Writing Experiment Lab | Poe's Law Playground
As this is not a competition, I am going to not write a daily blog on Weekends from now on. Not that I can’t, but I want to let the brain take a back seat on weekends and indulge in other skills I might want to improve on.
Not that someone is complaining, but I just wanted to make it concrete by jotting it down.
In your head you might have a baritone of a voice. But in actuality, you might sound like a whistle.
Anyways, I sound exactly like what I picture myself sounding like: Fast, Hyper, and somewhat sparky.
I got an opportunity to talk about Blogging on a Podcast recently.
On the go gyaan, is a relatively new podcast but getting popular as we speak. It deals with discussions on Communication and is made by my friends from Toastmasters. Here are the links:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/onthegogyaan/
Apple Podcast:
https://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/11-blogging/id1525908344?i=1000497926503
To those who can blog every day, kudos to you. I know I thought and proudly announced that I was going to blog every day here, I have failed. Miserably!
Last post here was on February 19th, 2018. And today is April 8th, 2018. I am using an app to track habits and my blogging streak looks like this.
I am certainly not proud of this. But, I have an excuse. I have been busy doing work in the office and then I had to carry it along to my home and then had to continue doing that till I had no energy left but to sleep. I have been working for just a few months shy of 10 years and hours-wise, this is the most I have worked at a stretch. Of course, it doesn’t mean I have done the most productive work of my life. But I have enjoyed the struggle to give it as much as possible. And funnily, it isn’t over yet. But I needn’t keep awake till late nights. So, quantitatively work-wise, I have been proud of myself. My shoulders and lower back has pained because of work for the first time. This might sound totally non-sense but whatever. Enjoying work till you start snatching your hair out is also enjoyment.
So, will I be back to regular blogging? Not sure. Will I try? Of course yes.
Also, few updates: I also didn’t blog because I had gone back to home for Holi. Also, I think I am not going to publicize my blog on Twitter and Facebook anymore. I am done with those sites. Those who want to follow my blog, they can either subscribe to this in their feed readers. Or maybe, I don’t know for sure, I will start a fortnightly newsletter thingy which might have abridged posts which anyone can subscribe via email. I have watched many movies, TV shows, read some books, etc, so just to come back to the habit, my next few posts would be their reviews. So, till then, keep smiling till you have teeth.
Also, Casey Neistat is back with his regular vlogging, so why not I take inspiration and keep this thing going.
When I blogged/ declared/shouted from the mountaintop, that I was going to blog every single day this year, I was pretty sure that I won’t be able to do that. *Wink* Life is too smart you know! Still, I wanted to try. So, barring few weekend breaks for leisure and life, I posted last on Jan 18th and disappeared.
The first reason was that I wasn’t well. I had gone to Goa for 4 days and the change of weather from Goa to Bengaluru did nothing good to my sensitive nose and vulnerable throat. Secondly, I had some visitors at my home (The ILs) so I couldn’t blog at night. Thirdly, everything one does in life, has a very serious correlation with the mood one is in. Mood again is directly dependent on the health and well being of oneself and one who cares about. To summarise, some of my loved ones weren’t well. Moreover, I wasn’t even equipped in any way that I could do something about them. So, I did nothing about continuing with writing as I could do nothing about other’s health issues.
But now everything has come back on track or as they say, I’ve understood that this is how it is going to be. People are eventually going to get better and life will move on.
In short, I will try my best to continue with keeping writing alive. This blog post is just a means to get fingers acclimatize to the process again.
We will return to regular programming soon. See you all (millions and millions of you readers) shortly.
I had started blogging in January of 2007. That time, my sole intent was to earn money. So, I quickly set up a Google Adsense account and started putting ad banners of all sizes on my blog. Initially, there were more banners than blog posts. During those days, even the Earnings Per Click (EPC) was good. I started writing more and shared the blog link with all my friends. I even went on and set the Home Page of the default browsers in my engineering college to my blog. That time, I hadn’t created a Facebook or a Twitter account. Probably, no one I knew had. So, the only way to share the blog links to get more readership was to go to other blogs, comment there and hope to get a reply. If you were lucky and your comment made sense, people would click on your profile which would then lead them to your blog eventually. And guess what, people were less cynical those days. Most of the bloggers of that time connected with each other. Commenting and regularly sharing new links among each other had become common. By 2008, the camaraderie grew and joint-blogs started. Bloggers started networking and regular meetups were organized. By then, I realized that I liked writing. I realized that putting thoughts on a blog opened up many new avenues in the mind which I didn’t know existed. I made many friends that way as well. (Also, I never was able to reach the minimum 100$ mark which is needed for Google to release the payment. So, it means I haven’t earned anything yet from my text-blogs).
So, I continued with blogging without worrying about money, although not very regularly. But I kept on publishing some content here and there even when most of the bloggers I knew gave up and switched to usual social media microblogging.
Now, I am proud to say that I am still continuing. Writing and sharing means a lot. It makes one minutely better than those who don’t. Not everyone can write. Not everyone who can write is brave enough to share. So if you are writing and sharing, it adds a bit of flair to your persona. Also, this is always a give and take relationship. To write more, you have to also read more. Reading other blogs can give you as good an insight as a good book will.
As I have declared that I am going to blog regularly this year, I have already started to write daily since last 2 weeks. At least 6 people I know, have shared their intentions of starting blogs of their own. The main aim of this very post is that I want to help those who want to blog, but either doesn’t know how to blog or need a push to blog.
Here are some pointers which would help you:
Don’t worry about the readership or money. First, start a blog and write.
To start a blog, you can make an account on WordPress.com or Medium.com. These 2 are the most popular platforms nowadays. You can use tumblr.com or blogspot.com as well. Personally, I would suggest Medium because it is also a great way to start reading more.
What to write? It could range from your movie reviews to your travel experience, or something you know which you want to share with others, or some quote which you liked, or your opinion about a certain issue. You can write about your cat or you can write about how to file Income Tax Returns. One thing I know and have experienced is that writing can help you understand yourself better. By writing, you don’t react, you respond.
For your and anyone new who wants to write, sake, I have started a New Publication on Medium.com. On that, I would encourage everyone who is new to join. By doing so, we will create a small community of new bloggers. Whenever you think you have matured enough as a blogger, or have reached a threshold of say 10 posts, you are free to leave the community and carry on with your posts elsewhere. No hard feelings.
We can figure out moderation rules and stuff later. I just encourage you to jump in and start writing. Please drop a mail to [email protected] once you have set up your blog.
If we can start this community with even 5 people, your 1st blog will already have 5 new readers. We can encourage each other to write more. You encourage me. I will keep a check on your progress. What say?
For the above point, the link to the publication is this: https://medium.com/kycnow
Kickstart Your Creativity Now — A Blogging Space for New Creators
Mail me / ping me / talk to me and start with your first blog. Share the link with me and I can add you as a Writer on KYCnow. You don’t need to link your aadhar to be a writer, I promise even if the name is misleading. 🙂
Well, 2014 is over before you could even spell it out. It got over as quickly as your weekends get over if you sleep a little extra. Here’s my round up of 2014 just for the sake of documenting my life for future biography and also for blogging’s sake which I am continuing since last 7 years or so (Don’t know why).
I know you weren’t able to follow through on your resolutions, as always and same way, 2014 was quite an eventful year for me as well. I ticked off a few things from my bucket list as completed and deleted (moved into Sour Grapes Category) a few. Putting them into bullet points to make the post look longer and more readable:
This sums up the year 2014 for me. Let’s see what 2015 brings!
They say that Print is dying. Which is technically correct, print has always been dying ink onto paper. But sadly, digital media is actually killing the newspaper. Not because everyone now has a mobile phone with Internet and everything is available online easily. But because the quality of newspaper hasn’t increased much and admit it, it is difficult to hold while you are on a commode, unlike your phone which is so easy (until it slips from your hand and…)
The print is actually dying faster nowadays because new age websites which present content in lists and bullet points have become immensely popular. Their motive is to break down the story into 35 points or average IQ of the reader (whichever is lower) to make people understand the point the news is trying to make. Now since I am a very happy going (jolly?) and optimistic person, I don’t like to read sad news only. Enough of killing, corruption, crimes against women and hatred against creed, caste or religion. I expect a piece which is full of satire, wit, and name calling of anyone with whom I don’t agree with. So to find genuine humor in a newspaper, either you have to read a Hindi newspaper where all news items are deliberately presented with a headline which unintentionally sounds funny, or you have to find lighthearted humor pieces online.
Online there were funny blogs and funny columns. Then there were sites like Faking News and Unreal Times, to name a few, which were doing a fine job but their problem was that people didn’t read anything apart from first 8-9 words which happened to be their headline. But they surely had wit and good humor if not the best. Then in the last couple of years, new websites came up which you won’t believe, that they could blow your mind the next minute you log onto them. I wouldn’t share their URLs because hyper-linking is endorsement but I will give slight hints which might appear as Buzzfeed and their desi copy paste jobs like scoopwhoop, etc.
Ok, serious stuff from this line: These websites present comedy (and sometimes pictures from email forwards of the late 90s) with lists and have GIFs or just normal photos accompanying the 2-3 word text. This is because pictures are louder than words, we all know that and editorial quality of such websites is almost zero, why write text when you can post pictures. One of the common topics they touch is nostalgia by posting lists of 298 things you could do in the 90s but cannot do now. Or 85 radio advertisements which people miss nowadays because they don’t listen to the radio much. Or 36 types of people who are sexist because 24 hours a day they all talk about 36 sized people. But the lists and GIFs or normal pics with 28 pt sized text in Impact font with a stroke of 3 pts. are just for distraction. The best part about them are the headlines. These headlines might make you cry or blow your mind or make your limbs dysfunctional. The template for these headlines is so brilliant that it can never go old.
Now my point is that such websites are killing humor, shamelessly. They are making a reader keep his/her brain aside and laugh where they tell them to laugh. There is no subtle hidden humor which can make you smile. They have content which begs you to LOL by reminding you 25 things you might find funny but they aren’t but since we have added GIFs of emergency cute animals in them, they surely have become adorable.The reader doesn’t have to implement even a bit of the gray cell to read some genuinely good stuff which doesn’t accompany any picture. (like this text, hehe). The attention span had already taken a hit by those 140 character websites and now the sense of humor or the HQ or Humor Quotient has shattered into 128 pieces which got mixed with the brain which had blown a while ago. I tried giving them some attention but couldn’t laugh at it, in the same way, I cannot laugh at sitcoms which have a laughter track in them. Where are the good old pieces which tingled your funny bone and also shared the horrific news by mellowing them down to the level of humor? What happened to subtle humor which changed your opinion about things without making you go through pictures which take a huge amount of time to load on your mobile if you are inside a loo and you have only 2G?. I hope people move over these lists and come back to the real deal of text and larger attention spans. Amen.
So, if you didn’t read anything above since there were no bullet points or ordered lists, the summary is this: Humor is dying. (Same as the headline. Did it blow your mind?)
P.S.: My last post on this was an NSFW comic. I loved making it because it incorporated elements from few of my fav. web comics. Though, most didn’t understand that. Can’t blame because you like spending time on 9Gag more than the sites from where they curate stuffs actually.
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