A couple weeks ago I was out and about on a Friday night, having birthday drinks with my brother-in-law-in-law (we both married into the same family, so I guess that’s the right term). Although I’ve met quite a few of his friends before there were a few there that I hadn’t and of course he did the introductions. He started with my name but instead of leaving it there he also mentioned, before anything else, that I was a blogger and the topics that I write about. This was the first time that I had been introduced to anyone in the real world as a blogger and I must say it was both startling and thrilling all at the same time.
For starters I’d never really used the term to apply to myself instead identifying myself by what I do as my day job (IT guy or, if pushed, virtualization specialist) and then usually mentioning that I blog during the week about things that interest me. Blogger in my mind conjures up an image of someone who does this thing at the very least semi-seriously with either the passion to write about something they love or they’re in it for the money. As I’ve mentioned a few times before this blog began more out of a necessity to chronicle my misadventures in joining the grass roots political movement No Clean Feed. However after writing on a few things that interested me and having people say how much they liked them I made it part of my weekday ritual to post about something, sometimes to my detriment.
With the 2 year anniversary of this blog fast approaching it really goes without saying that yes I am in fact a blogger, even if I don’t identify myself as one. Whilst this blog has always been somewhat of a side project it’s still taken up a good chunk of my time over the past 2 years and anyone will tell you that if this site is down I just can’t do much else until its back online again. It’s also works as a great talking point for all the like minded individuals that I may meet in my travels with the added thrill of competition when you start comparing metrics just for the hell of it.
I guess why I shied away from the blogger title for so long was because I’m not really a part of any of the blogger communities. I mean I’ve got quite a few blogging friendsbut they’re all people I know in real life, not ones I made through blogging. Honestly this kind of behaviour is pretty typical of me as whilst I love to dive deep into many subjects I often don’t get involved with the communities that much, mostly because I already spend quite a bit of my time doing other things (which are right now Starcraft 2 and programming). That’s not to say that I don’t want to be a part of them, far from it, it’s probably more that I don’t feel like I’ve got anything of worth to add to the community. At least nothing that I’m not already doing with this blog.
There’s also the scatterbrained approach to my subject interests which makes slotting into a blogging community rather irksome. I write about many things that interest me but I try to do it in a way that would be a least semi-interesting to the wider world. Although the numbers really do speak for themselves with my most popular posts being my game and product reviews, an article about the Internet filter and an aptly timed and titled critique of the iPad. Indeed if I’m honest those are probably some of the most enjoyable posts I’ve written and I’m glad that people enjoy reading them. It does break my heart sometimes when an article I feel really proud of doesn’t generate any responses but it’s part and parcel of any endeavour. All that pain is forgotten in a heartbeat when something I write garners just a single response, either online or in real life.
Does this mean I’ll be introducing myself to people as a blogger from now on? Probably when I’m in like minded company but still I find it hard to say that I am a blogger when its more of a hobby than anything else. I do enjoy the writing and exposure that it grants me and realistically a good chunk of my identity can be traced back to my writings on this site but still I’m just a regular IT guy who takes the time to write to no one in particular almost every day. Maybe one day I’ll take a title like social media extraordinaire when a large group of people start hanging on my every word but until then I guess I’ll settle on saying that I’m a part time blogger.
Yeah, that seems to work 😉
