What I learned from Blog Day 2005
What Blog Day 2005 Taught Me
[This post is a slightly revised version of my response to Paul
Woodhouse's comment in the topic thread of previous "Blog Day 2005"
post.
Reader comments are increasingly providing me platforms for subsequent
blog posts. Thanks everyone for your valuable and enriching comments
at my blogs.]
I observed the "A Listers" reaction to Blog Day 2005, where we were
all encourgaged, by an obscure blogger in Israel, to just list 5 good
blogs, hopefully from other cultures or industries, to recommend to
your own blog readers.
This went over like a lead balloon.
Hugh Macleod even did a little cartoon poking fun of the concept,
calling it organized "link whoring". Hugh is known for lambasting and
"roasting" via cartoons, and the objects of his comical "scorn" or
teasing are rarely offended, it seems.
Of course, I deposited a comment on Hugh's blog, correcting this "link
whoring" of Blog Day notion.
My comment explained that...
*clinking (clique linking)
*ghost blogging
* fictional character blogs (in most cases)
*buzz agenting (pretending to be a satisfied customer/user, then
posting rave reviews in blogs, forums, etc.)
...are unethical and ineffective "blogstitution", not Blog Day.
Blog Day is a way to help your readers discover new blogs, and to pull
us together as a blog realm. The blogosphere has many deadly enemies.
Let's all join forces in a united front to defend and protect our
beloved Kingdom of Bloggery.
It requires a bit of old fashioned humbleness to stop your own
grandiose posting and linking to consider lending a boost to some
little blogs, not "below" your exalted position in some silly
hierarchy, but below the threshhold of your readers awareness.
How many "A List" bloggers participated? A few. Some with genuine
benevolence. Some perhaps grudgingly or perfunctorily.
I sent out a stroke of midnight last call email to about 30 or 40 "top
tier" bloggers. I must credit Mike Bergin, of the blog 10,000 Birds, a
bird-lookers site, for emailing me and reminding me about this event.
Only a handful "A List" bloggers emailed me back to say thanks for the
heads up, and whether or not they'd participate in Blog Day 2005:
Robert Scoble (The Red Couch/Naked Conversations, Scobleizer)
Hugh Macleod (Gaping Void)
Karen Ruby (Karen Ruby)
Carrie Snell (Omnamaste/A Grain of Salt/Wrath of Grapes)
Robert May (Business Pundit)
David Weinberger (Joho the Blog)
Paul Chaney (Radiant Marketing)
John C. Dvorak (Dvorak Uncensored)
Greg Hoffman (Security Awareness for Ma, Pa, and the Corporate
Clueless)
Neville Hobson (NevOn)
Paul Woodhouse (Tinbasher)
John Battelle (John Battelle's Search Blog)
...either already knew about it, or scrambled to publish a Blog Day
2005 post on their blog, or emailed me to tell me it was too short
notice to do it justice, or promised via email to comply with it as
soon as they could.
If you check their blogs, you'll see that many did not do a "5
Recommended, Unexpected Blogs To Consider Exploring" type post on Blog
Day 2005, but that means they at least replied to me via email, or
displayed a Blog Day 2005 button.
Of course, unexpectedly, at the same time, Hurricane Katrina hit and
devastated a huge chunk of the USA, like a nuclear attack.
This horrid disaster sidetracked a lot of bloggers from previous
priorities, and rightly so. I just don't quite know what to say yet,
so I've not posted anything about this tragedy.
NOTE:
Also, I didn't email every single "A List" blogger, or ally blogger,
that I know of, and this was extremely short notice.
So please don't think that anybody not listed above must necessarily
be arrogant or uncaring about other blogs. That would be a gross
misinterpretation.
Paul Chaney deserves a lot of credit for replying to my email, and not
even mentioning the fact that, as I discovered when I visited his
blog, he is in the path of the Katrina hurricane, and has been
suffering power outages. That is a noble, selfless, altruistic
attitude of great merit metaphysically. Way to go Paul.
That little event of my email reminder of the Blog Day 2005 has
resulted in a "A List" of my own: bloggers who can see the struggling
"underlings" who are their brother and sister bloggers, and try to
lend them a hand, a boost, a promo.
Spend more time helping, posting comments at, and advising new
bloggers, obscure bloggers, worthy bloggers...
...who write profound, witty, sincere, funny, inspiring posts...
...and consistently, heart-breakingly, sadly get "0 Comments" at their
blogs, but keep on, bravely, blogging.
I dearly love those souls. What a great model of perseverance and
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