DISQUS

Chris · 1 year ago

"If I post something like that I notice that no one comments. Yet if I post something pithy about movies I hate or enjoy, it’s like flies to sugar "

Absolutely. The same thing happens with me as well. I have found, as you note, that if one blogs on the purpose of blogging it does tend to garner a fair amount of notice. :-)

Drew Tatusko · 1 year ago

It's weird, but it is teaching me something about the medium. I wonder if people blog less to share and sharpen thought (which is really what I am here to do) and more for the purpose of self-aggrandizement? We are a culture that is addicted to fame and reality TV is part of that. I am beginning to think that blogging is part of that phenomenon.

Now your brother challenged some of my thoughts on McCain and we had a somewhat heated disagreement. That's the kind of stuff I like. I like it when people force me to see something differently or to make me aware of my assumptions. But it happens so rarely on my own blog that I do wonder why people blog and read them at all?

Nick Norelli · 1 year ago

If I don't comment on the deeper posts, it's because I'm too stupid to do so. Well, that, and I was extremely ill yesterday. ;)

Drew Tatusko · 1 year ago

I know. Hope you are feeling better. I (and I really mean my whole family eventually) had a doozy of a flu like you were talking about this fall. Passed out and knocked my tooth off the metal trashcan. Not fun.

Bryan L · 1 year ago

Drew,
You pointed out the lack or responses to your theodicy post and then mentioned how the not so deep posts get more responses and then you go on to ask "What grabs your attention and holds it?"

Speaking for myself, short posts are generally what grab my attention. When I get up in the morning and there are 40 new posts in Google Reader I quickly scan through them all. I will stop and read the shorter ones and scan through most of the rest that are longer. If I find one that is long but looks like it might be interesting then I will mark it so that I can come back to it later when I have more time. In the case of your theodicy post this is what I did. Unfortunately I don' always get back to the longer posts or by the time I do I feel too much time might have passed or the blog owner might have moved on (this is especially the case of the blogger posts rather frequently) so I don't end up commenting

I think with the longer more serious posts, sometimes it might be better to split them up and post them in parts and have some discussion take place and then posts the next part. I think this helps to keep the topic of discussion a lot more focused like a laser instead of broad like a shot gun (I remember in learning about preaching that some focused on this technique of making things more laser focused). I know when there is a long post sometimes I don't know where to begin commenting and so I just don't.

Also I find that when I'm looking at a long post it sometimes helps to have certain catchwords or provocative statements in bold that will catch my attention. That way it makes it easier to find out if I'm interested. I try this sometimes on my blog but I don't know how other people view it of if I go over board with it.

Anyway those are a couple of things that I think I will do in the future with my blog since I figure some people who read it probably have short attention spans like I do (I think I have ADD : )

Bryan

Drew Tatusko · 1 year ago

It's interesting because the medium is neither like a discussion forum or BBS, but what I am finding is that it's not really like a journal or a newspaper either. It is somewhere in between. It's like a medium for commentary, and not the best place to provoke a whole lot of original thought. Or, original thought that is just really toned down commentary. It is a peculiar and new kind of reading behavior though as it seems.