Lots of things have kept me preoccupied online and offline. I have been around but I haven’t had the time to interact with most of Lainy’s Musings’ regulars as much as I wished to. It actually was a sluggish week for me as far as regular postings and networking with my bloggging comrades. My blogging comrades have been my regular mantras to regain back much of the lost traffic at LM and yeah, the lost zest and passion for blogging.
I thank this blog’s co-author Windy for publishing some relevant articles for Lainy’s Musings. I am grateful because you always come to the rescue :D
“It seems with the advent of microblogging platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and MySpace, to just name a few, blogging with good solid content was considered obsolete. Why post a five-hundred word count blog post when you can get your point across in just 140 characters on Twitter?”
Photo from http://cac.ophony.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/bloggers-blog.gif
Amongst several repetitive no brainers that spawn in Blogosphere, one of them is the ever persistent “Meme”.
Please don’t get me wrong.
Tags and memes are one of the best ways to develop strong camaraderie and bonding between and among co-bloggers. But it’s about time that some truths prevail amongst bloggers. The liberal handout of various kinds of memes can get very confusing particularly with the more complex kinds and its repetitiveness has made its original intent rather outmoded.
On the other hand, it does come handy to serve as an interim article for bloggers, like me, who do paid postings. However, on the blogging downside, more often than not, blog quality is being put on the line when paid post articles are published. Though quality is subjective even to the discerning reader, I have always believed that content is still king.
There is reason that underscores why some bloggers have become rather selective when they publish their articles. Published material has dwindled to skimpy 2 sentences, single paragraph with a couple of images to idiomatically support that “a picture paints a thousand words“.
So it appears that both, the heightened time and interest of yesteryear blogging has waned considerably.
After having purposefully allowed the Poll to stay on top at the Post fold for four days, without any new article published, this is the result of the Poll. The image captures are taken from the Poll’s admin backend…
Remarks:
1. Apparently not that many polled. The most polled was Poll Number 1. Hmmm…does that say something about the habit of bloggers/readers?
I should ask Windy if he can produce a automatic scroll timer for a Blog, if you know what I mean.
2. The poll aggregate has a poor spread in the number of pollsters. Therefore, it would not project a realistic average.
3. For whatever it is worth, here is the rest of the Poll results, item by item.
Remark: Twitter was left out intentionally. it showed that there are Pollsters who DO think when they cast their poll, as did the 4 who selected, “Not listed here”.
Once again, I thank those who took an interest and made their poll.
Having been a Blogger since the day you made that fateful decision and having been through the grind, the highs and lows and presumably in pursuit of what it takes to get your Blog on top of the fold, here then are 10 relevant questions to be polled.
By clicking on the VIEW RESULTS below each Poll box, you will be able to read the poll consensus and what choice it is for the majority.
To begin with, that’s a stupid question - “why does one Blog?” but necessary just for the sake of this article, if I may add.
Apart from monetary reasons, since e-Commerce and other Services have found their presence at Blogs and forced Blogs to migrate from its traditional path, the Blog despite it all has grown by geometric progression.
A Personal Endeavor
It provides the latitude for an individual to devote time to deliver something he thinks is important enough. In doing so with a Blog it also enables him to commingle with the blogging fraternity.
For some a Blog is the best way to “get it out of their system” so to speak, as it affords a catharsis in some way. You know, like after having a spat with your spouse or sweetheart or friend. The Blog is the inevitable Paracetemol. You could compare the Blog to a facial puss-filled acne just waiting to be relieved.
Then there are the cry-babies, seeking attention through the use of their Blog. Perhaps for these they either feel neglected or unable to have even a 5 minute conversation with their spouse without their house roof caving in.
These and numerous other personal reasons motivate an individual to join the status quo by adding a URL or more to their list of personal possessions.
Is blogging invasive?
It is definitely invasive. The only activity one can assume that isn’t would be if one decides to be a hermit.
For as long as the Blog is active, the Blogger is subjected to a rewording of Thomas A. Kempis’ phrase:
“For Blogger proposes, but man disposes; neither is the way of the Blogger in his own hands”.
Every Blogger will have to accept the reality that he is surrounded from the sweet-toothed to those that are fanged.
Blog Diversions
Tales of virtual romance and those that led some to the Vows of Marriage are known.
The broadening of both knowledge and acquaintances is another.
I shall leave out the regrettable side of what transpires simply because that is not what a Blog is ever meant to be.
Of late, Social Networks have seized on the immense number of Blogs and these social networks have evolved with a remarkable makeover. Remote cellular links has also given a few Social Networks a fillip while they aspire to share the same pedestal as Blogs.
The Cycle of Reinvention
Has the Blog gone a full circle and like it’s predecessors is on its way out? Like the emails, the Chat Rooms and Forums, is the Blog being diminished by other avant-garde electronic gadgets?
I believe Blogs will approach that eventually. Arguably personal free-time will be shrunk even further and the time spent at the Computers will be forcefully minimized. Why right now even as I write this article, my cellular phone is being spammed by advertisers and news that I never registered for.
Wireless Internet connections are available at specific Coffee houses as a growing in-house feature. There is even a Bus Transport Company that provides wireless Internet link for the few on-the-go passengers whose bread and butter depends on a Notebook or a Laptop. These are now the visible symptoms of a breach from the traditional Internet Cafe services and Desktop at home situations.
Even the present popularity of Social Networks might take a backseat unless they transform their reach in ways greater than what they are now.
Going Futuristic – Blog with your hand held cellular phone
As one would do it with a Desktop PC or laptop, the geniuses of blogging platforms such as Google’s blogspot and WordPress may extend their longevity. That is if they are not already at their drawing boards brainstorming how one can Blog with the use of a cellular phone in ways never thought possible before.
In March, I publish an article that has relevance. It was titled, “The Art of Writing for Blogs”. If you missed it and now wish to read it, you may Post-hop by clicking the button below to peruse it.
However, I was on copy in Windy’s email to another Blogger. Windy added some interesting details which I would like to share with you.
Perhaps this may be of some assistance to you and I hope you will find something in it that you will be able to find useful.
Basically, you have the same common problem that challenges the majority who find it difficult to put down their thoughts in writing.
Now, before I begin, I must clarify that there are different conditions and that these warrant different styles of writing presentation. Such as, if one is an Academic or a Researcher or a Journalist or an Author of novels. Each of these have what one may call a specialized manner in which they present their writings. It has to suit the profession.
So, for Bloggers, their manner of written presentation is somewhere in between that of a Journalist and an Author of novels. That kind of written presentation suits the format of blogs.
Now I shall begin. Fasten your seat belt. This is going to be a long ride. LOL
Anything that you intend to write MUST have an Introduction, the Body and a Conclusion. This keeps you on track with what you are about to write and prevent you from straying from the main subject matter.
The Introduction should at the most be no more than two paragraphs; best if you keep it to just one paragraph.
The Body can be as many paragraphs as you wish it to be. Importantly, each paragraph should contain not more than one specific thought that you are relating. This makes it easier for the reader to follow your thought progress.
If there are a series of paragraphs, it is also good to group them into a subtitle. When you subtitle the group of paragraphs, it is a neat way to organize your writing and it also improves the understanding of the reader who can see how you are moving logically from one part of the essay to the next part. (I will show you an example of this after I have completed explaining all this.)
The Conclusion should be short and sweet. Not more than two to three sentences. It gives a sharp and sweet sting right at the end. The Conclusion must emphasize either the Title of your essay or confirm what was said in your Introduction.
Here is an example how it would look like, let’s say if i were to write something About Cats.
Title:About Cats
1. Introduction
Cats have four legs, one tail and come in all shapes and sizes.
2. Body
Cats make good domestic pets (as sub title)
This is something commonly found in any part of the World. Cats are easily domesticated animals. They are timid unless provoked and can be very lovable and loyal pets. Children find cats so amusing that they often pull them by their fur or tail.
Blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah – paragraph
Selecting a cat for a pet (as sub title)
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Do cats talk? (as sub title)
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Symptoms that your cat is sick (as sub title)
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah blah – paragraph
Blah blah blah – paragraph
3. Conclusion
I read that cats are love on four legs. How so true!
As you can see from the above example, that is how a Blog article should more or less be presented. It makes it easy on the reader’s eye to get an overview of what the entire passage is about.
Making it easy for the reader is of paramount importance because you write not for yourself but you write as the medium to reach out to the readership of others. Readers therefore become your “customers”. And it is to the best of your blog’s benefit so that your reading “customers” will find it simple and easy to read what your write.
What about personal expression?
This depends on your choice of words and how you construct your sentences.
If you were writing about how you were robbed on the street, you would not write as though you are taking a sight seeing tour of the Niagara Falls. The sentences would be short and choppy to reflect as though you are short of breath from the fright of it all. The words you would use would be hesitant, staccato, arousing shock, pain, etc.,
But what ever it is, it must be expressed in the way you would have related it as if you were speaking to someone about it. That would reflect your personality. If you wrote it like the person who writes scripts for the TV Program “the X Files”, that wouldn’t reflect you.
How about being Grammatically Correct?
First, you can’t always be grammatically correct. How people write it in America and how the British write it have strange differences and it is not that either the American or the British is incorrect.
People in places where Pidgin English is the lingua franca, they would say that both Americans and the British are stupid. Why the need for so many rules, the need to worry about grammar and miss delivering what is essential? There will always be those who pursue perfection to idiomatic ridicule as in remembering to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.
Give yourself time and you will progressively understand what rules apply and what rules do not apply. English is a very flexible language.
Listen to a Chinese speak or write English and you would know what I mean. As a Chinese is often heard to say or write in this manner,
“You have a big, big house with a long, long road leading to it from the front gate”
The Chinese is absolutely comfortable with repetition although it is rejected as redundancy by English grammar.
Do the Visayans give a damn if Windy understands what they are talking or writing in English? They don’t. They are comfortable with their English standard and they say, “to hell with the rest of you English expert b**t**ds”.
This is in addition to all that Lainy replied to you at your Comment.
To continue with the series of Blogger aversion, this is what I consider the next most averse Blogger. It is Number 2 right after the Hypocrite Blogger.
Big egos are big shields for lots of empty space. – Diana Black
Elsewhere at I’d Say, “Bloggers, Move On”, Windy once described the Egotist Blogger as the “I, Me, My Blogger”. I don’t know why Windy used three words when only one could have said it all. Ha ha ha. I think he wrote it for literary emphasis.
Egotist. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than me. – Ambrose Bierce
In many ways it is true since the Egotist Blogger, no matter how much he talks about at his Article or where ever he submits a Commentary, he would not feel at ease without referring to I, Me or My as often as he possibly can
What are the characteristics of the Egotist Blogger
1. Bloggers who will discredit anything that another Blogger imparts without fact and proof.
2. Bloggers who arrive at other Blogs and try to get all the attention by being ostensibly loud.
3. Bloggers who have little substance in what they say but try to impress others with the use of clichés and bombastic jargon.
4. Bloggers who by their behavior become the “Emperor” in Hans Christian Anderson’s tale about the Emperor’s New Clothes.
5. Bloggers who unable to maintain discussion at a rational level, indulge in name calling and making wild aspersions.
6. Bloggers who like sick second heroes, after failing to defend themselves in a public argument, they will declare, “I am going to stop blogging”; then surprise everyone by sheepishly returning to blog.
7. Bloggers who suffer an inferiority complex and campaign for answers, “Do you think I should quit blogging?” (like as though it really matters in Blogosphere if they are missed)
What will the world be quite overturned when you die? – Epictetus
8. Bloggers who send personal emails when they feel they have failed to make an impression.
9. Bloggers who have so much time to dispense to others Norman Vincent Peale’s type of self improvement when it is obvious they are the ones who need it most.
10. Bloggers who believe that their life would fall into an abyss if they ever apologized.
11. Bloggers who revel in reading what is not in print and complain vehemently that they have been blog-buggered by insinuations.
12. Bloggers who put themselves and their Blog at the right hand-side of Blog-god.
What do we know about the Egotist Blogger?
The Egotist Blogger is so full of himself, it is amazing how he defies the proverbial “pride goes before a fall”.
Hmmm, did it say, “fall”? What fall? The Egotist Blogger has a skin thicker than that of a Hippopotamus!
Chameleon-like, the Egotist Blogger picks himself up after every dastardly act, blithely dusts off his dirt and undismayed continues with his reptilian hiss, “trussssst Meeee”. So - off he slithers to coil around another Blogger and his Blog.
Edward de Bono, physician, author, inventor, consultant and known as the originator of the term lateral thinking had this to say:
Thinking is often regarded as an extension of the ego. Clever children in school base their egos on being clever and on being right all the time. They dislike group work because they cannot then show the rest of the class where the good idea originated. When the ego and thinking are treated as the same thing there is a reluctance to be wrong and a need to defend a point of view rather than to explore the situation. A person should be able to treat his thinking much as a tennis player treats his strokes: he should be able to walk off the court complaining that his backhand was not working very well on that occasion or that it required more practice.
This new meta-system is very much in favor of the self, but a self that is based on a proper sense of dignity, not on an inflated ego. A person who dare not admit he is wrong inflates his ego but weakens his self. (Edward de Bono – The Happiness Purpose)
The Egotist Blogger is a parasite and for his insatiable craving, Blogosphere is his personal gallery.
Has it ever occurred to you how many occasions that you have been in discussion with Bloggers who eventually reveal who they truly are?
If blogging is anything else it also is considered a personal reflection of the Blogger from his published articles and/or comments. How many Bloggers have failed miserably in understanding the value of the blog media let alone their own personal value?
Granted that there are uncountable reasons why anyone would wish to blog. These reasons alone is not being evaluated. What is being evaluated is the Blogger and his ethics.
The smylere with the knyf under the cloke.
Geoffrey Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales ‘The Knight’s Tale’
No matter how one sees it, the Blogger whatever he writes, these two are inseparable.
To a large extent, the anonymity that the Internet affords, it adds more bravado to the Blogger. It is this veil that enables the Blogger to mask himself for reasons he knows. And that assumes whether in the first instance they really know their own self.
I write about the HYPOCRITE BLOGGER. This should instantly make it clear what this Article is all about.
Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks
Invisible, except to God alone.
John Milton: Paradise Lost
Just for the sake of making a statement, I shall quote directly from the Oxford English Dictionary.
hypocrisy
• noun (pl. hypocrisies) the practice of claiming to have higher standards or beliefs than is the case.
What are the characteristics of the HYPOCRITE BLOGGER?
From my experience, these are a few of Hypocrite Blogger characteristics:
Bloggers who pompously serve advice to others without understanding the root cause of the issue and themselves fail miserably in executing their just advice.
Bloggers who offer sweet nothings and are never heard of ever again.
Bloggers who run from pillar to post in whichever direction the wind blows stronger.
Bloggers who condemn fellow Bloggers with a fiendish motive and without proof.
Bloggers who ask for help but turn their heads away when it is their turn to help.
Bloggers who deviously gather information about someone else and without the latter knowing that (s)he is being dissected like a laboratory specimen; later to be abused.
Bloggers who never fail to produce that unmistakable aura around themselves that truth and knowledge is only beholden with them.
Bloggers who behave as though they have never sinned in their life.
Bloggers who merely wish to get close because of ulterior motives.
Bloggers who do not have a mind of their own.
Bloggers who form their own blogger-clan to malign others.
Bloggers who use their Blog as leverage to inflict their scorn and do it without justification.
Keep up appearances; there lies the test;
The world will give thee credit for the rest.
Outward be fair, however foul within;
Sin if thou wilt, but then in secret sin.
Charles Churchill: Night
“Nosce te ipsum”
In plain English, it means Know Thyself.
Was it not Socrates who said the most important thing in life is to know your self? He meant that Knowledge of Self is the starting point of personal and spiritual growth
In this passage that Einstein once said, it uncannily personifies the Hypocrite Blogger that I write about.
Somebody who only reads newspapers and at best books of contemporary authors looks to me like an extremely near-sighted person who scorns eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and fashions of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else. And what a person thinks on his own without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of other people is even in the best case rather paltry and monotonous. There are only a few enlightened people with a lucid mind and style and with good taste within a century. What has been preserved of their work belongs among the most precious possessions of mankind. We owe it to a few writers of antiquity (Plato, Aristotle, etc.) that the people in the Middle Ages could slowly extricate themselves from the superstitions and ignorance that had darkened life for more than half a millennium. Nothing is more needed to overcome the modernist’s snobbishness. (Albert Einstein, 1954)
Also, if I may also borrow a word that someone used in his appraisal for the submissions at my Blogoversary Writing Contest last year – MEDIOCRITY. That is yet another thing akin to hypocrisy.
Compound for sins, they are inclined to,
By damning those they have no mind to.
Samuel Butler: Hudibras
Mediocre bloggers over-populate Blogosphere. Time and time again, without fail, these mediocre Bloggers have nothing better to offer than what either offends them or they pursue hell bent to blog-whip others or manipulate blogger friendliness for self gain and Blog gain.
I have noticed Language Translations at some Blogs. These are located at the sidebar and sometimes at the Post fold.
However, Windy came up with a different idea. He has embellished the Comment section with the ImTranslator widget. It is located as close as possible to the Comment edit box. Windy believes that it serves a greater purpose at the Comment section than anywhere else at a Blog.
The ImTranslator which is one of the best available with some give and take on your part. Here is how it looks. (Please move your mouse cursor over the image for zoom-in view)
1. How it appears at the beginning.
2. Make your language translation choice and type in what you need to be translated in the upper box. Then hit the “Translate” button.
3. ImTranslator provides the requested translation. Copy and paste the answer into the Comment edit box. When Comment is done, click “Submit Comment”.
I received this from Windy. After having published his Apologia, “For Those That Have Eyes But Read Not” which had a respectable 168 Reader VIEWS to date, Windy sent me this.
I believe that it serves appropriately, like he says it – as a sequel to his Apologia (which incidentally had no worthy challenge).
Here is Windy’s sequel.
Hi Lainy,
This is a sequel to an Apologia that I delivered titled, “Does Reading Improve Writing?”
Several days have passed since I wrote lengthily on that matter.
While trying to understand what could possibly lead some to believe that reading DOES improve writing, I came to this conclusion.
It may be caused by an avid reader who is deluded by deja vu. The avid reader is driven by what he writes from what he reads. There is a satisfying feeling that he is beginning to emulate the author of the book.
What is the meaning of Deja Vu
It is the strange feeling that you have already seen or experienced something
What is Deja Vu in psychological terms?
Something that is believed to be an example of familiarity-based recognition
My conclusion it is not that reading improves writing but rather that the reader projects himself in similar position of the author of the book.
This is sufficient motive for the writer to justify that it is what he reads which empowers his improvement in writing.
I would call these kind of writers – Deja Vu writers.
Furthermore,
A Deja Vu writer would most likely produce ersatz writing
The Deja Vu writer does not rely on his originality, brain power and skill in writing what he thinks. He would not express in the manner that he would in the natural way that he is accustomed.
He actually begins to believe that his potential to write is summoned by the author(s) of book(s) he has read.
What is ersatz?
It is being an imitation or a substitute, usually an inferior one; artificial
An artificial or inferior substitute or imitation
My conclusion
These are a few renowned writers and what they have said about writing.
“If you wish to be a writer, write.” – Epictetus
“For a long time now I have tried simply to write the best I can. Sometimes I have good luck and write better than I can.” – Ernest Hemingway
“The way you define yourself as a writer is that you write every time you have a free minute. If you didn’t behave that way you would never do anything.” – John Irving
I have more that I could add to the above life. Suffice to say here, NONE of these writing luminaries EVER used the word READING!
So for whatever reasons a person boasts about being a writer or pretends to be a writer by wishing to produce a book comprising Blog Posts, this final quote ought to drive home the bare and brutal fact about writing.
“Writing a book is a long, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven by some demon one can neither resist nor understand.” – George Orwell
The Deja Vu writer lends credence to my “axiom” that THE HUMAN MIND CHOOSES ONLY TO BELIEVE IN WHAT IT ONLY WISHES TO BELIEVE IN.
Windy handed me this to publish it for Recel who blogs at My Written xPressions. Says he read Recel’s latest Post, “To Quit Blogging?“ and he put this together for her.
Recel, this is for you and it is from Windy.
Hmmm, although Windy himself has stopped blogging, it is apparent that he continues to “snoop” around in Blogosphere. Personally, I do know there are a few Bloggers whom Windy has a high regard – and Sis, you’re one of the few…
General Santos Time
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