April 21, 2006
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TOPIC: BLOGGING WITHOUT BORDERS
I recall how I first got into blogging, in the fall of ’03. I was back in St. Louis, talking to a professor of mine about my interest in writing. She told me to try blogging. I responded, “whating?” She was a bit shocked that me, being of the internet generation, was behind the curve on this new technology. But, I followed up on what she told me, and here I am, over 2 years later and still blogging strong.
Now, blogging is a household word, and while there are many people who still have never seen a blog in their lives, it’s becoming more common to discover in conversation that someone else has a blog. It’s a bit like text messaging in America. I don’t know exactly what factors were at play, but one day my best friend texted me something that would normally deserve a phone call, “Dude, your Mets are 10-2!” but instead, I was caught staring at my phone, not exactly sure what to make of this. Before I could shake my disgust, however, I responded (with a text), “Why the fuck are you texting me?”
I guess that is an example of resistance to change. Still, blogging has changed from when I first began using it as a means of “publishing my thoughts,” and organizing action, to something used to connect with other people for anything imaginable. There’s as many types of blogs as there are cereal in the cereal aisle.
With this, I’ve also begun feeling the frustration of communities, or on a more basic level, services. I use xanga, only because that’s what I was first introduced to. The problem now, is that I have friends on blogger and other systems, and it becomes more of a challenge to keep up w/ them. I don’t want to have to open up several accounts, or write more than one blog. But myspace seems to be better for networking than xanga.
What do other people do to maintain all their blogging relationships?
Comments (6)
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you should be worried….manhattan is gonna be underwater….but u got like another 30 years…unless the pace keeps quickening.
im worried about us…
wow i never assumed u would be so ehh about this….hmm pegged u wrong
anyways its not natural when we affect it….its not so much that this might not have happened, its that we directly effected it throguh our oil loving carbon addicted ways. We exacerbated the situation
and humanity is not prepared for the changes that are going to happen.
for someone who loves nature so much, im surprised u arent interested in protecting it more..
your attitude is like a fat man saying there is nothing he can really do about his health problems..
I sense I’ve missed an argument about global warming. Is correlation being confused with causation? I’ll resist the impulse to dive in and shred someone’s stance on the issue.
Dan, every blog has it’s merits. I have a site on Blogger/Blogspot and one on MySpace. They are all equally lame and filled with the same vapid personalities. Usually, my posts are the same from blog to blog, just Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V from one to another. But honestly, it’s a bigger pain in the ass to keep track of multiple blogs and their affiliated correspondence. I’ve found I get too caught up in the mechanisms of the blog site, and I don’t pay enough attention to my own content.
This “networking” thing you speak of…if you speak the word with strictly a social connotaion only, then I suppose the word is fairly accurate. If you are trying to give “networking” a business or political slant…I don’t think MySpace (or any blog) is the right avenue.
As for “publishing my[your] thoughts”, well you’ve already written and published one book. I’m scratching my head and wondering what’s holding up the second book.
Don’t get me wrong, blogging is nice; but too many people treat it as a substitute for real-world equivalents. That’s like trying to eat a photograph of a steak.
Well, I did sign up for xanga just so I could comment on your blog. But most services, like typepad, blogger, etc. don’t force you into signing up in order to comment. It’s a xanga problem! But you should definitely get a Bloglines account and subscribe to people’s blogs via RSS. It’s easier to organize when the content comes to you, vs. having to check a million differnt sites.