State of the blog 2011

The first thing I should do here is apologise to anybody who is reading this blog post. You see, normally, when I write something on this blog, I write for my reader(s). It could be a picture update of the kids or it could be for the purpose of shooting my mouth off and giving you my thoughts and opinions on what is happening in the World. Either way, it is primarily written for other people to read.

However, this particular post has a completely different purpose. For a while now, I've been struggling with a fundamental question surrounding this blog. I haven't come to an answer yet but I get the feeling that my brain is going round in circles without treading any new ground. In essence, I'm hoping that by putting my thoughts into writing, it will help me clear up some of my thinking.

I've now been blogging for just under 4.5 years (I started in January 2007). When I first started writing this blog, it was primarily as a way for me to get familiar with what this whole "blogging" thing was about. After a while, I even realised that I liked shooting my mouth off and spreading my own unique brand of random rubbish onto the world wide web (the old adage around opinions and assholes springs to mind here).

Eventually, I got into a steady rhythm of posting 3 articles a week (2 on this blog and 1 on my gaming blog). However, you have probably noticed that recently, that publishing schedule has gone to Hades in a handbasket.

Believe it or not, this isn't because I have run out of things to say (although I will admit that I have repeated myself on numerous occasions). The problem is that, due to work and family commitments, my "me" time is, on average, limited to around 30 minutes each day with a bit more at the weekend if I stay up late. And into that brief slot of 30 minutes, I'm trying to slot in gaming, reading and blogging.

Something has to give.

The thing is, despite what I said above about spouting random rubbish, I actually try and put some thought into my blogging. I might not always succeed, but whenever I post my opinion, I try and back it up with reasons why that opinion is valid. I always try to sense check what I'm posting and sense check articles which I link you to instead of just believing anything I read online. This takes time.

Time which is increasingly hard to find. The reality is that I just don't have time to regularly post anymore and, if I'm being realistic, I don't see this situation changing for at least several years.

So what does that mean for this blog?

This is the question which I have been struggling with recently and to be honest - I really don't know. I am hesitant about formally killing the blog as, on the rare situations where I do have time to post, it would be useful to have a forum to spout off from. On the other hand - if my posting is so rare, then it is unfair to expect anyone to check on this blog either regularly or semi-regularly on the off chance that I have written something.

So, that is where my thinking is currently at. Not sure what will happen to this blog but will let you know if and when I come to a decision.

I hate html code

I don't know if I told you this before but I hate html coding. Or, if I'm being a bit more precise, I hate having to deal with html coding on my blog. Why am I complaining about html coding on my blog now despite having used blogger for several years?

Well, recently, something changed.

In the past, whenever I created a blog entry in Blogger, it was always super easy. I would login to Blogger and click the New Post button. At that point, I get a big textbox and I would just type in whatever I wanted to say into that textbox. Blogger also supported basic text formatting so I could easily get to a new paragraph by simply hitting Enter twice. The html coding was still there in the background but I could just ignore it and do my own thing.

And then, over the weekend, I popped online to prepare my gaming post when - quelle horreur! Last Thursday's post was just a wall of incomprehensible text with zero formatting! Somehow, all of the text formatting had been lost after posting. I edited the post to put back in the paragraph breaks but quickly realised that none of the text formatting was being kept. In the end, I had to go into Edit Html mode so that I could manually enter in line breaks using html code which was a huge pain in the ass!

The annoying thing is that I don't know why this has happened or what I can do to correct it. I recently installed Chrome on my PC (giving it a test run which I'll talk about in future) and I can't help but wonder if that has anything to do with this. If so, considering that both tools are by Google, what a frak-up.

In any event, I hope that this is just a short term issue. If I have to frak around with html coding every time I make a blog post in future, then, well...

Twitter

By now, the more observant of my readers (so no, not you) will have noticed the twitter feed on the right hand side of my blog. For the extremely unobservant, I should add that the twitter feed is mine and that I have indeed created a twitter account.

The catalyst for this was basically last Thursday's post. I had some random thoughts which I wanted to share. The problem was that there wasn't enough meat on those random thoughts to really justify a blog post in its own right but other than ignoring it completely, what could I do?

Well, it turns out that I could have created a twitter account and micro-blogged about it. Who knew, right? Too late now I suppose but hopefully, such short and random thoughts can be kept to twitter in future.

Also, somehow I have managed to pick up three followers. I have no idea how I managed this or why they would be interested in my tweets considering that my tweets so far have consisted of random crap. But there you go.

New blog functionality

Just a quick note to let you know that I have added a customised search engine to my blog. If you are looking for a specific post, then you can use the search engine on the right of the screen (it only searches my general blog and my gaming blog).

btw - you did notice that I had previously added an RSS feed to this blog, right? And you do know what RSS is, right? Right??

Belated Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to my blog
Happy Birthday to you.

Can you believe that I only just realised today that I've been blogging for over a year now? Its true - my first post was made on 24 January 2007. I can't believe I let the first anniversary of my blog go by without any comment!

Anyway, I first started this blog post primarily for the reason of exploring the whole web 2.0 thing. You may recall the whole thing was brought on by a presentation from my boss talking about natives and immigrants to technology. I mentioned a while ago that the main purpose of this blog was to give me a forum to rant and rave in - a chance to give voice to my own brand of lunacy.

After a year, I don't think the blog has changed much in scope. Looking at the categories, my favourite topic of conversation is Gerry. This has always been the case and I don't see this changing much in future. In fact, you can expect some more photos of Gerry soon!

My second favourite topic of conversation is video games. Despite the fact that I'm a hardcore gamer, this does surprise me. When I choose a blog topic, I do try to stay away from talking about video games (I save that for my gaming blog) unless it has a broader message I want to make. Looking back at some of my video game related posts, there seems to be a wide range of different posts. I guess you will just have to accept the fact that a lot of posts on my blog will be game related.

I guess the next milestone for my blog will be when I hit 1,000 visits. Currently, I'm at 868 visits which averages out to approx 66 visits per month. Wow - thats a lot more than I would have expected given that this blog is mainly read by family and friends. At this rate, I should hit 1,000 visits in another 2 months (or possibly sooner if I hit the refresh button on my browser a couple more times!!)

Streamlining the blog

Don't have much time today as I have to rush to see a movie.

All I wanted to do today is let you know that I streamlined the blog a bit by rationalising the categories. Before, the categories were a bit haphazard and probably didn't make much sense. When I first started this blog, I didn't have any clear idea about what I was going to post about. All I wanted to do was get a better idea of this whole web 2.0 phenom. Now that I've been blogging for a while, I realised that the categories I had were starting to get a little non-sensical.

What I've done is to rethink the structure of my blog. I've then gone through all of my posts since I started this blog and recategorised them. Many of the old categories are still there - however some of them are gone and some of them reworded so that it makes a bit more sense.

Most of you won't be affected by this. The main benefit is for people to more easily find past posts that I've written about (ie me).

Target audience

I got asked today why I was creating this blog. My initial response was "Didn't you read the first post?".

However, it turned out the question was more in vein of who I expected to read this blog. She was also kind enough to point out that I didn't get any visitors as no-one was commenting. grr.

Of course, I immediately got very defensive and said that based on the site meter, lots of people were reading my blog. Including someone from the UK (thx for the kind comments man!). However, it did get me thinking about who I am writing this blog for. As with any creative endeavor, it behooves (luv that word!) the author to consider the target audience.

So who am I writing this for?

Is it for my friends? As a way for us to keep in touch through my random thoughts? Or to share the latest photos of my son? Not really - if I wanted to get in touch with my friends, I would email or call them.

Is it for Joe Public then? Again, not really. I don't have any agenda I'm trying to push (check out this blog for a good example - Mahesh: Hope you get your money back!). And quite frankly, I'm too egotistical to really care what Joe Public thinks.

So, who's left. ME of course! After due deliberation, I have come to the conclusion that this blog is written by me for me. It's just a way for me to vent and rant. Plus, putting my thoughts into writing is a good way to ensure that they are well structured. If nothing else, its a good way for me to practice my writing skills and use big fancy words that I normally wouldn't get to use (can you find all the 5 syllable words in this post?).

Unfortunately, this also raises a small issue. The style of my writing is very conversational. If this blog is written for me, does this mean that I am talking to myself? Am I crazy? Have I finally gone off the deep end?

Hold that thought - I need to answer the door - there are a couple of people in white lab coats outside.

Hello!

Huzzah!!

My first blogpost - I finally enter the 21st century. :)

I guess the first thing to talk about is why I am now creating this blog. Part of the reason is that my boss in his presentation yesterday was talking about the professional of the future. One of the points he mentioned was that people born after 1982 were "natives" to technology while those born before were "immigrants" to technology.

In case there is any doubt, I am an immigrant to technology.

But here is the problem - I want to be a native.

I have always considered myself to be "hip" and "trendy" despite the fact that I am no longer a spring chicken (In fact, I am probably closer to getting my mid-life crisis!). I try very hard to be open to new ideas etc. And in many ways, I guess I do a good job at this. At least I am not afraid of technology anyway (I say that like its an achievement!).

But after listening to my boss talk about the 1982 cut-off and his example of his daughter having 5 email accounts, I realised that maybe I'm not as trendy as I thought.

So here I am - writing my first blog post (and becoming the Time person of the Year!!).

I hope you enjoy this blog (and brief insight into my psyche).