[Copy Cat] The Journey of a Blogger

http://gradwolf.wordpress.com/2008/04/05/the-journey-of-a-blogger/

 

I was wondering about the journey a blogger goes through from the time he starts to the time he becomes a seasoned one. I am not a seasoned blogger myself compared to millions out there, but I guess I can comment on this, having started to blog almost 3 years back.

Here is what typically happens.

Phase 1:

Everyone is blogging. He reads articles online about how blogging is cool. About Web 2.0. About user generated content on the web. And so begins yet another blog. The stats say a blog is born every 2 seconds. Isn’t that the same rate at which India’s population is increasing? If yes, its astronomical!

Phase 2:

He is in awe with himself. From someone who cringed when asked for his English answer papers back in school, he has evolved into the person who lets out his content for the world to see and comment on. At the beginning he writes for himself. He may write what he did that day, how his day was, how he felt about some people. He never expected any comments. There were 0 anyway. He records his life, his rants and his day to day experiences.

Phase 3:

The 0 comments becomes 1,2,3 and then 4. The guy is simply overwhelmed. Here begins the change in attitude and so in his writing. He starts writing for an audience. He doesn’t write for himself anymore. He has readers, he has sent out the feeds and he feels obliged to write for them. The first person views become third person views. He writes on current affairs, about other bloggers, other communities and his own, film reviews etc. Occasionally he feels nostalgic and would write about his past life, how he misses Bombay, things he has not already recorded. These are the usual sentimental posts you find in many blogs. Including this one.

Phase 4:

The blogger then becomes aware of blogging communities. If we are talking Desi, there is desipundit, desicritics, desidabba etc. He attends blogcamps, barcamps, unoffical blogger meets and unconferences. He meets new people and develops a group of his own. He calls them blog buddies and he comments in their blogs, they comment in his and the blog buddy”ship” grows. He learns about the technical aspects and thus occurs the move from blogspot to wordpress. Or his own domain. Its all about how PHP is cool. And open source is the way to go!

Phase 5:

Now he is obsessed with stats. Where are people coming from? Who reads his blogs? What do they click on? He learns the art of linking. Like that famous what-is-his-name blogger once said- link baby, link. So he links to his favorite blogs. He finds so many blogs and loves each one for different reasons. He likes people who record their life in a matter of fact way. Simple no holds barred writing. He loves the writing of some well known people in the blogging community. He cannot figure out how some people can write humor so effortlessly. He likes blogs that talk about culture, especially those of Tambrahms. He likes blogs that are not written but spoken. Its nice to read actually. He falls in love with Bombay all over again whenever he reads Selma’s blogs. He feels bad she doesn’t blog often.

So, you get the drift?

He has now reached a pinnacle where he finds himself writing about the journey of a blogger. Maybe he is totally blank and doesn’t know what to write on. What do you think?