Just got this in my inbox via the contact form from a guy who wouldn’t even leave his email address so I thought I’d address it publicly;

Name: derwwod

Message: This used to be the coolest site because it had a grass roots vibe to it – now the main picture is no longer windsurfing but one ugly corporate looking hotel that could be anywhere. Now just throw on a few McDonald’s and Wall mart adds [his spelling, not mine].

But than again somebody did do a lot of fun work to put the site together and why not sell out to the corporate machine.

The wind died in revolt of the commercialism -and the sharks are biting everyone now – all because if that crappy corporate commercialism on the once cool site!

So, apparently the wind has been so crappy here and there’s been shark attacks all because of me – because I have a photo of the new Marriott hotel by the airport on the home page. Who knew that I wielded so much power?!

So, here’s the deal. I started this blog in April 2004, 9 years ago, shortly after moving to Maui. Now, well over 1,200 blog posts, dozens of videos, hundreds of photos and hundreds of hours put into writing, shooting photos and video, editing video later, I gotta admit, I’m completely burned out from it. Over it. Pau!

Keep in mind this has been a labor of love. The tiny amount of money I’ve made from selling calendars and ad space only paid for the web hosting and domain name registration. So there’s been no real compensation for my time and effort. And, add to that the occasional scorn of the windsurfing industry itself because it doesn’t like people posting photos and videos of their products before they’re ready to show them. Add all that up and it’s kind of hard to keep putting the energy into it when there’s other avenues that I can put my energy that are more rewarding, financially, intellectually, and personally.

I’ve seriously considered just shutting this site down. But it’s kind of hard to just kill something that you’ve created and put so much into. So, I decided to just de-emphasize the blog portion and leave it up as an information resource for windsurfers traveling here. Personally I think the hotel by the airport is a fantastic option for visiting windsurfers. And I’ve received no money from the hotel to place that photo there, so I haven’t “sold out to the corporate machine.”

So Derwwod (and any others with similar complaints), you try putting that much time and energy into something for 9+ years and then maybe you’ll have earned the right to complain.

I don’t see myself putting the time into this site that I once did. So, it’s going to remain basically like this, with an occasional blog post when I have the time, until the domain name expires next March. After that… ?