Heather Armstrong

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Heather B. Armstrong (née Hamilton) born July 19, 1975, is an American blogger who resides in Salt Lake City, Utah. She writes under the pseudonym of Dooce. Armstrong explains that "Dooce" came from her inability to quickly spell "dude" during IM chats with her former co-workers.

Armstrong was raised a Mormon in Tennessee, and majored in English at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, graduating in 1997. She then moved to Los Angeles, California to work. Armstrong married web designer Jon Armstrong and returned to Salt Lake City to work as a consultant and designer.

"Dooced"

In 2002, Armstrong ignited a fierce debate about privacy issues when she was fired from her job as a web designer and graphic artist because she had written satirical accounts of her experiences at a dot-com startup on her weblog, dooce.com. ^[1]She did not challenge her termination and has refrained from identifying her place of employment in interviews.

Armstrong warns her fellow bloggers:

I started this website in February 2001. A year later I was fired from my job for this website because I had written stories that included people in my workplace. My advice to you is BE YE NOT SO STUPID.

Armstrong's domain name has since become an internet neologism: to be "dooced" is to lose one's job as a result of something one wrote on the internet.

Dooce.com

Armstrong has written extensively and sometimes humorously of her struggle with depression as well as her pregnancy, parenthood, and her experiences with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In 2004, Armstrong accepted text advertisements on her website for the first time. In 2005, Armstrong accepted graphic ads and wrote that the revenue from the advertisements would be her family's principal source of income while her husband made the transition to self employment.

Lawsuit

In late 2005, Armstrong entered into negotiations with Kensington Books to produce two books, one of which was to be a memoir of early parenthood. The negotiations broke down in May 2006, and Kensington sued to force Armstrong to fulfill the terms of the unsigned contract [1] [2]. In October 2006 both parties agreed to a settlement which allowed Armstrong to seek another publisher [3][4].

Other ventures

Armstrong is a music columnist and consultant for the Alpha Mom media network. She and her husband run Armstrong Media, LLC, a web design and content-generation business.

External links

• dooce.com
• blurbomat.com Husband Jon Armstrong's website
• dooce plugs in on Alpha Mom
• Urban Dictionary reference for "Dooced"
• CNN: Another person "Dooced"
• BBC News: Article About Heather/Dooced