Why do we (I) blog?

Having just published a post on my exercise regime, and penchant for bollywood dance routines, I began wondering, WHY am I sharing this with the world? WHY do I want to? and come to think of it WHY do I blog? I even feel ‘bad’ when I dont update the thing regularly!

So, thinking cap on, as I cant sleep until I get to the bottom of this, we will start at the top:

I started because I felt I lacked external stimulation (translation: sad little bunny with no social life), I had just relocated 800 miles, and was stuck at home working on my thesis, probably THE most isolating task a person can do … you cant really strike up a conversation with your new neighbour along the lines of ‘do you think the supersymmentry breaking motivated small-field models of inflation will withstand the test of the B-mode satellite, or is your money on the large field models, and while we are on the subject do you think it is even worth building something so expensive which doesnt really add much observational scope to CLOVER?’ [here neighbour backs away slowly, never for a second turning their back on you, they enter their house, and lock the door] . I mean you could try such an approach, unless you wanted to make friends, and well while you are writing up, your research is about all your mind is full of! Also the forum I was a member of was stuck in a bit of a rut of tit-for-tat among the members, a -virtual- friend suggested I blogged, so I did.

Blog in place, and even though my social life took off, I became addicted to the adrenaline rush when someone comments… especially if they come back… considering anonymity of blogs means people are more honest, so when people said nice things about my blog it really fed my self esteem (translation: yay! they like something about me!). Also, in a ftf (face to face) conversation, we are never as articulate as we are when we write, we also need time to formulate an opinion/response usually by which time the conversation has moved on and returning to the topic makes you look obsessed. So that would be my third point, blogs are a great way to have deep discussions, without the tangential direction conversations usually take, without the ‘in your face’ emotions, with more thought going into it… and you can take your time to reply, i.e. oh My God I am so losing this debate, better get onto google and find ways of backing me up!!! sometimes even having your mind changed, or changing someone elses’, well optimisms’ still alive isnt it?

Ranting, lets face it a blog is one of the best stress relievers there are, mind you that only really works when you are properly anonymous, otherwise, well you are either careful or a total insensitive.

Getting a message out, in my case the Palestinian message, and even though there are many far superior blogs that deal with the topic, it makes me feel that at least I am doing something.

Online database of what interests you, a DB which you won;t lose or forget where you left it! So I may simply copy&paste an article I found interesting, this if often so that I can find it easily in the future.

Meeting new people, or more precisely people I would not usually meet.

This article on why people blog is rather good too, one of the points that he makes is really the reason is why I posted my last entry is

“Societal need to share. As a cynic who gets paid to write, I have a hard time with this explanation. But it seems some people genuinely like to “share,” and this is one way.”

That is me analysed, what about you? Why do YOU blog?

hmm, I see a tag marathon coming on… yeah, why not