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What happened to blogging for the hell of it?
What happened to blogging for the hell of it?
It's just a bit depressing to see how much it's all become a numbers game, whether those numbers are dollars in your pocket or followers on your Instagram. I'm probably saying nothing new to anybody who's been on the blogging scene for some time, but as a newcomer who's just here to write creatively and have fun, it was a stark reminder of how corporate the web has become. Why is that the end goal of blogging? Of writing? Just to make money and grow our followers? To increase our traffic so we can expose our visitors to 300 repetitive ads that take up their entire phone screen? To "convert" our readers into our customers, because them reading and enjoying what we have to say simply isn't enough? Personally, I want nothing to do with it. I'm sick of everything having to be a hustle now, even something personal like sharing our ramblings with strangers on the internet. I have little else to say other than that I hate how capitalism ruins everything fun it touches. I'll continue to write about things that make me feel passionate, not how to make money or gain followers.
·whiona.weblog.lol·
What happened to blogging for the hell of it?
confidence
confidence

related ideas—imposter syndrome, [[Provocations for blogging online]] by Molly Mielke

I’ve never been good at closing sentences, last paragraphs, or finishing things perfectly. I find conclusions hard to draw because they’re so subjective. Is it really my place to tell you what you got out of my words?
I find it extremely helpful to take notes on my thought patterns in whatever text box, notebook, or messaging app is closest. Texting is particularly great because it’s continuous, ever-evolving, and the exact opposite of an essay ending. Each concise little text bubble is an opportunity to shift, interrupt, and recalibrate how meta my thinking is, given a little help from people who love me.
The clearest sign that I had fallen into the trap of thinking of myself as a brand was how concerned I had become about even slightly shifting my ambitions/interests/personality.
Feeling like you’re worth listening to is a byproduct of making hard decisions and teasing out of them cohesive and convincing personal stories that help you make sense of the world.
I have no perfect conclusion or closing sentence. All I have is a commitment to make the most of my 22-year-won freedom: I will talk more, be wrong more, and feel less ashamed about it. I will endeavor to see beyond myself, chase moments of mental freefall, and unabashedly document the full spectrum of this here human’s experience. I will write this story precisely as I see it, even if that means losing you in the process.
·mindmud.substack.com·
confidence
Writing, Riffs & Relationships
Writing, Riffs & Relationships
Here are the basic ingredients for a riff: An inquisitive title, something that is not “the ultimate guide” but more “some notes on…” A few references - connecting the dots between some links, quotes from other sources An anecdote from your own work that provides rich texture and context for what you do Some open questions that invite people to A deliberate small list of 3-5 people you can send the post to
People’s first instinct with content is to try and make it polished and closed. To be useful by solving something or creating the ultimate guide to something. Those pieces of content can be good - but they’re very hard to write, and even harder to write well! Instead I prefer to take a more inquisitive and open-ended approach.
Closed writing is boring writing. If you’ve fully explored and put to bed the topic you’re writing about then there’s very little left for someone to react to. “Nice post” someone might say. But if you deliberately leave some rough edges, some threads that the reader can pull on, then you’re inviting the reader into the conversation. You’re saying (possibly explicitly!) - “Hey, what are your thoughts on this topic? How do you think about it?”
·tomcritchlow.com·
Writing, Riffs & Relationships
Small b blogging
Small b blogging
As Venkatesh says in the calculus of grit - release work often, reference your own thinking & rework the same ideas again and again. That’s the small b blogging model.
I think most people would be better served by subscribing to small b blogging. What you want is something with YOUR personality. Writing and ideas that are addressable (i.e. you can find and link to them easily in the future) and archived (i.e. you have a list of things you’ve written all in one place rather than spread across publications and URLs) and memorable (i.e. has your own design, logo or style). Writing that can live and breathe in small networks. Scale be damned.
·tomcritchlow.com·
Small b blogging