DISQUS

Adam Singer · 4 months ago

Keep up the great work Mark, we look forward to another year!

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Thanks Adam, I always appreciate your support.

StevenHodson · 4 months ago

a good honest post Mark - well done.

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Thanks, Steven. You are a juggernaut.

Michael Kozakewich · 4 months ago

1. I'd like to expand on this: It also takes a spark of inspiration.
2. I join large discussions, because it's what everyone else wants. I add as much of my own thought as possible.
3. Tell me about it. I don't have ANY readers, and I've been blogging since March.
4. I think I've got this covered.
5. Actually, I've never used sites like Digg or StumbleUpon. Never. I had no clue, until right now, that I'm supposed to link to other people's work so that they'd link to mine.

And so the total result is that you kind of NEED all the above, if you're to gain any sort of readership.

I think my main problem is that half of my posts are metaposts or 'about me'. I have another journal for that. I shouldn't have that in my tech blog.
So I've been trying to cut back on the boring and airy.

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Michael:

Engaging people on their blogs, like you did with this comment, is an important networking activity as well.

Yeah, I've been self-censoring a lot due to a fear of being boring and airy. Hoping this post didn't fall into either trap - I don't think it did.

As for Digg and StumbleUpon... they aren't necessary, but they can be a help. I've gotten some minor traffic from Digg (probably more from Mixx than Digg, hat tip to the wonderful people of Mixx), but never front page. As I mentioned, most of my traffic has come from StumbleUpon but from experience I know that it's awfully easy to stumble something and then completely forget about it...

Mahendra · 4 months ago

Mark,

This is the first post I'm reading on your blog, and I'm now subscribed to your feed. :)

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Well, thanks Mahendra.

mitchjoel · 4 months ago

Excellent commentary. I think I have a Blog post brewing about how comments can happen on the Blog and everywhere else too... that's something I am noticing more and more.

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

I look forward to that post, Mitch, and thanks very much for stopping by.

Ian M Rountree · 4 months ago

Having spent the greater part of the last half of my life on the net, and most of that blogging in some form or other (LiveJournal, how lemented thou art) I think you're making a valid point that originality is difficult.

However, I have to wonder; does approach count as originality? If people are looking for news pieces, for blogbites where we used to search for soundbites on the TV or radio, can the originality of approach to an existing or much-repeated story actually lend weight to the blogger, as well as the story?

You can go anywhere and read the same three hundred comments on a carbon-copy news story, but how much fun is it to be the first one of your friends who finds just the right gripping quote from the obscurity of the sphere? On the other hand, how much should we, the bloggers, pay attention to the tone of the comments on our writing, beyond just the content?

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Hi Ian. It could be that approach is the last bastion of originality, since the human race seems to have talked through every possible subject endlessly... ;)

Ian M Rountree · 4 months ago

If that's the case, I picked the exact WRONG time to begin blogging professionally. Part of the beauty of having so much material to choose from lately is not so much making junk up as we go along - I know I'm not quite creative enough to do that for more than a year - but the chance to rework and revoice what's there, making new connections other people may be missing.

There may be nothing new under the sun, but if good old Noam Chomsky was right, we're placing more things as neighbors and strange bedfellows than we have before, and that's kind of fun.

Mark Dykeman · 4 months ago

Rock on.

weareweb · 4 months ago

Some interesting points here, especially about the social bookmarking - I am just at the point of adding this facility to my blog.

I am trying to keep up a daily post but it is hard work, haven't ran out of things to say yet but it's early days!

Great post, thanks for writing.