Is it possible, in your mind, to completely agree with the quoted part above, but also think that Ed’s role in moderating / administering the board has been … less than helpful?
There are at least three roles that Ed is playing that are worth teasing apart. First, there’s Ed the admin/mod here. This is the Ed who created ridiculous fora to promote his own book, created a banned-word list, changed the Pit rules, basically created the schism of '09, and then disappeared, because he’s not really a contributing member of the community. That’s the kind of seagull administration that has @SmartAleq and @MrDibble so rightfully irritated.
Then there’s Ed the person, who some think is wandering around the halls of the Sun-Times (perhaps virtually during pandemic days) convincing the suits to just keep the lights on at SDMB. Or maybe he’s unfortunately reminding them that we even exist, and thereby potentially creating the conditions for us to get shut down! The truth is, nobody in this thread has any idea, and it’s all idle speculation.
Lastly, there’s Cecil, who we all know is Ed. Many of us found this place originally through his columns (and I hear he has books, too, though I have no direct evidence of this.) Now he’s proposing to write some new columns, and give paying members some input as to their topics. His old style of column may have been rendered obsolete, but… I’m not so sure. I think there’s a huge potential need for well-researched answers to general questions. One of my favorite subreddits is AskHistorians - randos like me can ask questions to the academic historian community, and if you get an answer, it’s pretty-much guaranteed to be on-point, well-thought-through, etc. But it’s aggressively moderated. Don’t even try to leave a top-level comment unless you can really claim expertise in the subject matter AND are willing to write a relatively deep and well-sourced response. Consequently, many questions are unanswered. I see the best case of a new SD being like that, but across more fields and with less expertise (but still researched.) I’d love to see that. I’d pay for it.
I pretty much agree with everything in the quoted part of the OP. Ed really should lay off any administration of the board. Find one or two well-trusted members of the community who would volunteer. Focus on this new project. That said, I still think @SmartAleq was completely wrong to post it in that thread. That was Ed, posting as Cecil, looking for feedback on that idea. It was just the wrong target for that vitriol.