Mobile Blog JKOnTheRun Is Reborn After The Fall Of Gigaom

Harken back with me to the heady days of 2004. The century was still young and we humans were yet unsullied by the great iPhoning of mobile technology. A young man, James Kendrick, hat in one hand and valise in the other, had just disembarked from the great ship HMS Mainstream Tech Media and begun writing on a website called JKOnTheRun.

In those heady days tech blogs grew fat on the vine. There were hundreds of them, all scrapping for the same press releases, and Kendrick was one of the kinder and gentler souls in that world. His work in mobile computing was important and easy to read and his were some of my favorite posts.

Four years later Kendrick sold his site to Gigaom and it was eventually subsumed. Sadly, Gigaom toppled this year and Kendrick had left in 2011 to go to ZDNet so the old site was left homeless. But the purchasers of Gigaom, Knowingly, have freed JKOnTheRun of the shackles of death. Gone from the earth for nigh on seven years, it has suddenly sprouted again and is available at jkontherun.com.

“I restarted it based on its history. I still get contact from people asking if it’s coming back, at least before today,” said Kendrick. “The folks at Knowingly gave the jkOTR domain, IP, and brand imaging, but I paid the legal fees for the transfer. I took over the jkontherun.com domain yesterday.

Kendrick, who is now blogging on the site regularly, will focus on mobile and will do reviews of things he wouldn’t do on ZDNet.

“I think what sets jkOTR apart from the crowd is my experience in mobile, and the fact that since I’m doing it for fun everything’s fair game,” he said.

Kendrick wrote:

Here’s what you’ll find on the new site — mobile technology, including gadgets, news, reviews, and anything else I feel like writing. I won’t just cover this stuff, I’ll share what I use, why I do, and what makes it work for me. It will be written from a personal angle. If I try a product and it sucks, I’ll tell you that and explain why.I am platform agnostic and will continue to be so. That means you’ll find info about all major brands and platforms.I intend to keep the site very minimalist with a focus on the content. No flashing lights, no morphing images, just plain good writing that will keep your gadget lust at bay.So welcome back to jkOnTheRun. We’re going to have a lot of fun.

It’s hard to build a blog brand these days and it’s great that Kendrick is trying. When he started blogging was still a nascent art form but now it is firmly established. It will be great to hear his voice again in the cacophony of the content-o-sphere.