Following a long lasting procrastination, my blog page was finally conceived and nurtured as a result of my social media class…. And after almost 4 weeks into the process, I love this addiction! In theory, I knew that new information and news cannot be created out of the blue; but what I learnt was that any contribution to the existing facts and figures is still original in its own form because its characterized by one’s own thoughts and ideas. Blogging about my experience as a blogger was a little mind boggling initially, but when I sat down to think about the various tacit steps that it took to produce a worthy blog…it felt to be a worthwhile topic to blog about. This blog is more of an integrated response to an introspective back and forth of the what, why and how of blogging.
What is a blog?
I found myself stuck on this basic and fundamental question for quite sometime. From what I understood, a blog was a piece of writing that reflected one’s impression about something. It was a public platform through which people of similar interests shared and educated themselves with each others work ultimately forming a virtual community. A few other views from BlogBasics that describe the meaning of blogs effectively are:
“…the first journalistic model that actually harnesses rather than merely exploits the true democratic nature of the web. It’s a new medium finally finding a unique voice.”– Andrew Sullivan
“[a] collection of posts…short, informal, sometimes controversial, and sometimes deeply personal…with the freshest information at the top.”– Meg Hourihan
Once I stepped into the blogging world, I realized it can be nearly anything and everything that you want it to be… news, personal updates, celebrity gossip, marketing techniques, recipe compilations, investment guides, ad campaigns, political propagandas, health tips, gardening suggestions, recommendations on investments, and the like.
Why Blog?
Well! Being humans, we are fortunate enough to have our brains developed fully well in order to function as the most developed of all living beings…and so each one of us has a voice. Blogging provides us with that medium where one can communicate without vocal chords! Each one of us likes to hear and be heard…blogging is exactly that! There are a multitude of topics that people all across the globe talk about. I was overwhelmed, at first, to realize how much people talk about everything under the sun! Sure enough one of the first responsibilities of a blogger is to determine the purpose of blogging. Though a lot of people use this platform to convey personal thoughts, it has also become an integral part of professionalism in today’s world.
Commoncraft effectively illustrates the significance of blogging through this video.
How blogging works?
The answer to this question involved no guesswork, creativity or imagination. It was an experience suggested by my professor, which has now replaced Google search for me. This blessing in disguise came in the form of Netvibes! It allowed me to organize everything on one dashboard – view videos, clips, images and information all together; see the updates coming in from Twitter, Washington Post, The Guardian, Google, New York Times and the like on a particular topic. I could customize the tabs with the image that interested me the most, search for different topics simultaneously, read and view topics with the backdrop of my choice…it just felt so awesome!! It was too much information thrown at me at first, I agree, but I am proud of how I managed to pick the keywords to narrow down my search and get content-specific details.
Netvibes Dashboard
It was more like being a part of the social world where millions of people were talking about the same thing through different media and tools. It was about listening to them, not each of the voices, but thumbing through the ideas to see where my thoughts fit in best. My dashboard taught me what the most current topic of discussion in the electronic media was and also helped me find a spot according to where I belonged. I realized the meaning of what my professor would keep telling us in class,
“…it’s not always about talking. You must listen first in order to be heard later…”
Thank you, Dr. Peggy. Your lessons are invaluable! You made me fall in love with blogging more than I would have actually imagined!
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