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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?

#91

Post by rrishi »

prmoustache wrote: post #87

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.…

you might be interested in the concept of digital gardens: https://maggieappleton.com/garden

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

#92

Post by alpinisme »

prmoustache wrote: post #87

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.…

Agreed completely. From a reader perspective, blogs are also often not friendly to new visitors. How do I find the best entry point? Which entries are fluff and which are deep dives? The best you can usually hope for is some tagging mechanism, but blogs generally expend little to no effort thinking about architecture, discovery, browsability, or the reader’s progression through the site. Don’t get me wrong - that’s a lot to ask of a casual effort. But I do wish we had a genre/format for sharing one’s thoughts online that did encourage reflection and iteration on that level.

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

#93

Post by wannabebarista »

alpinisme wrote: post #92
prmoustache wrote: post #87

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.…

Agreed completely. From a reader perspective, blogs are also often not friendly to new visitors. How do I find the best entry point? Which entries are fluff and which are deep dives? The best you can usually hope for is some tagging mechanism, but blogs generally expend little to no effort thinking about architecture, discovery, browsability, or the reader’s progression through the site. Don’t get me wrong - that’s a…

One thing I've tried to combat the chaos of blog structures is to include links to other posts in series as a header (when it makes sense).

The biggest hurdle of moving away from a blog to a static format is that blog posts are timestamped and there's no real expectation that they're maintained. With static pages, however, I try to keep them up-to-date.

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

#94

Post by _heimdall »

prmoustache wrote: post #86
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 t…

> I know it puts off some people who mistake that for anonymity and think this is ruining the web

Its interesting that we got to a point where anyone would consider anonymity to be ruining the web.

When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all.

Thank you Facebook, you did a wonderdul job of convincing an entire generation that they should put their real name, profile photo, hometown, etc online and tied to everything they say online.

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

#95

Post by reaperducer »

_heimdall wrote: post #94
prmoustache wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 t…

> I know it puts off some people who mistake that for anonymity and think this is ruining the web Its interesting that we got to a point where anyone would consider anonymity to be ruining the web. When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all. Thank you Facebook,…

When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all.

You consider that the norm because that's what you grew up with.

Before then, people would sign everything on the internet (and its predecessor networks) with their real names, work/home addresses, phone numbers, and more.

That's why when you create a new user on a *nix box, it asks for that information.

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

#96

Post by wannabebarista »

brontosaurusrex wrote: post #43

Some do, mostly when the problem they are trying to solve is somewhere in my blog past. I've learned over the years not to advertise the blog/page, due to weird questions I get, for example: Q: How costly is this? (A: it's free, minus my time), Q: Why is it so ugly? (A: When you write your perfect jekyll skin, I will use it, you know it's about my future self searching for the info, not about beauty), Q: Why? (A: I a…

I find the "Why?" question amusing. It's usually coupled with a disapproving tone.

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

#97

Post by defrost »

reaperducer wrote: post #95
_heimdall wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know it puts off some people who mistake that for anonymity and think this is ruining the web Its interesting that we got to a point where anyone would consider anonymity to be ruining the web. When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all. Thank you Facebook,…

When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all. You consider that the norm because that's what you grew up with. Before then, people would sign everything on the internet (and its predecessor networks) with their real names, work/home addresses, phone numbers, and m…

.. and when Usenet appeared people commented in tech newsgroups with their realnames and a good number of them also posted in alt newsgroups under nom de guerres.

That was the early 1980s as I recall them.

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

#98

Post by rchaud »

prmoustache wrote: post #87

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.…

100%. Reading blogs feels 'messy' exactly for this reason. It's not 2008 anymore when blog posts had a vibrant comment section, so changing the content of the post felt dishonest. Maybe it's modern social media that makes people treat their blogs like a tweet - uneditable, frozen in time.

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

#99

Post by ericyd »

I've recently had the morbid thought that perhaps my loved ones could appreciate my blog if I died prematurely. I don't maintain my blog much and I certainly don't think anyone reads it. It is much more for intrinsic benefits of working through thoughts in a structured way.

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

#100

Post by beeboobaa3 »

reaperducer wrote: post #95
_heimdall wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know it puts off some people who mistake that for anonymity and think this is ruining the web Its interesting that we got to a point where anyone would consider anonymity to be ruining the web. When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all. Thank you Facebook,…

When I was growing up in the 90s and early 00s anonymity online was the whole point. Everything online was behind usernames, and usernames weren't expected to be connected to your real identity at all. You consider that the norm because that's what you grew up with. Before then, people would sign everything on the internet (and its predecessor networks) with their real names, work/home addresses, phone numbers, and m…

It's what the internet grew up with, actually.

> That's why when you create a new user on a *nix box, it asks for that information.

That's your local account, not information that is visible to anyone outside of your network.

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