Depends Ends

Roger el-Simon addresses the dupes troops:

I wrote a letter to the Pajamas Media network bloggers yesterday, some of whom took it a bit more personally than intended. We disbanded the ad network part of our business for a simple reason: it was losing money and we couldn't see how in the reasonable future that would change.

Actually that part of our business has been losing money from the beginning, so the people getting their quarterly checks from PJM were getting a form of stipend from us in the hopes that advertisers would start to cotton to blogs and we could possibly make a profit. Didn't happen. No wonder those people are kicking and screaming now that they are off the dole. I might too. (Emphasis added.)

Those of you who had "wingnut welfare" may collect your prizes. Line forms right here.

But exactly what "part of our business" at Depends hasn't been losing money from the start? There is no other part of the business. Perhaps Roger means the part of the business that resides in his bank account.

The questions remain: Who was willing to take losses for such a long time, and why? (I suppose it wasn't that long. November 2005 was when Pamela Oshry was flashing Instacracker at the swanky Depends launch party. Still, three years is a long time to flush money down the crapper and into the orifices of Rog-el and Chuck Johnson.)

P.S. to Rog-el, you might want to take this bit down asap. It's a target rich environment.

Update: Link fixed! This blog still not losing money!