nice to see something in 2012 that runs without advertisements on every nook and cranny of the website.

I would also like to take this chance to thank the numerous people who dedicated their time to this blog over the past 7 years--the people who posted, the people who commented and the people who sent death threats.
Thank you for being a part of the 4000+ posts, the 28000+ comments and the 1,700,000 visitors.
Also, thank you to secretdubai for starting this blog, and thank you to the many members/contributors. The UAE Community Blog held an important place on the internet in the UAE for at least some freedom of expression and had a profound impact on at least a few contentious issues.