Topics we’ll never see at a blogging conference
Five things I hate about blogging
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- Andy Rooney
- Steve Jobs
- Amy Winehouse
- Leonard Stern, creator of Mad Libs
- Jack Kevorkian
- Randy "Macho Man" Savage
- Osama bin Laden
- Elizabeth Taylor
- Jack LaLanne
- Leslie Nielsen
- Bob Guccione
- Barbara Billingsley
- Tony Curtis
- Dennis Hopper
- Gary Coleman
- Chinese murderer**
- Casey, aka Moosh In Indy*
- Adolf Hitler
- Peter Graves
- Corey Haim
- My Grandmother**
- Roy Scheider
- Zelda Rubinstein, J.D. Salinger
- Brittany Murphy
- Oral Roberts
- John Lennon
- Ken Ober
- Henry Gibson
- Patrick Swayze
- Ted Kennedy
- John Hughes
- Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett
- Walter Cronkite
- Billy Mays
- Ed McMahon
- Stephen Hawking*
- Robert Novak
- Caylee Anthony
- David Carradine
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Find me at:
Twitter: Amanda234
says:
I think so. It lessened it, anyway. Your little wordpress icon looks like an adorable frog.
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@Amanda, that should be their mascot. The WP frog, not to be confused with the WB one.
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Twitter: ragingdad
says:
Well, it killed my blog. No doubt, my attention span is shot and I’ve almost totally bailed on updating. It bums me out…
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@raging dad, but do you tweet all day long?
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Twitter: ragingdad
on August 11th, 2010 at Wednesday, August 11, 2010 @ 11:58 pm
@Avitable, no. I tweet in fits and starts.I think it is not that I have replaced blogging with tweeting, but instead it has helped to reduce my attention span. Or maybe I just got bored with my blog.
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Twitter: VerdantDude
says:
Maybe. I’m still hoping that Twitter will be a fad, or it will turn into something a bit more interesting for those of us who don’t really find it interesting right now. I do know more than a handful of bloggers who have moved onto the 140-character world of tweets and twats and twadoodles. Maybe it’s temporary, I don’t know.
Blogging a badge of honor. Everyone has a Twitter account. My mother has a Twitter account. Anyone can be a Twitterer. It takes a little something more to be a blogger.
As it stand now, I prefer blogging and bloggers. Twitter hasn’t killed it or us…yet.
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@B.E. Earl, that’s what I’m hoping. I think the bloggers who are good at what they do still blog. But I know that I don’t get half the feedback I used to, and that’s always disappointing. The point of this blog is to make people laugh, but how do I know if it actually does if people won’t tell me?
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Well you drew a picture instead of writing an actual post… so you tell me.
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@Miss, Yes, that.
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Twitter: VDog
on August 11th, 2010 at Wednesday, August 11, 2010 @ 12:22 am
@Miss, OH SNAP!
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@Miss, smart ass. That picture took longer to draw than writing one would have!
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Twitter: fandpinlv
says:
For me, I find I get twitchy if I don’t write. 140 characters is rarely enough to get me where I need to go. Apparently I have this over-inflated sense of self that drives me to the delusion that I actually have something valuable to say. Shocking, I know.
That said, Twitter has retrained by brain to get to the point quicker. There is something elegant about having to make your point and shut the hell up. Now if it would just carry over to my blog writing and my comments on other people’s blogs.
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@Fear and Parenting in Las Vegas, if it helps stem diarrhea of the mouth, I guess it’s a good thing.
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Twitter: ellemmes
says:
For me, probably. It’s sad, but true.
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@Lisa,
I like your blog, too. The stuff you write about takes more than 140 characters!
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Twitter: undercovermama
says:
In a way it has…but then, sometimes I need more than 140 words. But I can’t keep up with blog, facebook, tumblr, blah blah blah…
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@briya, that’s why you should just stick with blogging.
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What is this twitter you speak of? For me it’s facebook that’s killing blogging.
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@Jen, my problem with Facebook is that you don’t own your content. If they decide to remove it because it’s offensive, that’s their right.
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Twitter: themuskrat
says:
Yes, but it had it coming.
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@muskrat, always knew you were a miblogynist.
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Twitter: CountessMo
says:
I’m not sure about blogging, but it’s certainly done a number on commenting on blogs.
By the way, can I ask how the Twitter bird took out WP & Blogger? I mean, literally. I can’t tell if that’s a gun he’s holding or if he’s just happy to see me.
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@Maura, it’s clearly a tiny bird pistol.
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Twitter: Bellaventa
says:
I think Twitter has made people complacent about blogging. It hasn’t killed it and I doubt it ever will completely. For me, twitter has killed Facebook – I rarely go on that thing anymore…too much work.
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@Robin, I don’t use Facebook except when my tweets post to it. I hate how much Facebook has taken over.
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No, but it’s made it easy for people like me, who have experienced a serious famine of free time, to drop the blogging but still maintain important online friendships.
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@The Momshell, and that is a positive. If it’s either Twitter or nothing, at least there’s Twitter.
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Twitter: Blogography
says:
Depends on the blog. There are so many now where the blogger just isn’t putting the time in to keep their blog interesting. They’re messing around on Twitter or growing frustrated because they aren’t getting feedback from people who used to comment but now spend their time Tweeting instead.
But there are others who revel in having the freedom to surpass the limitations of Twitter, and are blogging now better than ever.
And then there are those who are flooding Twitter with multi-tweet messages or other crap that BELONGS on a blog, but aren’t put there. Those people ARE KILLING TWITTER WITH BLOGGING!
So while blogging has a foot in the grave, I think there are enough people keeping it alive that it will survive for a while longer yet. At least I hope so…
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Twitter: msmegan
on August 11th, 2010 at Wednesday, August 11, 2010 @ 10:22 am
@Dave2, I’m in the “growing frustrated” category. For me, blogging is about interaction and I’m quickly losing interest as it appears no one’s reading. Although I may be driving them away because I’ve lost interest…
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@Dave2, the lack of feedback does make it hard sometimes.
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Twitter: poppycede
says:
There are still lots of people starting new blogs today.
So, blogging isn’t dead.
And my blog’s a WordPress blog.
And I’m renewing it when the domain name wants to expire.
And you can’t make me not.
Another question: What happened to the internet radio show? *point point to sidebar*
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@Poppy, so you’re saying that your blog is dead? The internet radio show will be coming back!
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Twitter: BackpackingDad
says:
I don’t like Twitter.
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@Backpacking Dad, I second that!
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@Backpacking Dad, jumping on that bandwagon.
For me, FB killed the blog.
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@Backpacking Dad, it probably doesn’t like you either.
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Twitter: Zakary
says:
I neglect Twitter, but not as much as Facebook. I don’t post on my blog as much as I would like to, but I can’t really point the finger at Twitter because I blame my children.
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@Zak, damn kids.
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Twitter: FreakyWeasel
says:
No way blogging is dead. I’m way behind the times and I stlll blog about my scrotum, sack, and pubes. The sad thing is the lac, of interest in those topics.
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@Freaky Weasel, that is a problem. Let’s work on that.
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Twitter: ragingdad
on August 12th, 2010 at Thursday, August 12, 2010 @ 12:05 am
@Freaky Weasel, I totally blog about pubes and my scrotum. We’re a dying breed, I’m afraid.
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Twitter: Kapgar
says:
Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but it certainly has diminished the desire for me. Being able to take long blog post ideas and distill them to 140 characters is a cool skill to have.
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@kapgar, but getting a message across when you have so much to say diminishes that message, doesn’t it?
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I mostly only stalk popular people who don’t say enough on their blog with twitter. I am always running out of letters when I want to talk.
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@Zanthera, I sound brain-dead at that early hour. Meant to say “Twitter isn’t enough for me yet great for stalking popular people who don’t blog about the little things in life. Sometimes the little things are just as interesting.”
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@Zanthera, I like following celebrities on Twitter.
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Can’t comment. Too busy tweeting.
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@BOSSY, says the busiest blogger I’ve ever seen!
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I think it has killed commenting. It takes SO long to log in and type all this crap. I say that blogs should have an easier commenting system. Or something.
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@Lora, if there was a way to make it easier, I’m all for it.
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Twitter: hismuse
says:
Not killed maybe but it’s on life support.
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@Robin, or maybe it will undergo a renaissance!
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Twitter: Tara_R
says:
I think that the bloggers who want to continue writing will, but the interaction, the engagement from readers has been affected by Twitter. Twitter is real time and instant gratification, comments or reading blogs take more effort.
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@Tara R., yeah. It’s the interaction that I miss.
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Twitter and Facebook combined have killed “light” blogging. If your blog consists of merely updates about where you’ve been and nothing else, you’ve probably moved to twitter, and if 140 characters is too short, 420 may suit you on Facebook. However, for the blogger who actually posts some real content, blogging is the way to go. Actually, this may be a good thing… keep the light content in Twitter, and the real content in your RSS reader.
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Twitter: Faiqa
on August 11th, 2010 at Wednesday, August 11, 2010 @ 9:41 am
@John, This is what *I* meant to say.
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@John, what about the feedback? How do you encourage feedback on your real content?
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@Avitable, Well I guess there in lies the problem. Maybe if someone somehow designed an easy to implement two-way feeder system similar to RSS, we could encourage more feedback. Hmmm…… I may have just discovered my first major project in the world of programming…. I’ll be sure to mention you when I become rich and famous.
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@John, I think an easy way to comment on a smart phone would also be ideal, too. Right now, so many comment systems have problems.
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Twitter: Faiqa
says:
This is going to sound mean, but… here goes. If you’re blog is being killed by sporadic 140 char updates, you should revisit choices regarding content. So, Twitter did not kill blogging… it’s an evolutionary mechanism that is going to push out some blogs and push forward others.
God, that made me sound like a jerk.
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@Faiqa, no, that makes sense.
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All I know is my computer sounds like it’s gonna blow or something, so… no.
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@Sybil Law, you and your computer, always blowing something . . .
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Twitter: msmegan
says:
I don’t know… it’s certainly killing my comments, which is making me far less likely to write which is probably making people lose interest and comment less, so…
I don’t know.
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@Finn, so if you had 50 comments a post, you’d be more likely to blog?
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Twitter: msmegan
on August 11th, 2010 at Wednesday, August 11, 2010 @ 8:08 pm
@Avitable, It wouldn’t hurt. The whole idea of blogging for me is about interaction.
I write for a living. If I want to write for me, I work on my fiction or a poem. Blogging is writing for an actual audience and getting to exchange ideas. Comments give me creative energy.
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@Finn, I agree with that sentiment completely.
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Twitter: snerkology
says:
Not *killed* it, but revealed a lot of bloggers who find it easier/more convenient/more in keeping with their thought process to keep to 140 characters. I know quite a few bloggers who have all but fallen off the “blogisphere”, but are active on Twitter. On the one hand, I’m sorry to see the loss of entries; on the other hand, I’m glad they haven’t disappeared completely like a lot of bloggers that I miss.
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@Tiffany, sometimes I have funny ideas that I could put on Twitter, or I can save them and make a full fledged blog post about them. I’m glad I choose the latter.
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Twitter: twinmomoftwinz
says:
Not killed but possibly severly injured. I don’t blog as much as I used to but as others have already commented certain thoughts/ideas/emotions can’t be confined to 140 characters.
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@Stacey, maybe it’s just refining blogging, then.
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I don’t know if it killed blogging… it certainly killed blog commenting though.
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@Gav, yeah, true.
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No more than television killed radio or the Internet killed books. There are still plenty of decent blogs to read, with actual content that can’t be conveyed in 140 characters. I suspect that bloggers who made the leap from that medium to twitter never really had anything interesting to communicate in the first place.
Further, I suspect twitter will only blunt the writing abilities of most of its users, as it forces the expression of ideas to be truncated. Imagine Macbeth or The Odyssey written on twitter. Actually, don’t imagine. Go here: http://www.holytaco.com/if-homers-odyssey-was-written-twitter
Different formats allow for different writing styles, and while twitter may provide a suitable entertainment platform for Shit My Dad Says, that does not hold true for most other users. Nobody REALLY gives a damn where someone else just had the tastiest burrito or that somebody hates today’s weather. Twitter is far more of a social tool than blogging, but it never really pierces the surface of ANY topic. Real discourse simply cannot be achieved in 140 characters. The most useful dynamic of twitter is the pr/marketing angle, wherein people/corporations can update about their latest deal or happening or blog post. Outside of that, it’s just people filling valuable bandwidth with mindless static.
Fantastic picture, by the way. You selling prints yet?
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@Krëg, television, radio, the Internet, and books, are all different media. Twitter is micro blogging. The better analogy is microwaving vs. cooking on a stove.
I just stuck that photo on a T-shirt today. It’s in my Zazzle store.
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I don’t think it’s killing it but it’s certainly putting a dent in my blogging. Ideas that used to grow into full blown blog posts now get blurted out in 140 characters.
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@Kevin Spencer, don’t you miss putting those ideas in the ground and cultivating them into a blog post, though?
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I wouldn’t say Twitter has killed blogging (although I like your artist depictions). I would say that Twitter is more a distraction to blogging, then you click the link in a tweet that opens up a new blog post, and wonder “why don’t I blog more?” It’s a vicious circle that has reduced my blog post frequency.
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@martymankins, this is one reason I make myself blog every day.
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Twitter: ragingdad
says:
Well here’s a crappy deal. I commented here yesterday that I rarely update my blog anymore, and some turd went over to WordPress and figured out that I hadn’t repurchased my domain name since it expired a few days ago… So the jerk bought it and posted spam on it! Now, my blog address is totally stolen.
I think it is shitty characters like that who make me less interested in continuing blogging. Between the spam comments on blog posts, the number of fake followers on twitter, and URL poachers, it all just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
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@Raging Dad, well, that’s shitty.
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Twitter: coalminersgd
says:
It hasn’t killed my blog. Lack of sleep has done that all on it’s own!
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@Coal Miner’s Granddaughter, damn kids.
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I don’t twitter. I don’t get it. The idea of broadcasting little thoughts every moment of the day is a mystery to me. I prefer to write it all in a big chunk, so I still blog. I also facebook. Twitter seems like a watered down version of this.
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@Peau, I think the big difference to Twitter vs. Facebook is that Twitter is open to the whole world.
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@Avitable, really? huh. i thought you had “friends” and only those friends saw your tweets. see, i really don’t know anything, other than i think saying “i just twatted something” is full of yay.
i think it’s the minutiae. i’m just wagering people want to hear my inane, non-important thoughts about as much as i want to hear theirs. although admittedly my thoughts are better than everybody else’s.
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@Avitable, oh, btw, i texted you my new # but it bounced back to me. i’m guessing it’s safe to assume it’s because you hate me and always will.
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Twitter: juliryan
says:
It’s kind of like saying television is going to kill books. Blogging and Twitter are just different platforms. And you get to choose which is the appropriate venue for your pithy little thoughts.
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@Juli ryan, I think they’re the same media. Twitter is a micro version of blogging. It’s closer to saying that DVD sales are going to kill movie theaters. People use Twitter so much now that in many situations, they’re too lazy to share their reactions to a blog post.
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Twitter: juliryan
says:
I guess that I agree. I still read a lot of blogs. I “Like” a lot of posts in my RSS reader, but I don’t always comment on them. And I also use Twitter for micro-blogging, but I fancy myself a writerly sort. So, I like to think that my stream tells a story. I don’t think most people use Twitter the way that we do. It’s more often used for IMs or promotion.
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@Juli ryan, I get annoyed that people use Twitter like an IM system. Just email them, ffs.
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Oh please. I’m not on facebook, I don’t twitter, I don’t blog. I am a reader. I read and I like it and tend to forget that you can not actually see me reading. And giggling. Occasionally.
So – I’m telling you now. Ok?
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@Katharina, you can send me photos of you giggling, too, if you want.
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Yes, I believe it has. . . I mean, seriously. What’s a girl to do when someone unfollows me on twitter and therefore will never see the genius that is my blog, simply because I wrote that I ate wings and bacon cheese fries for dinner last night. Damn you, twitter.
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@Black Belt Mama, exactly!
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To quote myself (because I’m a blogger and therefore incredibly egotistical:
“If blogging is cocaine then Twitter is crack. They both are addictive but the feedback rush from Twitter is more immediate but also shorter lived.”
Twitter would never replace blogging for me, I’m too wordy. But it’s certainly taken out a number of exceptional bloggers I know.
I think blogging may be dying, or at least dramatically shrinking. I’m not sure if the sole responsibility can be lain at the door of twitter, but it is certainly contributing.
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@Dan, maybe only the really high quality blogs will remain. It’s a survival of the Twittest type of thing.
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Twitter: Beccas4
says:
Gosh I hope not because I think I suck at tweeting, but I can write really well on a good day!
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@Becca, I hope not too.
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Twitter: thepsychobabble
says:
Blogging-perhaps not. but commenting? Oh yes!
although, I blame a good chunk of that on smart phones. I mean really, if they can make it so that I can read your blog, why can’t they make it so I can freaking comment??
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@thepsychobabble, I’m going to go look and see if there’s a good smart phone commenting plugin, actually. That’s a good idea.
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I read about 20 comments and then got pissed because you have 100 comments on a PICTURE. Ass.
Moving on. I think Twitter is ok. It’s nice to have a quick update on a FEW people, but mostly I am looking for a conversation and I just don’t get that same feel on Twitter. Also, it’s really easy to find an old conversation on my blog because it’s SAVED FOREVER. Twitter is just piles and piles of teeny notes like a message board on crack. I mainly use it for drunken nights and to link to my BLOG posts, where all the real juice is at.
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@tracey, not just a picture. An AWESOME picture!
My biggest issue with it is the lack of feedback. I write on my blog to get feedback on my blog, because it is permanent and saved. It’s not something that will disappear in a blink of an eye with a hundred updates a second.
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