I have been blogging for a while now and have also been an active, enthusiastic and faithful reader (and comment-er) of a few blogs. I love blogging and I therefore strongly feel about this world and would take liberty to write about some killer misunderstandings about blogs. I tried my best to understand how and why people blog (or don't) and these points are a direct result of that. As always, things I say might be false and limited in some exceptional cases; I must clarify that I mean no offence.
1. Blogs they MUST be funny!
I have heard this several times, from several important and distinguished bloggers. I do not agree. All a blog needs to be is 'engaging'. I can quote several blogs (This one is my favorite) which are nothing close to 'funny' but are outstandingly engaging. A reader of your blog is just a click away to reach or get-out-of your blog page, unlike in a book where he is less probable to judge the writing without attempting to read at least a couple of pages. It is therefore, extremely crucial that the blog is really interesting and consuming. Funny blogs are a good read, definitely. But surely, not being funny doesn't qualify a blog for a bad one.
2. Blogs they must NOT be long!
Honestly, it doesn't matter. As I already said, as long as what you write is extremely engaging it doesn't matter how many pages it runs into. Also, most blogging websites offer to not-break up the article into pages, so that fixes it all. Anyway, for those who are capable of and prefer compacting their thoughts into a couple of sentences, there are adorable micro-blogging sites like twitter. Personally, I love long articles! Short ones are fine!
3. Blogs they 're not serious writing! Typos are OK!
Typos are NOT OK. Casual language is perfectly alright. But, so far as typos and grammatical mistakes are concerned, you cannot afford recklessness. Unless you stick to writing error-free articles, no one is going to enjoy reading what you write. A blog is just a step further in innovations related to literature. They are definitely not serious, but they aren't unimportant either. You never know, a blog might someday earn you a job (or not)! And if nothing else, it is good to be right! :)
4. Blogs they 're not interesting. My Facebook page gets more visitors!
Facebook is like the chai stall where you love to hangout with friends, while a blog is rather like a book that you write. It has nothing to be similar to a social media site except that probably they are both websites where you post content. The statistics and numbers that are valid on a networking site are definitely different from their counterparts on a blogging website. And in the end, all that doesn't matter till you and your readers enjoy what you write.
5. Blogs. Oh! I would be great at writing them because I am great at writing!
Okay, this finally is a confession about why I think my blog has in some ways continued to fail. I love to write and I am fairly good at it. Friends do read what I write and my Google Analytics shows constant activity on my page. However, I have somehow lost a lot of my comment-ers. Despite writing stuff that makes people come back to my blog, I am unable to convince them to leave me a comment or two. There could be a plethora of reasons for this, one of which is probably that I have failed to write stuff that mattered to people. I am probably not writing stuff that people have an opinion about. It definitely takes something more to write a blog that gathers attention and appreciation!
...
Also, blogs are not widely and actively used in India yet. Most of my friends still think it is too strenuous, time-taking and boring to blog. (and to comment on others' blogs). A lot of them think that I might not notice their comments. Some of them do not find anything important, exceptional or relevant enough to comment. Most of them are indifferent. A lot of communications professionals themselves do not author blogs. Blogs are just not the in-things. (Of course! Facebook is!)
All this said, I would say that I am not discouraged.
Mostly because I love writing so much! For me, this blog is actually an escape-tunnel (Yes! That's precisely why the name Ctrl+Alt+Del!). It is a world away from the real world, which otherwise was just a set of dreams and fantasies. Here I define what looks and behaves like what.
Here I write what I love to read!
I read my own blog, several times!
And that, is what keeps me blogging!
1 comment:
"Here I write what I love to read!
I read my own blog, several times!
And that, is what keeps me blogging!"
I think they sum up the entire concept. In my view, you write what you want to, love to. I mean, not you as in "you", but if one writes what one wants to, that's a reward in itself... :)
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