Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Blog Mortality

Tillerman recently has had two posts, here and here trying to answer that weighty, age old human question, what happens at "the end", when it truly is "finis", when everything is finally "kaput".

I too have been pondering on "the end", but not in the context of aging decrepitude. I've been contemplating the death of blogs. It happens. My output in my second year of blogging has dropped precipitously. In the hyper-accelerated Internet, have I reached my apex and am now rapidly descending to the end? I have several blogs in my blog list that at one time were vibrant with daily posts but now blink feebly, like Tinkerbelle, a post coming once a month, once every three months. Am I watching the death thrall of these blogs, or even the beginning of the end of my blog?

Blogs are human. They have birth, life ,death. Some blogs flame out quickly, some like Tillerman's live a long life (over six years?). Most blogs seem to have a shorter lifespan than guppies.

For the blogger, blogs are time consuming, frivolous, and for most of us, despite what we think, primarily a solitary ego trip.

I have installed a blog counter; it seems conveniently designed to make me feel good. One day it added 400 hits overnight. It blithely adds hits at a nice daily rate, completely divorced from the reality on how small my readership really is.

But I'll let you in on a secret...... I blog for myself. As long as I can amuse myself by clicking on some old links to a "Music for Fridays" video or some arcane sailng topic, I'll keep going for the time being.

Meanwhle, I better add some more posts so that I can bump July up.

4 comments:

doryman said...

It's your daughter's weird music taste that keeps us coming back. (Not)
That would be "Music for Friday-ish"

Pandabonium said...

I started my first blog, Pacific Islander, soon after moving to Japan to share my experiences with them. For years, my mother's nurse would print out my posts for her to read and later to have read to her.

When my mother died, my blogging almost did too, but after some months, other readers - some family, some friends - gave it new purpose, and so it lives on.

My sailing blog is more of a diary for own use, and if some family and friends enjoy it, great.

Recently, family members cajoled me into joining Facebook as a way of "keeping in touch". I didn't like it and after two weeks gave it up. I much prefer writing on my blogs and using email.

Nothing is permanent. Not my blog, not my boat, not me. I'm not going to worry over "when" or "how" the end will come. I'd much rather live in the present "sonomama", as it is.

Anonymous said...

But I'll let you in on a secret...... I blog for myself. As long as I can amuse myself by clicking on some old links to a "Music for Fridays" video or some arcane sailing topic, I'll keep going for the time being.

Great! You are definitely amusing to me as well. Hope you will keep the blog going for a long time..

Pat said...

It is also interesting to watch the direction some blogs take, and their meanderings.

But just as different types of time on the water can be good, so can many of the quirky directions that a blog may take may be fun and rewarding.