TORONTO, ONTARIO - According to the calendar, today marks the two-year anniversary of this blog. In the Internet era, that's not saying much--the earliest blogs started almost a decade before this one, and any blog that is regularly updated for more than about three months tends to last for years.
Along more than 850 posts so far, this blog has clearly changed in focus. Originally intended to try to point out some aspects not receiving much attention in the political races in Canada and the United States in the fall of 2008, political posts are quite rare now. That's mostly because the tone of this blog was intended to be largely non-partisan (though I doubt any regular reader had any doubts who I would vote for long before the elections arrived). Nobody wants to hear that. Reasoned analysis is not considered to be of value, only partisan point-making. There's no interest in centrism.
The bulk of the posts now are of the glorified diary variety. Photo blogs of events that I've attended or places that I have visited dominate other attempts at commentary on the state of the world. Still, a perusal of any given week of posts shows a variety of topics, often including media, heritage, transportation and societal trends.
Because successful blogs stick to a single topic that has a target audience that returns regularly, this blog was not expected to be wildly successful, as I had no interest in a single-topic blog. Still, I expected that more comments would be posted to the blog to argue with points raised. Those have been few and far between. Frankly, there's been more deleted spam than challenging comments.
Near as I can tell, the bulk of the regular audience are friends and family checking in on what I have been doing. As a result it seems like the future of this blog might well be limited to the diary-type entries to save time in e-mail and phone communications with friends and family.
Certainly, the idea that this blog might directly or indirectly lead to employment has proven to be a pipe dream. I've been explicitly told that I have no blogging skills by two potential blogs I expressed interest in contributing to, and I can't say I've met anyone as a result of this blog, much less a potential employer.
I rather like the idea of reaching one thousand posts, though, so shortly of having nothing of consequence on my mind, the near-daily posts will likely continue in the present format until that milestone is reached.
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Travel: Catching Up
TORONTO, ONTARIO - When I left home for what proved to be five weeks of travel around the new year, the vast majority of the blog posts that occurred during that time were focused on the experiences I was having as I traveled. As a result, I gradually collected a list of things that I would have written about that were effectively "bumped" by the travelogues. Yesterday, I finally cleared that backlog.
That, of course, was not the only backlog from that travel. My mail was piling up for five weeks. I had five Christian Science Monitors and four Chemical & Engineering News issues waiting to be read, along with other mail. Only this morning did I finally clear the stack of newspapers, and now I can start working down the other reading stacks. Podcasts? I think I had 2.5 days worth of programming backlogged when I returned six weeks ago. It's down to about half that now. Railfanning notes? That's a complicated one since I still had material from 2005 to catch up on, but suffice to say I've only written up what I saw after the New Year on my recent trip. Pictures? Those paying attention will notice that I still haven't presented the pictures from Arizona yet.
The fact that one can spend a much longer time dealing with the aftermath of a trip than one spent traveling in the first place is a reality that I have long loathed. Some people deal with it by intentionally taking a few days of home vacation after traveling (in some sense, I have that but taking a job search seriously is much more like telecommuting to a job than being on vacation). Most of the time, one just has to gradually catch up as I have been doing. There's a reason why I preferred to only spend 25% of my time or less traveling (on business or pleasure); three-quarters of time was about enough to catch up and stay sane.
In any event, now that the blog is in some sense caught up, it may quite often be less than daily. It is clear to me that quality of writing and topics has suffered of late; I'll be writing only when I think I can present something well, even if it means a few days are skipped.
That, of course, was not the only backlog from that travel. My mail was piling up for five weeks. I had five Christian Science Monitors and four Chemical & Engineering News issues waiting to be read, along with other mail. Only this morning did I finally clear the stack of newspapers, and now I can start working down the other reading stacks. Podcasts? I think I had 2.5 days worth of programming backlogged when I returned six weeks ago. It's down to about half that now. Railfanning notes? That's a complicated one since I still had material from 2005 to catch up on, but suffice to say I've only written up what I saw after the New Year on my recent trip. Pictures? Those paying attention will notice that I still haven't presented the pictures from Arizona yet.
The fact that one can spend a much longer time dealing with the aftermath of a trip than one spent traveling in the first place is a reality that I have long loathed. Some people deal with it by intentionally taking a few days of home vacation after traveling (in some sense, I have that but taking a job search seriously is much more like telecommuting to a job than being on vacation). Most of the time, one just has to gradually catch up as I have been doing. There's a reason why I preferred to only spend 25% of my time or less traveling (on business or pleasure); three-quarters of time was about enough to catch up and stay sane.
In any event, now that the blog is in some sense caught up, it may quite often be less than daily. It is clear to me that quality of writing and topics has suffered of late; I'll be writing only when I think I can present something well, even if it means a few days are skipped.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Blog: Post #400
TORONTO, ONTARIO - When I reached blog post #200 back in February, I vaguely promised to repeat a look at lessons learned after another two hundred posts. Blogger.com has kindly reminded me that this is post #400, but I'm afraid I don't have nearly as many interesting things to say this time.
One of the lessons that I appeared to have learned in February has proven not to be true. I actually wrote out the band name Barenaked Ladies in this post and it was not spammed. Maybe the spammers aren't searching for the band's name since Steven Page left the band?
Blogger.com has informed me that I have a mere three formal followers of this blog, and I have no idea who two of you are. Neither is following a terribly long list of blogs, so both of you seem to be genuinely interested in something that I had to say (about exactly what I have no idea). Apparently it is rare in cyberspace to even know one of your followers, so I suppose I should feel fortunate to know any of you in real life.
There are various indications that even though informal followers are out there, the vast majority of the readership has searched for a specific topic and reads only one post, sometimes even leaving a comment months after the post was made (note the August comment on this February post). Some posts have risen fairly high in Google searches (witness a search for "UP conductor Reed Jackson" showing this recent memorial post as #5), so I suppose this phenomenon is not surprising.
A consequence of the one-post readership is that I'm not inclined to split this blog into different topic-based blogs as the technorati recommend. While I'm sure I have topic-based readers, the title line is for you. If you don't want to read my political and economic posts, or my railroad-related posts, just watch the first world in the title of the post and you'll continue to know whether to skip a given post.
Despite my lack of things to say in this post, I'm still looking at a list of post ideas that I haven't done yet, and I've proven in the past two months that I can keep posting even after working a full day, so this blog will continue at least to its first anniversary, now just weeks away.
One of the lessons that I appeared to have learned in February has proven not to be true. I actually wrote out the band name Barenaked Ladies in this post and it was not spammed. Maybe the spammers aren't searching for the band's name since Steven Page left the band?
Blogger.com has informed me that I have a mere three formal followers of this blog, and I have no idea who two of you are. Neither is following a terribly long list of blogs, so both of you seem to be genuinely interested in something that I had to say (about exactly what I have no idea). Apparently it is rare in cyberspace to even know one of your followers, so I suppose I should feel fortunate to know any of you in real life.
There are various indications that even though informal followers are out there, the vast majority of the readership has searched for a specific topic and reads only one post, sometimes even leaving a comment months after the post was made (note the August comment on this February post). Some posts have risen fairly high in Google searches (witness a search for "UP conductor Reed Jackson" showing this recent memorial post as #5), so I suppose this phenomenon is not surprising.
A consequence of the one-post readership is that I'm not inclined to split this blog into different topic-based blogs as the technorati recommend. While I'm sure I have topic-based readers, the title line is for you. If you don't want to read my political and economic posts, or my railroad-related posts, just watch the first world in the title of the post and you'll continue to know whether to skip a given post.
Despite my lack of things to say in this post, I'm still looking at a list of post ideas that I haven't done yet, and I've proven in the past two months that I can keep posting even after working a full day, so this blog will continue at least to its first anniversary, now just weeks away.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Media: Reporter Transitions
ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA - The world (foremost the blogosphere) has lost three major media resources of late.
It came to my attention that former Christian Science Monitor reporter Jill Carroll has decided to become a firefighter in Fairfax County, Virginia. I missed this news when it first came out, but it was referred to incidentally in a recent World Edition of the monitor. One thing we can say about Carroll, who was held hostage for nearly three months in Iraq in 2006, is that she must be attracted to all kinds of danger.
Those in the Pacific Northwest and interested in politics have by now heard that David Postman is leaving the Seattle Times for Paul Allen's Vulcan, Inc. to do media relations. Postman had become the single most reliable source for political stories in the Seattle area, appearing on everything from TV-W to filling in on talk radio stations, and was an early blogger. His move leaves a gigantic hole in the northwest. Postman himself had effectively become more important after the recent departure of Robert Mak from KING-5 in Seattle.
A reporter of a different kind has disappeared from the web. Tod Maffin has ensured that both internal Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) employees and the world at large have gotten insight into the workings of the CBC through editing the Inside the CBC Blog. However, Maffin is now moving on to other things and it is not at all clear what will happen with the blog.
Wise bloggers understand that most of their content ultimately comes from traditional reporters out doing classic investigative work. Now, not only are we losing those journalistic foot soldiers like Carroll and Postman, we are even losing the gatekeepers trying to keep the information flow going like Maffin.
It came to my attention that former Christian Science Monitor reporter Jill Carroll has decided to become a firefighter in Fairfax County, Virginia. I missed this news when it first came out, but it was referred to incidentally in a recent World Edition of the monitor. One thing we can say about Carroll, who was held hostage for nearly three months in Iraq in 2006, is that she must be attracted to all kinds of danger.
Those in the Pacific Northwest and interested in politics have by now heard that David Postman is leaving the Seattle Times for Paul Allen's Vulcan, Inc. to do media relations. Postman had become the single most reliable source for political stories in the Seattle area, appearing on everything from TV-W to filling in on talk radio stations, and was an early blogger. His move leaves a gigantic hole in the northwest. Postman himself had effectively become more important after the recent departure of Robert Mak from KING-5 in Seattle.
A reporter of a different kind has disappeared from the web. Tod Maffin has ensured that both internal Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) employees and the world at large have gotten insight into the workings of the CBC through editing the Inside the CBC Blog. However, Maffin is now moving on to other things and it is not at all clear what will happen with the blog.
Wise bloggers understand that most of their content ultimately comes from traditional reporters out doing classic investigative work. Now, not only are we losing those journalistic foot soldiers like Carroll and Postman, we are even losing the gatekeepers trying to keep the information flow going like Maffin.
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