John Gallagher wrote his dissertation about how people with a large following online relate to comments from their audience. Over many years he interviewed people who were top Redditors, top Amazon reviewers, and he interviewed Heather and me.
Heather and I both started blogs in 2002, we both got in trouble for writing about our coworkers, we both wrote about our bodies, our pregnancies, our money, and our divorces. We both received book deals and accolades and death threats. And I always admired her.
When I told Gallagher, “If I have haters that means I have an audience” he told me Heather said the exact same thing. I realized he was my best source of information for how Heather thinks about her blog — I always picked up when he called.
Heather was an early adopter of everything, and I learned to follow her. People told me, “Do it like Dooce” so I added photos to my blog.
