Thursday 29 May 2008

My Blogs, Warts and All

I have this view on blogging, which my mate thinks is rather sad. He thinks everything is sad anyway. My posts are largely unedited. I don’t write a post and give it to someone to cast a ‘fresh eye’ on it. This is what I think, when you ask people to proof-read your blogs before you publish they don’t only spot the mistakes they also want to express their opinions on what you have written and more often than not they sway yours and the blog is no longer original. Probably better written but the originality is lost. My blog is my personal diary, though published for the whole world to see but it’s still my personal thing. It’s not a corporate or some other organisation’s blog, It’s moi. I want readers to connect with me on a personal level. I would like to meet a regular reader of my blog for the first time one day and make him feel he had known me since the day he started reading my blog. That is why I publish my posts, warts and all. It’s better to have a wysiwyg reputation. (What you see is what you get).
Unlike other types of publications I think the most authentic blogs should be the ones in their raw state.
Mind you, I don’t have the same opinion about other publications. A novel, be it fiction or fact, has to be properly edited before it is published because it’s not really about the writer. It’s more about the characters, storyline, plot and stuff. I think it actually bothers on criminal negligence to publish a textbook containing errors that could easily have been verified. (Lord help us if that was a medical text-book.) Almost the same argument goes for news journals and other regular publications. My blog on the other hand is what it is, my blog. I’d rather be corrected by someone from Australia who leaves a comment on my blog than have a proof-reader correct me always before I publish only to fall far below expectation when I finally meet readers of my blogs in person. My writings have to reflect my personality.
Hey, that’s just my opinion you may have a different one. It’s just that I have this habit of being right all the time.
Having said that I go to great lengths to carefully go over what I’ve written a million times to verify my facts, check my spellings and grammatical constructions before I publish. So whatever error you come across in my blog, that’s me.
I read about this lady who started writing a blog with a pseudonym until her writing skills improved and she started using he real name to blog. That’s what I’m talking about. (I’m not using a pseudonym though). She taught herself to write through blogging. Sometimes an embarrassing criticism from an unknown reader could be more effective than a gentle advice from a proof-reader pal.
Note however, that the most important factor to consider about blogging is to put the readers of the blog first.

2 comments:

Personal Property said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Personal Property said...

I just wanted to say that, by submitting your original blog content, along side ezine, you are risking your blog being penalized by search engine for duplicate content.

Its just a friendly thought.

You have a great blog by the way, I loved reading the articles.