A Short (Personal) Introduction

I have a confession to make: I used to work at a very boring desk job (don’t tell my former boss!). I sat in a chair for 8 hours day with about 2 hours of work, so I had A LOT of time on my hands. I couldn’t watch too much tv (but really, thank goodness for Hulu and iTunes!), I couldn’t read a book, and I couldn’t go to sleep. I had to look like I was actually doing something, so I started reading random websites on the computer. I’m not sure how I ended up at dooce.com, but I spent most of a month reading the website’s archives (all the material she had previously posted that was not on the main page). Heather Armstrong, of dooce.com, is the grand-mistress of personal blogs, and her website is a great example of a personal blog transformed into a thriving business. Here is a link to one of my favorite entries (http://www.dooce.com/2009/06/30/familiar-territory). It is long, but totally worth it – not many people can make me laugh and cry at the same time!


Blogs, shortened from the term "web log," started as an online journal - a place for an individual to type up their thoughts and post them online. Many people used their blogs as a substitution for their private diaries – only now they could share their writing with the internet! The genre has quickly evolved. As with many genres, the term “blog” can cover a multitude of definitions. Many of the websites I read every day are some form of blog, but there are so many different forms that I can’t keep track of the differences. My point is that pretty much anything you want to say has a place.
At one point (during my not-so-exciting job), I subscribed to well over a hundred blogs. After cleaning out Google Reader (a program that filters all of my blogs together and lets me know when they have been updated) this summer, I now have only 49. Yes, there are tons of blogs written by people who think you care what they ate for lunch (Frito Pie) and some are not edited well (or at all). However, I have learned so much about such a diverse community through reading blogs that I highly recommend you look into reading/writing a blog.


Things I Love About Blogs

1. It is instant and free publishing! ANYTHING you want to write, all you have to do is hit publish and bam, it is available for anyone with a computer-like device and an internet connection to read. You don’t have to find a book agent, write a manuscript, submit a writing sample, or pay any money. You don’t have to wait for the mail to deliver something, or the printer to eek out ink onto a piece of paper. If something happens to you on your way home from school, it can be published online within 10 seconds (depending on your typing speed!).

2. There are so many choices! You can have a food blog, a gadget blog, a political blog, a short story blog, a photography blog, or a mixture of everything and anything you want. Actually, many of my favorite blogs have lots of different sections – photography, videos, recommendations, reviews, recipes, home improvement, etc. The point is, you can have complete control, no one can tell you what to include or not include.

3. Blogs are changing the world. Seriously! Someone recommends a movie on a personal blog, the word starts spreading, and suddenly tons of people are going to see that movie. There are blogs with tips for being green and recycling, what kind of car you should buy, and what books you should read. Blogs of all kinds are becoming increasingly popular, diverse, and creative ways of sharing information. They are changing the way advertisers view the internet, the way (and speed!) information is spread, and the amount of information available.