PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- The owner of the liberal-leaning political blog Rhode Island's Future says he's looking for a successor to take over the site, which was taken down sometime before Monday.

Brian Hull, who purchased the site in 2009, says he's willing to transfer the site to someone for no financial gain.

"What's most important to me is rebuilding the RI Future blog to what it was when I was running it full time. There are a couple people I'm in touch with about running the blog full time, but nothing as of yet. Things are still fluid right now, and my main concern is getting it back live," he said via email Wednesday.

A page that provides links on stock and futures trading has been up in its place since at least Monday. According to Domaintools.com, which compiles information on Internet domains, the website's domain registration was last updated on Feb. 25. The current subscription expires Feb. 24, 2012.

The company that now owns the domain name -- www.rifuture.org -- is subscribed to Washington state-based eNom's "Whois Privacy Protection Service," which blocks public access to a registrant's information.

A Twitter account linked to the original RI Future political blog has also been inactive since last Friday.

Hull says he enrolled full time as a graduate student at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government in September and his studies have prevented him from devoting more time to the site.

"Basically, once I stopped actually managing the site and writing the majority of the content back in October, no one was able to take over at the same level of commitment because of campaign work," he said in an email. "Now it seems that the original people who I was in contact with about the site have transitioned onto new positions of their own. "

Hull says he's been trying to get the site back online, but has run across some roadblocks.

"The person who was managing the domain name registration didn't let me know about its expiration," he said in an email. "It seems the original hosting company that was used to first register the site no longer exists. The parent company that took control of the registration also doesn't exist. And I've left messages and sent an email to the new company that I hope actually can re-register the domain for me."

Hull, who is the state coordinator of the Rhode Island chapter of the Progressive Democrats of America, purchased the site from Patrick Crowley, an assistant executive director at the National Education Association Rhode Island, one of the state's teachers unions. It is unclear how much he bought it for.

The blog was originally founded by Matthew Jerzyk, who is now a member of Mayor Angel Taveras' City Hall administration.

At the time he purchased it, Hull said he saw it as a "great opportunity to better coordinate the activist community in the state" and to use new media to better advocate for progressive causes.