Aw Shucks - Darren Rowse Killed My Blog

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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:

1. Jojigirl - No skin off my nose. I'd be as poised as the woman in this video.
   
2. Tonex - Uh - oh, I would have designed a minimalist theme for him had he stayed longer!
   
3. Ann Handley: Who he? Maybe it's just one of those random things.
   
4. Jan's sister: He's got a blog? What's a blog?
5. 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?

Tags: blogging, goals

Once More With Feeling: Goals for 2009

Goals that are not written down are just wishes. - Anonymous

Very well then. I have to set these down then, my goals for 2009.

Personal Goal. Giving up the smoking habit. I have set it out in my initial post in this blog, but I kept postponing the day of final deliverance. I confess I have yet to position myself on the starting block and make a go at it.

Every day, I first check out the comment section on this blog. Primarily because I positively cringe at the prospect of a reader checking my progress on my earlier vow. I hate that I can't brag that I have started already. Can't even put to to paper the suffering I have to go through on account of kicking the habit. Bad, bad.

It's no relief that this blog has stayed under the radar of friends and well-meaning readers. When they do eventually come around and ask I have to be honest. My credibility as a person and as a blog author rests on this.

It's not enough to write it on stone. In this day and age you have to write it down on a blog for good measure.

I'd occasionally post here my progress if you don't mind. And if you feel like checking up on me, feel free to do so. I'd appreciate it.

Goal For This Blog . In my earlier post, 8 Internet Goals for 2009, I have cheekily enumerated what I set out to do for next year. That I guess was written in a moment of pique or derangement. At the time, I desperately needed company in this blog. And there were no visitors so I wrote that. The only valid goal was summarized in the 8th entry. So there.

Of course, I can delete it, but in retrospect, I elected it to stay as a stark reminder of my progress as a blogger.

I wish to add my dream of moving into a more decent house (shhh, this is just between you and me, okay). Where I can move as I please. Where there's a big cupboard I can stack with to-die-for plug ins. Every time I check out my blog neighbors in wordpress ville, I hate having this feeling of inferiority as if I were a poor cousin. I know I'm not exactly living under the bridge, but I can't help it.

It strains credulity if one blogs about personal growth while living on the pittance of the blogger platform.

I'm just saving money for the move.

In your case, what do you wish to achieve in 2009?

8 Internet Goals for 2009

It's all very well to be optimistic when you are down, and although you're seeing stars from the ditch, that doesn't cut it for me anymore. It has got to improve. I don't want to smell funny and disoriented from too much muddling through anymore. And a goal-oriented blogging is the way to go. So here are my goals for next year:

1. Clarity. I resolve to use simple, everyday words in my blog if I really want to gain readers. So that the riffraff in my neighborhood will finally take a liking to me and thus bulk up my readership. Without their sweaty embrace and at the very least their grudging respect I'd be doomed at the bottom of the food chain.

2. Use of Exotic Terms. I will do away with high highfalutin words so I can sneak in every now and then some jargon of my choice. Like SEO. Leveraging. Meta this, meta that. Every one should understand that it's just very much like a dance of joy when posts about couple of obscure financial jargon will have successfully driven an insane volume of traffic to this blog. Consider this a commercial break from regular program. Don't despair because I will make it up to you in our karaoke night outs.

3. Utility. I'd serve you a movable feast of riches via guides to your personal growth. Simply because I'm a buddy after your own heart. I care for you deeply. Not only will I teach you how to make your armpits smell like a baby, I'd occasionally point you where the wonderful freebies are. Free downloads and stuff. Because I care from the smallest of your whims to your total education.

4. Upfront and Personal. I'd try to a put a little something of myself into my writing. So you and the world can find some uniqueness from the drivel that I dispense against the output of the rest of the blogosphere. Or I can draw inspiration from your exciting life and the wench you call your significant other. And when she finally leaves you for your own father, hello, maybe there's poetic justice in seeing her nailed just right on the internet, okay?

5. Sky-high Statistics - unique visitors, page views, subscribers, adsense growth. Last week, I was ecstatic I had one subscriber. Of course that was shortlived because I found out I had subscribed to my own feed through my mobile phone. What a hoot. Although I honestly think I have good taste so a vote of confidence - even from myself - ah, that's big deal. Hahaha. Faith cannot move mountains at my behest, but I sure can haul my ass up there.

6. Zen. I'd be detached from materialistic considerations. My equilibrium rests not on the fickle tastes of readers and the inscrutable Mr. Google. But of course,just to be sure, I'd be keeping a tight watch over these concerns. Especially my small patch of adsense. I will be serenely watching my grass grow. And finally -

7. I'd intone every morning as I watch the sunrise, "Universe, I am ready. Give it to me, give it to me."

8. Chuck nos. 1 to 7. Okay, I need to go for clarity, utility, and Zen qualities. But not in the aforementioned context. I'd just be myself, engage you in meaningful conversations, I hope. And gently connect to the universe, and not holler into it.

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