Blogging in CT

Blogs can be a wonderful place to vent, or just to get some thoughts down and out. Overall after reading some blogs from my fellow Connecticutians, especially the comments of a native New Yorker and resident of Connecticut known as The Caffeinated Geek Girl.

After reading reading some of the blogs posted on that site, I found it was easy to relate to some of her stories, especially getting stuck in traffic on 95 that doesn't seem to ever move. It doesn't appear to me that this particular blog is anything but a private (but obviously public) venting ground. With postings ranging from the difficulty of working from home, a concert she attended or the death of someone close.

It does look as though this blogger is trying to do some good. There was mention of bone marrow donors that are linked to her blog. This is an interesting concept for me, I never would have thought to link people to my page so that others can benefit medically. It begins to dispel the idea that blogs are just an area for complaining or for showing off about how great your life is, some people actually use it for more.

Blogging Backlash

Michael Berube: professor, author, liberal, blogger. All of these terms are correct in describing the Professor of Literature at Penn State . After reading about his experience with blogging and the controversy that arose in the article Blogging Back at the Right, I've come to realize just how public this form of expression really is.

Freedom of expression is something that is highly valued in this country, thus you cannot prevent someone from doing so. However with the advent of blogs there is a more expedient way to express your opinions in response to how someone else feels. Unfortunately there is also the increase in the misunderstanding and misinterpreting of information and opinions to go along with it.

The internet is a very public form of expression, one that is not for the faint of heart. A thick skin is required for those of us who use it to express ourselves freely. Has my opinion of blogging changed now that I have been faced with a specific encounter of public debate in this form; not particularly. The only real difference to this form of expression is the fact that it is more instantaneous than that of debate in print media.

Just as with any other form of personal opinion expression, there are advantages and disadvangtages. The advantages include the almost instantaneous availability of your opinion to others. A disadvantage: misinterpretation is immediate as well. The differences in publishing an opinion in a blog as opposed to say The Mirror is simply the fact that it is incredibly quick.

Inevitably by expressing your opinion in a blog, you're going to annoy someone. It's something that as an author you have to be prepared to experience.

10 Tips

After reading the 10 tips for writing on the living web, I realized that there are a few areas that are similar to some of the other writing that I have done in the past. Essentially, this new medium for expression is still evolving so the more tips out there the better. Personally, I still see the web as somewhat informal form of communication.

There are several of the tips that I am inclined to agree with. Details are important for the audience, as a writer you paint the picture for them. A quick synopsis of what happened is boring, even for the writer sometimes and they experienced it first hand. I think it is also important, however to know which details to include and which to leave out. I also feel it is incredibly important to write about something that you care about. The passion you feel for the subject will come through in the writing and perhaps even change a few minds about the topic. Not to mention that the piece will be more interesting if it is important to you, instead of something that you couldn't care less about.

In general I don't believe that blogs are created for the sole purpose of self glorification. This may be true in some cases, but it doesn't mean that you in particular have to read that blog. The choice comes down to the reader and what they hope to gain from the blog.

Neuromancer

Why are we reading a novel in a writing class if the class is about digital writing and not novel writing? There are a few different things that come to mind when thinking this through.

First there is the subject matter of the novel. It is about cyberspace and computers, both of which are incredibly present in our culture today. Our entire world has essentially come to depend on computers for everyday function. Some of the vocabulary in this novel has become vernacular in some respects. In reading this novel, we can compare what the author thought of computers back in the 80's as opposed to what they are today.

This novel is Sci-Fi because it touches on abstract ideas. Notions of people being people having microchips implanted underneath their skin is something that while it still hasn't happened, perhaps will occur in the future, hopefully the very distant future.

Considering the vocabulary in the novel and the recent developments in technology and entertainment (namely The Matrix movies) some of this once counterculture has become more maintstream.