I don’t even think this should be a question anymore. Everyone seems to be blogging about everything from where they’re spending the holidays to what they fed their dog last night. It’s the mundane, the interesting, and even the crazy. It’s easy, and it’s fun. People who always wanted to broadcast to the world what they’re on about, now can. Others who always wanted to write “The Great American Novel” now can. Anyone who ever wanted to put a commentary out there on something they’re passionate about now can. There’s no limit…not even the sky.
I heard it said years ago that email was the death of letter-writing. Well, I would venture to say that email probably did kill letter-writing to the extent that we no longer have need to write long letters to the folks “back home” and wait days (or even weeks depending on where you’re mailing it to) for a response. But then the Internet came along and gave us a new opportunity for writing. Blogs.
Blogs are a whole new form of communication – and I think a great one. They give us each a forum for saying what we want to say to anyone who cares to read. We’re not even limited any longer to only those who we have the email or physical addresses for. Not hardly. Now we can post updates on our lives and happenings that total strangers can stumble upon and take in.
Wow.
I mean seriously – if you think about the impact of this, it’s really astounding. Now granted, even I have a couple of private blogs that I keep just for those closest to me where I put details and thoughts that I just wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing with the world at large, but I love having a public blog where I can just go on about nothing in particular if I want (case in point, this entry). I also love my travel blog which enables me to keep everyone updated when I’m on the road (as I so frequently am) in a way that I never could have dreamed. There is just nothing like taking pictures at Machu Picchu and then being able to post them with my thoughts on the experience later that same day for everyone to see.
I guess I shouldn’t be so amazed by this…it IS “The Information Age” after all, but I think an advantage to being able to remember life without the Internet is perspective. Not that I don’t sometimes take it for granted – for example, when I find myself cut off for some reason, I seriously miss it, but generally this has become such a large part of our culture and daily life that I rarely experience total down-time.
Okay…I need to wrap this up for now. I desperately want to spend some time chilling out this evening, but first I need to try and get some stuff done…online, of course.
