Hello,
I'm Mervi Eskelinen!
An artist, nerd and sorcerer, dedicated to make world softer and better for everyone, and to get you to make more art. Make art, change the world!
Things blogging has taught me
Blogging as well as tweeting can be used for many things. Spreading the word of something, branding, ego tripping, being a jerk towards others and so forth.
At the same time it's of course also a learning experience for the blogger (or tweeter) herself. And it can be pretty interesting.
So I started to think what blogging has taught me. There are several things, and the following represents just a few of them. However these right now feel like the most important lessons blogging and tweeting has given me.
Nevermind the spills
Typos and little mistakes happen. As long as it's not hurting someone (or myself) it doesn't matter that much.
Sometimes I write something, rewrite it and *KAPOW* something goes wrong. I mess with the grammar or repeat the same word over and over again.
Afterwards I usually notice these mistakes. I still care, but previously I used to go crazy over those mistakes, but now I'm easier with them. And easier with myself.
Just submit it
it's good to check the text. And fix it. But too much is too much. After the third rewrite it's most likely ruined.
Being able to publish the text at some point is way more important that getting it perfect. I mean... There's no perfect, you know.
Rewriting over and over again just results to the mistakes I mentioned previously. And it takes the soul out of the text.
Haters gonna hate
No matter what I write I know someone will have a problem with it. Or want to show they are smarter than me.
There's no way to make everyone happy. Some people seem to think criticism is the same thing as being a negative asshole.
I still haven't learned to let their negative assholeness just slide. That's something I need to work with. Or the negative ones need to work with their attitude.
Response is rare
Getting response is difficult. Popular sites and twitter users do get comments and replies, but the less famous ones get them less often.
Many bloggers have turned off their comments, some because they've felt "0 comments" is embarrassing.
A friend of mine told she doesn't like to write anything anywhere if she cannot edit it afterwards. Many are shy to leave comments or reply. Web is full of guidelines on how to comment or how to tweet, which makes some feel inadequate.
In my opinion a comment doesn't always have to be some sort of a deep analyze about the subject. Being polite and encouraging is quite enough.
It's not the quality, it's the quantity
I'd like to say quality is what draws people in a blog or reading tweets. In my experience it's not.
When I post more often, more readers and followers will show up. There's also a bit more response when I post more regularly. Most of the visitors on this site stick around for 10 seconds at most. That means they barely have time to read even the shortest posts. If they are really fast.
Posting a lot does also lure spammers. Unfortunately this is a common problem these days.
Personal is the thing
Being personal is damn difficult. And really rewarding. After posting something more personal I always feel somewhat shaky for a moment. After a little while it starts to feel quite good.
Personal posts also get more response in a way or another than the more general ones. And gain more readers.
Being all serious and businesslike may make you seem cool and all. But it also makes you seem cold and rather boring.
What have you learned?
Now I'd really love to hear what you've learned while blogging and/or tweeting. Have you came to same conclusions as I, or has your experience been completely different? Have you learned something totally else worth mentioning?
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