Wouldn’t ya just know it? I finally give myself permission to blog about whatever I want, whenever I want and I hear a rumor that blogging is dying out.
Recently, a friend of mine attended the Romance Writers of America (RWA) Conference in Atlanta and came home with a shocking statement from one of the workshop presenters: Blogging is dead. Not just dying, but already dead. Apparently, as writers, we’re not to rely on it for promotion, for building readership or connecting with our readers and so forth.
Um, hello. I have a personal blog and a group blog. My group hasn’t heard this rumor. So if not our websites and blogs, then with what should we use? Am I out of the communications loop or should I disregard this statement as only one opinion?
I searched the net using the phrase ‘blogging dead’ and came up with these:
Blogging is Dead (Again)… 2009
Hmm… Starting to see a trend here.
Why Blogging is Dead (Dec, 2012)… I’ll confess to not understanding most of what this article is talking about. I’ve never heard of the avenues with which she’s getting her blog to the world, but apparently it’s more high-tech than I utilize. Then again, I don’t even have a smart phone…yet.
Some of these articles talk about Facebook and Twitter utilization in lieu of blog posts. I’ve noticed a lot of writers are using Facebook to post pithy, newsworthy items, mentioning milestones in their careers, running contests and such all through their news feeds and Twitter streams. What do you think? Has that become today’s blog?
Has anyone else heard this rumor or think there’s any validity to it?
CAROL BURNSIDE / ANNIE RAYBURN 
I’m a fairly new internet user as of 3 years ago. I will never belong to Facebook. Remember the embarrassing results for some people when FB did the photograph thing two years ago? Zuckerberg isn’t making any money from me. I bookmark many authors’ sites and many blogs. I like my privacy what there is of it left. I don’t like censorship. A good example is Yahoo buying Tumblr last month and changing search algorythms so NSFW sites are invisible. This is in addition to WordPress regularly shutting people down. I did join LinkedIn but ‘connect’ on a limited basis and have not shared my contact list with them. I recently sent a protesting email to ESPN. If you want to comment on a sports log, you have to sign in with FB. Oh, yeah over my dead body!
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It’s the same with the NYT site. I had to sign in AND sign up for at least one newsletter (I chose one on books) to be able to comment on their articles. It amounts to holding us hostage.
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I signed up for several NYT newsletters a few years ago. What gripes me now is they count how many stories each month one clicks on and reads. After reading 10 in one month, you can’t read any more without signing up for a digital subscription. They started this policy about a year ago. Three or 4 months ago, I signed up for The Washington Post and they instituted a similar policy for $9.95 a month including mobile. I don’t have or intend to buy a smartphone but they don’t have a ‘basic’plan.
I get newsletters from politico.com which give me background on Congress. So far they are free. What I do occasionally with NYT and WaPo stories is google them to find other links.
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I don’t think I’ll ever have to worry about the 10 limit.
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