I was glued in front of the screen. My hands were getting clammy and a drop of sweat careened downward from my temple onto my cheek. It was at that moment that I understood fear. I saw despair and desolation. It came in the form of a blank page. What on earth do I blog about?
Blogging definitely is not what it used to be. The good ole days when people just blogged for the fun of it are gone. I mean if you really want that kind of thing just go on YouTube and watch vlogs (video + blog = vlog) right? It’s much more personal and direct to watch someone actually talk to you through the camera and basically talk about life. People used to do this with blogs but that was way before video and phone cameras. If video isn’t your thing then you can just post a pic of what you’re doing on Instagram. That works great too. You don’t need to think too much or compose anything but the perfect shot. I mean we all have friends who only post what they eat or when they workout. It’s cool.
The truth is that there are so many options out there for personal updates thanks to social media. In some ways the written word is more sacred than ever. When you blog, people expect more of you. They expect your content to be really good and informative. You can’t just slap together something off the top of your head or copy a bunch of sources. Not only will your readers notice but so will Google. You can’t get away with writing garbage. You can’t fool the internet that easily.
The barrier to writing is so much higher that it’s hard to really get into blogging. It takes a lot of effort and in many ways it’s much more depersonalized because casual visitors will expect something authoritative. Comments are also a mixed bag. For every genuine comment you might get on a blog there will be thousands of spam comments written by faceless bots or low wage workers trying to trick the author and other casual visitors into visiting a spam site. It’s really sad that there isn’t as much genuine interaction on blogs anymore and that people who blog need to fight tooth and nail just to keep comments clean.
I honestly don’t think that blogging is dead but it’s definitely a dying art from as our attention spans get shorter and shorter. I sat down to write something more constructive and useful but this is basically what happened. I hope to get back into some kind of blogging groove. I need to seek out bloggers in the fashion space for more daily inspiration though.
I’m not giving up! No, not yet. I need to blog.