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Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

lars-christian.com

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Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#81

Post by fullspectrumdev »

langsoul-com wrote: post #14

The thing about irl blogs is how, if it's tech related, then it kinda follows you. So there's a pressure to keep things corporate to not scare away job opportunities. There's a reason why LinkedIn reads like garbage, and even if it's obvious, people neither point it out or stop.

I’ve had this fear a few times - and when my last workplace started getting a bit weird (layoffs) I largely stopped publishing much of anything. I experimented with publishing under an alternate identity a bit, but it never stuck.

Now I’m working through my backlog of drafts, dumping a load of stuff ASAP, and then trying to commit myself to some form of publishing schedule to force myself to “catch up” on the project backlog.

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#82

Post by fullspectrumdev »

matrix87 wrote: post #34
ggm wrote: post #26

The point of the article is one I align with: You're writing it for yourself, 99% of the time. The other 1% is the future you. I blog for work. I don't discuss it with family. I think I'd find it very stressful answering the "why did you say that" questions. The corollary of this, is that I write notes by hand in almost every meeting I attend, and never ever read them again -But for things like IETF I do a mixture of…

> You're writing it for yourself, 99% of the time. The other 1% is the future you. Or alternatively it could be a place for educational stuff like the more detailed answers on stackoverflow. Except the middleman gets removed

In the past I’ve used a blog literally to make small notes on very simple things that I always ended up having to look up, or for notes on the “right way” to do something.

For example: for years I was using Pythons requests library incorrectly. The way I was doing it worked - but it wasn’t correct.

Once I published a short blog on the correct way - the correct way seemed to stick better in my mind!

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#83

Post by rurban »

Eiriksmal wrote: post #7

Ah, Lars-Christian! No one wants to talk to you in real life about your blog because you're in Norway . If you lived here in the United States, you'd have a perpetual string of very interesting conversations about your personal website because Americans are all about technology and hearing how any of us peons are fighting the power, man. At least, I think that's what my wife's reaction is before she leaves the room t…

You apparently have no idea about Norway. Norway was the very first internet country, because of its vast coastline and enormous distances. Schoolkids had internet remote classrooms since the 90ies.

Everybody there is online, and blogs are widely read. Much more than in the US.

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#84

Post by tpoacher »

langsoul-com wrote: post #14

The thing about irl blogs is how, if it's tech related, then it kinda follows you. So there's a pressure to keep things corporate to not scare away job opportunities. There's a reason why LinkedIn reads like garbage, and even if it's obvious, people neither point it out or stop.

also why gemlogs have taken off massively, even if gemini itself hasn't

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#85

Post by wannabebarista »

I have a blog that's connected to my academic website. While my homepage gets some traffic from people googling papers, my blog gets much less. I post a few times each year, mostly about stuff I've been reading. I did have one post go viral-ish a few years ago (https://bcmullins.github.io/foreign-affairs-100/).

I was surprised to find that some workplace acquaintances and even students read my blog. A colleague out-of-the-blue messaged me about some python function I'd written (https://bcmullins.github.io/parsing-json-python/). A student asked about reading recommendations and how I choose books. So people you know IRL may be reading your stuff (or some of it) but just not mentioning it.

As another post mentioned, I feel much more pressure about my writing after learning that IRL people read it.

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#86

Post by prmoustache »

langsoul-com wrote: post #14

The thing about irl blogs is how, if it's tech related, then it kinda follows you. So there's a pressure to keep things corporate to not scare away job opportunities. There's a reason why LinkedIn reads like garbage, and even if it's obvious, people neither point it out or stop.

I am using a pseudonym on my blog and I tend to use a different pseudonym on all websites/services/medias I use. I have often pondered wether I should just publish under my own name or not. The thing is once you do that, there is no going back and I have never felt ready for that.

I know it puts off some people who mistake that for anonymity and think this is ruining the web, that people can't behave if they aren't talking under their own name, I respect that.

I am not looking for anonymity. I don't pretend to hide from authorities. However pseudonimity allows me to express myself while not engaging my current or future employers directly.

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#87

Post by prmoustache »

I love personal websites but I don't really like blogs. I prefer when people can rework/refine some of their pages instead of publishing new blog posts related to previous ones when revisiting a topic. And as a writer it allows me to write whenever I feel like to. With a blog you kind of feel guilty if you don't publish on a regular basis, and end up abandoning it altogether too easily if you cannot sustain a rhythm. A web page doesn't force you into a rhythm. A blog might be useful for historians in the future, when chronology might be useful but as a publisher and casual reader I find it lazy and unwelcoming for the reader.

I do like however personnal pages that have a small log mentionning the updates to which I can subscribe to.

Re: Re: Do people IRL know you have a blog?

#90

Post by tcgv »

wannabebarista wrote: post #85

I have a blog that's connected to my academic website. While my homepage gets some traffic from people googling papers, my blog gets much less. I post a few times each year, mostly about stuff I've been reading. I did have one post go viral-ish a few years ago ( https://bcmullins.github.io/foreign-affairs-100/ ). I was surprised to find that some workplace acquaintances and even students read my blog. A colleague out…

> A colleague out-of-the-blue messaged me about some python function I'd written

Just the other day a colleague at work was searching the web and eventually ended up in a blog post of mine. He was enthusiastic that he had "discovered" my blog. It was fun.

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