Comments on: A B.A.D. Day for Blogging?

By: Rebel Squirrel

Rebel Squirrel — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 01:30:00 +0000

Enh. I have you filed with Sara Robinson and Dave Neiwert (among others) in the category of “People who don’t post nearly as often as I’d prefer, but whom I am willing to chase all around the internet because when they DO post something, it’s well thought out and interesting.”

Of course, I don’t have a blogroll, because I can’t be bothered keeping one updated. Or even coding one in the first place.

By: Batocchio

Batocchio — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 08:24:44 +0000

Good stuff. Some other bloggers and I call it “long form blogging,” and I sometimes call my stuff “OCD blogging,” but I like “slow blogging.” I think many in the chattering class don’t slow down to think about much of anything, unless it’s a memorable but vapid quip.

I think blogging can be many things, but the two keys to being a small blogger are writing what you want to, and blogging because either you want to or feel compelled to do so. If it’s not enjoyable or fulfilling in some way, why bother, when life is pulling in so many other directions? There are some great “short form” bloggers out there, and some people enjoy posting several times a day. I don’t want to discount their discipline or my personal sloth, either, but on important subjects, I like to research, link a source for a claim, make connections between two or more pieces, and sometimes try to write an actual essay. Maybe it’s just that that process calms and centers my “monkey mind,” gathering all these thoughts, weighing them, trying to make coherent sense of a problem or issue. I also really hate feeling that I’ve dealt with something important cursorily. I’ll admit there have been times I’ve thought, my god, here I wrote an in-depth post, or maybe the definitive post on the important subject of mollusk opera or something, and I haven’t gotten linked and lauded? I have only a few comments, or – gasp – none? But why am I really doing it in the first place? I would blog much more if I had the time. But we all have our own special something to contribute, and while the need to justify one’s self is understandable, I do think the main trick is learning to value and appreciate what we ourselves do when we are authentic, in blogging and elsewhere in life.

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Thu, 05 Feb 2009 01:57:28 +0000

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By: Infidel753

Infidel753 — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 16:45:04 +0000

Thanks — I appreciate it. You have a very good blog here and I hope you’ll keep at it, even if you can’t post as often as you used to.

By: Blue Gal

Blue Gal — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 04:33:23 +0000

Wow. What a thoughtful post. I love the idea of slow blogging, rather than small blogging…kind of like the slow food movement? Close to home, close to the earth? Down to earth?

I definitely consider daily posting to be essential for me. Blogging is my writing practice. I really do encourage others to do that.

But if that daily posting is only one or two sentences along the lines of “watched the game, now I’m tired” (and we KNOW which big blogs do that) there really is no point to it. Unless you have a big huge lazy audience that is too dense to realize there is skype and twitter and either of those is a better chat room than a blog comment thread.

Thanks for taking the time to post this. I’ll sleep on these issues and probably write some sort of response.