A few weeks ago, I was eating dinner in a restaurant and heard a Cyndi Lauper song. Then came Men at Work. It seemed so nice that a radio station would play songs that GenX grew up with, but nicer that we didn't have an "oldies" radio station in the area that went past 1982 or so and perhaps I can count on some newer or older music. Entering young adulthood, the worst thing was the proliferation of "oldies" stations playing the same songs, and it felt gratifying to know that at least my generation wasn't inflicting that particular torture on the next...until the DJ cut in to say "Our all-eighties hour will come back after these announcements."
Longtime user nyceve writes to say ask us to Restore Daily Kos. I write to say "Don't restore Daily Kos" because at no time since 2004 did it ever deserve to be restored, that it cannot be restored, and that it should not be restored.
Restorations rarely restore righteously; at best they layer a simulation of the past over whatever "ruined" the past, which in turn is a layer over the past. No matter the skill of the artist or the craftsperson, that Stradivarius will not sound like it did in the 1750s. The Sistine Chapel was restored, but perhaps the revived version was gaudier than the original. Both the Strad and the Chapel remain near the pinnacle of their art, and it takes close inspection to tell the difference.
The restoration problem, at Daily Kos compared to restoration of great art, is that it takes no particular skill, research or nor time travel to discern the difference between now and the Golden Age -- it takes use of a search function. Such comparisons are not aided by our faulty memories. Worse, we all view some aspects of Daily Kos very closely, making it easier to find fault.
Another problem of restoration is that standards of morality and conduct change. The conduct expected of a community of bloggers whose words are not deemed worth reading by the larger public is not as strict as the conduct expected from a community of bloggers whose diary headings can be offered to the English-speaking world. (Thus the F and N words are no longer welcome in diary titles.)
Some contributors left because they were unhappy at Daily Kos for one reason or another. To bring the back is impossible since whatever "mutual bonds of affection" existed have been severed. Alegre left and left angrily; her later career puts her in the company of the birthers and would probably hinder a welcome back, should she desire it. MSOC left in anger and spent time denouncing this site -- she does not want to come back and it would be unfair to ask somebody to replace her.
Finally, if Daily Kos ever had a Golden Age, it must predate Howard Dean's Iowa campaign in 2003-4. It certainly predates the campaign to elect a fighter as DNC head in 2004-5. Perhaps glorious good feeling prevailed, but absolutely nobody in the media and precious few in politics pretended to care about what we had to say. We weren't even a blue ATM.
So don't restore Daily Kos. Let it evolve in whatever direction it seeks. Don't force it to emulate the Rolling Stones, who will probably be touring the world well into their dotage. (Or worse, like the old rockers now consigned to Pledge Week on PBS!) If a split lay in our future, let it take place, and let the dissident, departing wing use Scoop or whatever tool they find congenial, then modify it to their use. Or, let the blackwaterdog sphere and the budhydharma sphere continue to gestate in their embryonic sacs until the hour of their expulsion from the womb, or their reabsorption into Mother dKos.