Good bye, for a while

To all of the regular and not-so-regular OFK readers–

Thank you for your regular visits, comments, criticisms, and interest over the last nine years. This morning, I begin work on an important project that is incompatible with continued posting, so I must suspend posting for a few months. That won’t be easy for me. This site had become an outlet for recreational thinking, and for beliefs I hold strongly. It had also become a part of my daily mental equilibrium (I’m prone to bouts of crankiness when I don’t post). I expect, like a few of you, I’ll go through a period of withdrawal, but the hiatus isn’t permanent. I’ll be back in August.

No, this is not an April Fool’s joke.

Until then, I’ll leave this post as a moderated open thread for all of you to carry on the conversation among yourselves. Fortunately, the list of terrific North Korea blogs has grown in recent years, and if you continue to check back here by sheer force of habit, you’ll see updates to some of the best of these in my sidebar feed. Finally, if you agree that some of issues, particularly human rights issues, deserve greater attention, then by all means start your own blog, write a Wikipedia page in English or in another language, join LiNK, or contribute to the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea or the North Korean Freedom Coalition.

Good bye for a while, stay safe, and keep the people of North Korea in your thoughts. They need you.