Saturday 21 October 2017

#288 Defining a personal blog

Philosophy. Creative writing. General thoughts. Those were the three categories into which I tended to sort my blog posts. At least in my head. I sometimes wished I could narrow down the general stuff. Maybe I could, if I searched through all the general posts and looked for common themes.

Why bother?

Since starting to use social networks more, I'd been reminded that the majority of people making content for the web were making it about something. This was a fact I'd always known but for my first few years of blogging, hadn't cared about. I posted once a week and occasionally, not more than once in a month or two, someone might say that they'd read it. Lately, I'd been writing every day and someone always read it.

Keeping it general was my dream. At least, it might have been if I'd been the sort of person who had dreams. If I could make myself into a character... describe my thoughts and situations through the eyes of a character, then like a person from a storybook, I really could write about anything and it would still be sufficiently entertaining.

If JK wrote an eight book where Harry didn't do much except drink tea while sat King's Cross station people watching, plenty of punters would buy it. Of course, it'd help that it was about none other than the legendary Harry Potter, who couldn't even go into a book shop without making the front page.

I didn't need to make the front page. My own book didn't need to sell half a billion copies. I did want more from my writing though. I'd spent countless hours tweaking the webpage. The formatting. The fonts. The title. Getting a domain name. The social buttons. Playing with the HTML to customise the parts that Blogger's options didn't cover.

I'd been investing my time and would carry on doing so. I wanted to carry on writing daily. Finding topics. Building on past themes. Building character. Defining my thoughts and experiences as they occurred.


10 comments

Fizzfan said...

Not sure if you want to build a certain type of character ie funny, nerdy, philosophical, etc for the purposes of writing or are building one along the way from just conveying your real thoughts on a given day?
Even if you are just being you, I think writing’s only ever going to be a pool reflection with a lot of detail is missing. Maybe that’s part of the allure, it’s open to interpretation and you’re always a bit of a mystery.

Profound Familiarity said...

I still intend to respond to your last comment Fizz and will do so.

There are definitely filters on some things. I have a hatred of crappy, mindless photos and status updates that people put on Facebook, so I take some care to edit mine. It doesn't mean that some people won't still think they're crappy or that what I put online is any better than what anyone else uploads but I do put thought into it. I often delete my own comments shortly after having made them, to people's surprise. I get told not to do that.

Profound Familiarity said...

I'm looking out for your guest post on An Aussie In The World. I expect the cat's mother will upload it sooner or later and that she's been particularly busy lately.

Fizzfan said...

Yeah it’s all a bit of a minefield. No particular feelings on self editing. If it’s what someone wants to do, then they can.......it’s not my comment......
A friend set me up on Facebook and I practically never use it other than to occassionally respond to some people’s posts that I like.
I don’t mind people updating with photos of their families or little adventures but have zero confidence anyone would want to see anything from me. I practically never take photos anyway. It all seems a bit banal but then again life mostly is.
I am a funny meme fan though and sometimes pictures and photos help illuminate stories. I quite like visual aids.

Yes you do put a lot of thought into what you say. It shows and it’s a shame more folks haven’t been hooked in. One day....

Fizzfan said...

Cath, you’re being baited! :))
Sharpen your claws up and let the games begin!
Be thankful you live in a different hemisphere Dan :D

Profound Familiarity said...

Oh you cheeky bubble buff, I was not baiting anyone :) I simply meant that I'm looking forward to seeing your post.

Profound Familiarity said...

Your comment about nobody wanting to see anyone from you is interesting. It seems commonplace, generally, for people and their Facebook friends to have some common interests.

For example if a friend of yours liked dogs and posted dog pics and you also liked dogs and liked the dog pics, you might decide to post dog pics too because you'd know that both you and your friend liked dog pics.

I hate dogs and dog pics; not sure why I chose that example.

Fizzfan said...

I’m happy for other people to post anything. A lot of the Facebook friends I have are just work colleagues and not really real friends anyway. My real friends see me outside of work and if I wanted to send them any pics, I’d do it by email to them personally. Having said that, I don’t really know a lot about Facebook. I know you can set up groups n stuff like that but again, I’d rather email.
It’s handy for messaging some people though.
I don’t have a dog but I do have a cat. I’d NEVER put up a pic of her on Facebook though. The connotations of mad, sad, deluded and lonely would haunt me. Come to that I wouldn’t put pics of my family up either though.
Maybe because I didn’t grow up with social media, it seems a bit like showing off and a bit naff.....Still don’t apply those thoughts to other people though.....? Curious but it’s just true.

Why do you hate dogs?

Fizzfan said...

Bubble buff:)). I like it!
Maybe I’m the one trying to tempt her.....
Thanks for the support. It’s on the starting blocks I think.

Profound Familiarity said...

Oh I know what you mean about cat pics on Facebook. When I lived with Keira I'd never put pics of her on my profile. She had her own profile for that.