WHEN I BEGAN my online diary, “Living in the Bonus Round,” in March 1996, there was no way I could have anticipated that eleven years later it would lead to my being invited by pop star George Michael to play John Lennon’s “Imagine” piano. The route was unexpected, circuitous, and completely unplanned. But it was entirely representative of the numerous unexpected and life-affirming experiences that have come from my simple desire to create an easy way to keep my family and my doctor updated about my failing health

WHEN I FIRST MOVED to Los Angeles to matriculate at the University of Southern California in 1998, …I did not even know that ONE had existed, that many homosexuals in the country-and the world-had looked to the people in these neighborhoods for support, encouragement, and inspiration.

But gradually these ghosts revealed themselves-and they demanded to be heard. …

OVER THE PAST EIGHT YEARS, new voices have entered the public discourse over anti-gay ideologies. One of the loudest and most hostile toward us is the “ex-gay” movement, which attempts to de-homosexualize homosexuals under the pretext of saving souls in the name of Jesus. On the Internet and in the press, we are increasingly hearing the stories of ex-gay survivors, people who attempted and failed to alter their sexual orientation through programs such as Exodus.

IF YOU’RE OF A MIND to write a book about and for gay men and the Internet—or, say, fly fishing and the Internet, or careers in advertising and the Internet—know that your work will be hopelessly outdated about two hours before your publisher agrees to put forth the thing in ink.