When I first was told about blogs, they were described to me as an “online diary”, and to be honest with you, that didn’t seem to appealing to me. It wasn’t until I found anncoulter.com and davidlimbaugh.com, that I saw the full potential of blogs. So I ran and found a place to get a blog. I quickly found bravenet.com, and within a matter of minutes I had a full out political blog, and it was a blast! I quickly started improving and learning. Now that I look back I wish I never deleted that blog just so I could see how far I have come. It, most likely looked something like —this—. Why do I blog though? Well like I said, I started out with a political mindset, I wanted to “change people”. I wanted them to see my point of view and then agree with it. It was pretty much a one way thing. As I continued I began to see that it should be more like a conversation between me and the readers, so it began to slowly transform into what it is now. I now blog because I enjoy the interaction with readers, and I love to see myself get better. In fact I think that is my main goal, to better myself for the readers, I want them to enjoy this as much as I do. My inspiration has also changed, it started out as Ann Coulter and David Limbaugh, but now it consists of the likes of Ben Gray, Shawn Blanc, and Jesse Anderson. These people have phenomenal blogs, every time I visit their site I leave wishing I had the talent they had, I wish I could write like them. The changes I wrote about in earlier posts are all in effort to do just that, to get me as good as them. One day maybe I will be.
If you have a blog I would love to hear about why you blog and who are your inspirations?
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Well, I was similar to you, it never appealed to me. I only started using WordPress a few months ago but that was on a secure server (needed username and password to enter) and I never really got the true feeling of the blog… However once I decided to give it a go on my own domain I really got into it. As it stands I have been blogging for 2 months now and I have really enjoyed it so far.
In terms of inspirations I would have to say You, Nick and Nils from NDNL. The reasoning for both of these is because those are the first two blogs I took a real interest in. They are also the first two blogs which I subscribed to via feed, and my first ever comments on a blog were on yours and NDNL. I think both of you have great blogs and it would be nice, one day, to replicate what both of you have done.
Keep up the good work :)
hey, thanks Aidan.
Nick – Thanks so much for the accolades. I think you are right on the path to developing your blog into something that you and your readers find exciting and interesting.
You’re right on the same page with the series I”m doing now about Rock you blog. the main point of my posts will be to help each blogger determine what it is they want out of the time they invest into blogging and then make that happen.
- Shawn
Shawn that seems like a great series, I can’t wait to check it out! The more I think about it, it’s kind of like learning your “spiritual gifts” only with a blog. :)
Thanks fo the shout out! I’ve been blogging for a couple of years now andit has been quite a learning experience. Originally my blog was mostly just me posting links to videos or random other things I thought were funny or cool – not the sort of thing anyone would find interesting. =)
My main reason for starting Echo Faith was to plug into community. There were a bunch of graphic/web designers I highly admired that all blogged and I hoped I could get plugged into that same community. On the same token there were a lot of church planters that blogged and that was another community I was trying to plug myself into.
I don’t know if I’ve really successfully plugged into either but, like you, I’ve found that what I enjoy most is that interaction between people that read my blog and the constant effort to try to improve. Like you said, I want Echo Faith to be as enjoyable for the reader as it is for me.
It’s always good to hear that someone out there is enjoying my random ramblings… ;)
Oh, I love your “random ramblings”. Every time I go to your site I am sure to have some sort of fun, whether it’s a new video or graphic you’ve been working on, or it’s something you wrote.
but yeah, interaction, I believe, is what keeps me going. There are certain people out there that make this very amusing for me :).
Firstly just wanted to say I discovered your blog today via Ben’s site and it seems to be an interesting read, keep it up! (how patronising does that sound? sorry)
I’e been “blogging” for over a year now, but I still don’t really feel like I know why or what I want to achieve or say. I started because I saw blogs that looked so nice and I liked the design (Binary Bonsai, Shaun Inman, etc) and wanted something similar. But I never really knew what to write, and to be honest still don’t. I would love to do it regularly and actually get traffic to my site, but I get very little and it’s largely because I don’t know why I do it. I guess I need to find out what it is I want to achieve and go from there. It’s just the hard part in doing that!
Well, thanks for stopping by!! I know what you mean about not knowing what to write about. Recently I’ve decided to change the whole way I look at this blog. it used to be all politics and religion, now I decided it’s just going to be a personal blog and if I want to write about politics, I will.
Your blog looks good by the way!
Your blog actually inspired me to start one myself after I first came here and you asked if I had one. I’m a rookie for sure as far as blogs go, but I just started mine today on blogstream, I sent you the link by e-mail. After reading and responding to yours and visiting others, I realize that it is good to get your voice heard and to exchange ideas. It is also good for the mind and spirit to get what you are thinking out in writing and have people respond to it. I am very excited about it and thanks Nick for the inspiration.
Ed!!!!! I am so glad to see you got a blog. However, I can not comment over there because I do not have a blog with blogstream :( . I will be sending you an e-mail with some possible options for you.