Mar 10
21
Why Keep Blogging? and other SXSW Takeaways
It’s clear that virtually no one earns a decent living off blogging, so revel in the liberty of being beholden only to your interests. And when that interest flags and you begin to repeat yourself, as Guy LeCharles Gonzalez forcefully argued, quit and move on to the next thing.
At a conference like SXSWi, that was a rare but incredibly valuable sentiment. The Web has been through so many iterations that we now take it for granted. In the advent of social media, bloggers seek to distinguish their thoughtful commentary from the chat junk pile of Facebook and Twitter.
There was a funny moment during our “Why Keep Blogging?” panel at SXSW Interactive last weekend, when the home page of this blog was up on the screen during my introduction, clearly showing my last post was over a month ago, on February 14th! Despite that awkward moment, the panel went pretty well and we received a fair number of compliments, both in person and on Twitter, which I was watching closely during the discussion, an absolute must nowadays.
[Check out two other write-ups of the panel by Magnet Media and The Gavin Show.]
The point I made “forcefully” that Miller was referring to was my belief the best blogs are driven by passion, not obligation, and that you can tell when someone is just feeding the machine to maintain their traffic, a la Seth Godin, for whom I often use the hashtag #bloggingtoohard.
The lack of activity here lately has nothing to do with a lessening of my passion for publishing and marketing, but rather a necessary redirection of that passion to Digital Book World, where I already posted my initial SXSW highlights last week and where all of my publishing-related writing lives these days.
When asked during the panel what was next for loudpoet.com, I didn’t have a clear answer other than to say whatever else I’m feeling passionate about at the moment, and I certainly left Austin (and San Antonio) feeling passionate about a number of things, including going back to visit both next year! I already have a few ideas for panel proposals — some specific to publishing, some taking a broader view of new media — and my poetry gig at Lupe’s Art Blend gave me a taste of that familiar adrenaline surge that comes with performing on stage.
Lupe's Art Blend 3/16/10 from Guy Gonzalez on Vimeo.
The next few months here will likely be kind of random as 110% of my energy will be going to Digital Book World, and I’m trying to catch up on some analog reading, too, as my to-be-read pile is spilling over with 2666, Oscar Wao, Finch and Steampunk (the anthology).
Plus, there’s my Tumblog, a new experiment I’ve started at Snake Oil Review, and a couple of poetry-related sekritprojects in the works.
If you’re still reading along here, thanks! I’ll be back!
