Some interesting points there. I certainly wouldn't contribute to the codex myself any more for the reasons given. I might not be making any money off of my blog but that doesn't mean I want to give my efforts away to someone else. I am not just that community oriented, and don't feel part of the inner-circle community.

Personally I think there is something fundamentally wrong with using a written publication to discuss a blog. That is backwards.

Now, a blog network of sorts does sound very interesting. Consider how the online newspapers work now. They have columnists who write opinion and are prominently featured as the authors of that opinion. They also have reviews where the author is credited but the prominent thing is that it is a reviews page.

I would certainly take part in a collective where I could be featured as a commenter, plugin reviewer, and theme reviewer.

Get enough of us there, even if people still maintain their own blogs, and the revenue could be far higher.