Deep, Dark Secret

I'm going to reveal something of myself here. I know that I've blogged about the controversy brewing between English grammarians and tween bloggers who've adopted Internet slang to express themselves. I've always been one for showing what you know, so I never understood why anyone would purposely "dumb down" any writing.

However, I now see the light. (And it's two years after the fact.) I now can see how text messages need to, by definition, be written in brief. I can see how/why people use shorthand to write texts on cellies. You see, I text myself. I love sending text messages via cell phone. The years have passed, and I'm no longer so uber-concerned with proving to people that I do, in fact, know how to write abbreviations following AP style rules.

I guess I'm a slow, difficult product of the cyber-revolution. I think I worried too long about proper grammar. I am just not sure how to deal with the whole freedom of information and all that that entails.

How do we deal with this? Do we totally embrace this online revolution and try to create a cyberprofile for all of us? Do we ignore/deny the whole Internet presence? I'm just not sure, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.

How to Create a Successful Blog...or NOT!

If I think about the development of blogging, I am basically an amateur. This got me to thinking about why some blogs work and why other blogs fail. These are some things that came to mind.


Blogging at its core is about reading and reflecting ~ not about responding. Yes, you have to respond but mostly it is a forum for developing the brain. For example, can you imagine a class that only allowed you to write and not read. Too often I think people don't like blogs because they think they have to write something witty, pithy or intellectual. That would be nice but is not a requirement. Next, if you want people to respond to your blog post then spend time reading and then responding to other peoples posts......have a conversation.....not a monologue. And lastly, nothing piques curiosity like a hyperlink to something fabulous (even if you only think its fab) or a graphic to spruce up the content.



.........so with that said.............where are my bloggers?
Our last session is Monday. See you all there.