Image via Wikipedia
Darren Rowse asked in his blog, “If your blog died today, what would it be remembered for?” The following post is my reply to this morbid two-part scenario. We are now off to 2019 and I have just decided to end this blog. Here’s my obituary:
Jan of salabasngmandaluyong wrote finis to a 10-year blogging career that has been distinguished by exemplary writing and clarity of vision.
He had a wobbly start at blogger.com – a prolific web author who had increasingly become self-conscious that he was living under the bridge in the blogosphere. But he had made the transition to WP and an independent web host. From then on, he had become more self-assured and found his voice, which he increasingly used to deflate the egos of web snake charmers with their pet theories on SEO and get-rich schemes. He refused to call them writers. “They’re nothing but hacks, lowly and greasy mechanics.”
His blog is studded with elegant and humorous reflections on writing, technology and contemporary issues that bedevil mankind.
He had achieved recognition by seeking anonymity and shunning the social scene. On balance, his blog put up a good fight, but it had lost on many fronts:
- He lost to a formidable swarm of cliches he found despicable. Rocket science, breath of fresh air, and their ilk – while apparently not as popular as before – have all outlived Jan’s blog.
- He championed the true art of writing your passion as a blogger.Thousands of new information workers who joined daily the make money online bandwagon did not hear him and those who took notice thought him quaint and a little touched in the head.
- He had sought enlightenment and self-discovery through his web writing, but his stint as a blogger only brought him fame, modest money in the bank, and beer belly from leading a sedentary life.
Jan, however, had remained steadfast on his creative blogging philosophy he attributed to Skellie. He wrote from the heart and refused to pay heed to momentary buzz in the internet that powers hordes of traffic to a web author’s site. His blog friends found it amusing that for a forgetful guy he had Skellie’s words seared on his consciousness:
The key thing that makes it (creative blogging) so often overlooked is that it builds slowly but surely. Because you’re not following a formula people have already been conditioned to respond to, it’s going to take time for the value of what you’re doing to spread. But it will do so inexorably. And when it does, your slow rising star will overtake those of other bloggers who have been chasing peaks without building something never seen before.
Jan’s slow rising star was just starting to get noticed when he made this startling decision to quit blogging. He had rubbed elbows and drank beer with the likes of Chris Brogan, Darren Rowse and Brian Clark. He is not yet spat upon, or knifed – he’s not that famous yet. But friends see Jan as a deer caught in the headlights (sorry for this cliche Jan, this can’t be helped). He’s not comfortable with it.
Perhaps he’s made good on his empty threat to go to England to learn the fine art of gardening.
Or maybe he’s holding court in Bora Bora, teaching the natives about blogging. Or thinking up ways on how to make a comeback. Who knows?
Part 2 – An obituary for this blog as it stands today
Salabasngmandaluyong was hacked today and its author Jan decided to delete it altogether, Yatot announced in TYC. He spent all day sending messages to a handful of Jan’s friends in Facebook, Twitter and Friendster.
Readers reactions:
- Jojigirl – No skin off my nose. I’d be as poised as the woman in this video.
- Tonex – Uh – oh, I would have designed a minimalist theme for him had he stayed longer!
- Ann Handley: Who he? Maybe it’s just one of those random things.
- Jan’s sister: He’s got a blog? What’s a blog?
- Jan’s dog: Let him be. As James Thurber says, “Nowadays men live by noisy desperation.” He chucks the noise, let him deal with the other one.
What would people miss about this blog? Consensus: the interaction.
What has this blog achieved? Verdict: Nothing you can put a finger on, but yeah, the potentiality of this blog becoming better in the months to come.
Has it fulfilled a need or service in people’s lives? General agreement: Too early to tell.
What ground has it broken? After the huddle: Give the guy a break. He had blogged for all of two months. Seriously though, nothing. But he might have surprised us in the future had he stuck with blogging.
So, if it were your blog’s demise today – what do you think will the obituary read like?
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=9a281f27-439d-43ab-96cd-92d32fef674a)
