Blogging Ethics
If you Google "pish tosh," my blog is now the first thing that comes up.
My blog didn't use to show up on Google at all.
I have also just discoverd that if you Google "narrative blogging," the first thing that comes up is this entry from jill/txt.
And the second and third things that come up are two sites linking back to my own post on narrative, blogging, and reality.
I'm thinking about these "milestones" alongside thinking about the "ethics" of blogging. I have noticed that bloggers (I read) are often vigilant about responding to comments. Especially to new commenters.
And I was thinking that I was feeling guilty about not yet responding individually, even if only briefly, to the thoughtful comments on my post about being divided .
And I was thinking that I resented feeling guilty. Because feeling guilty is my whole problem right now.
And blogging is in some ways a "for me" venture, and as such is, I thought as I got into it, something that would free me from obligations, rather than entangle me in additional obligations.
However, at the same time, I love receiving comments, and I love commenting on other's blogs. And I like it when my comments are acknowledged by the blog author. Because one of the best things about blogging, to me, is the evidence that others are engaging with my ideas, thoughts, my narrative spin.
So I value the social and community aspect of blogging. I like participating in the community. But I don't like feeling guilty, or feeling that if I'm not up to responding I may offend or put off those who stop by... or that I will risk losing readers, because I confess I want some readers.
So, some meta-questions for the blog world:
1) At what point does my participation in and enjoyment of the benefits of the community of bloggers entail my responsibility to that community, over and above my personal desires and idiosyncrasies?
2) Or does the unformulatedness (to coin a word) of blogging mean that I can use it as I want to, dipping into the benefits, yet escaping obligatedness when I need to?
Into this mix come the comments on a whole other different kind of site which I was reading. The thread in these comments pursues a different set of concerns than those I'm discussing here, yet tucked into one of the comments is this sentence:
Or, as with so many Confessional Blogs of Anonymous Young Faculty (you know the genre), are commentary spaces only for therapeutic conversations?
While I think this commenter raises fascinating questions about responsility in blogging, I choke on that word, "only."
3) What's going on when people write sympathetic comments on each other's posts? Is it required, necessary, community building? Is it "mere" participation in a support group?
4) If you're in the group, are you required to signal your continued presence by commenting on each post?
5) Can "therapy" also be "scholarly"?
I know that for me the writing of rants does stand in for therapy, since I'm still looking for a therapist and still figuring out if I can pay for one. But because many of my posts are "confessional," does that make mine a "confessional blog"? Why not a "scholarly blog" or a "meta-blog," since I also write posts like this one?
I think I've mixed together a bunch of questions right now. But I guess I'm interested in 6) whether blogs are in fact divided into implicitly codified genres, recapitulating the "divides" between "disciplines" that give so many of us trouble?
7) And if blog "genres" exist, do the genres come with distinct sets of expectations?
8) And can/should we actively work against those expectations?
(And remember this post about who blogs what and why? Long-ass comment string but it would be interesting to see it worked up in chart form or something. )
***
I think there's an article in this stuff, people. Wait: maybe I'll write it myself.
posted by Evie P. @ 2:35:00 PM
13 Comments:
It's funny that you should mention this, because I actually spent two hours last night trying to get my blog to appear in a google search. And it is seemingly impossible. I even searched long passages from my posts, and nothing. Tony is popular on the internet, but my version is invisible. Is this unethical? Shouldn't all bloggers want to read about Tony? Am I not invested enough in the community to reap the benefits? Google can do ivy league libraries, but google can't do me. Someone should do me. Especially if blogging is as self-indulgent as I suspect, more people need to indulge in my self.
...oh, and another thing. Was I being sincere? Was that last post ironic? Am I starving for attention? And more importantly, are you?
It should also be noted that when one searches google for blogs and pizzicato five, an interesting (and seemingly abandoned blog) appears that was written by a lovely transgendered person who seems to know a lot. If she knows so much, shouldn't she be expected to continue blogging?
I -am- starving for attention.
Tony, I think the trick is linking to other people. Doesn't Google work partly by analyzing how many links there are between your site and other sites? So link to other people, and get them to link to you.
I'll update my blogroll soon and you'll be on it.
O yeah, not that I know anything about Sitemeter yet, but from what I gather, when you link to someone else's blog from yours, it shows up on their tracking software if they have any. And so then they go, oh, who is this Tony person who linked to me? And then then click and find out.
Dunno if this is entirely on-topic, but I find the dismissive tone people sometimes take towards "confessional" or "therapeutic" blogs annoying. I think part of what happens on academic confession blogs, anyway, is an uncovering of the unspoken truths about academe--not that these are the only truths, but there are a lot of things we pretend to believe, and unless people acknowledge that those things aren't really the case, it's easy to feel really paranoid and isolated. So yeah, it's community-building, but there is also a sense of a wider audience and an implied discussion and theorizing about academia, professionalism, the myth of individualism, meritocracy, the whole work/life "problem," the alienation of labor, etc.....
Just depends on whether you prefer to talk about that shit in the abstract, or through metaphor and anecdote. IMHO.
On the question of comments, I'm easy. Sometimes I respond, sometimes not, as it strikes me and as I'm procrastinating... sometimes I check for responses to my comments, and sometimes I forget...
Guess my commenting promptness today might out me as sad/obsessive, but some first thoughts:
Wolfangel, you've kind of raised another point for me. I've seen your name over and over in fascinating places but _I've never visited your blog_. (I'm going to now, though.) This is entirely coincidental: sometimes I have time and inclination to follow up on links; sometimes I don't.
Dr. B., thanks for what you said about modes: the "abstract" versus the "anecdotal" for example. I do think that language gets deployed in different ways in these modes (which can variously hide or highlight political assumptions). But I agree with (what I think you might be saying), that THESE ARE ALL FORMS OF ARGUMENT. My rants and anecdotes? They are (in my mind) directly engaged in argument, especially in the argument of what "counts" as a viable political response to questions of public and private, or something.
I love about "academic" blogs that (through memes, photos, etc) expectations can get turned on their heads, that hierarchies are upset. Yes. I am a person who thinks about My Little Pony and the meta-ethics of blogging in the same hour. THESE ARE BOTH IMPORTANT. I am not willing to say one is more or less important than the other.
This reminds me of the wise words of a wonderful man who said, "God made a lot of blogs, but he only made one Tony." That's right folks, be the first on your block to join the Tony Wears a Tux international fan club. I was and it changed my life. I used to be sick, but now I am healed. And it is easier for me to color coordinate.
I've had this anxiety - not only about responding to comments but about regularity of posting, whether I was interesting enough, etc. Ultimately, though, fuck it - it's just not worth the energy of worrying about it (a) and (b) as long as people are reading then I'm not going to stress out about what is (for me) a way of relieving stress (and procrastinating).
To try to answer your questions:
1. I think the answer to this is the same in day-to-day life. I feel more responsible to people that I "know" better in the blogosphere than people I don't. Right now, you're just starting out but as you go on perhaps you will feel more compelled to comment/respond, just as when you enter a new social group you might not immediately call a person back whom you've just met.
2. You can totally use it as you want to. I will say this, though: without some consistency people might stop coming to the blog and so it might not be what you want it to be if you ignore comments for a long time or fail to post regularly (no evidence of this, but this is my fear).
3. I like to think that people are really genuinely sympathetic. Otherwise, why bother commenting? It's not like it's required. Also, I don't think of it as a support-group thing. There's just something so negative about thinking about it that way somehow....
4. I don't comment on every post I read. I comment when the mood strikes me or when I feel like I've got something to contribute. (Or if people ask direct questions :) )
5. Why can't it be, would be my question.
6/7/8. I hate this whole thing about genres. Prof. B, Profgrrrl, and I started our blogs right around the same time, and before them I only knew of Invisible Adjunct and Barely Tenured as "Confessional Blogs of Anonymous Young Faculty" (and by the way, why does that term piss me off?)... I guess what I'm saying is that when I started I didn't think that I was conforming to the demands of any genre - I was finding my own voice in the blog and that was part of why I started it and why I found it interesting. If I'm considered to be part of a genre now... well, I feel like it would be weird to change the blog just to not be but I don't know. I feel like putting us all in the confessional ghetto is kind of fucked up. I read a lot of blogs like mine in that they are pseudonymous/talk about the personal and the professional, but I really don't think that we're all the same.
Ok, I babble. Enough for now :)
Like Dr C, I hate the whole genre thing. Why do I have to be this or that? Why can't I just be what I want to be? Isn't it bad enough that my journal articles have to fit a particular structure? Must my blog as well?
I feel like a selfish blogger. I blog when it is useful, for a host of reasons. Same for commenting.
I feel a sense of community here. Living alone for the last 16 months I've thought to myself "gosh, I could just disappear and no one would know for days" ... but now I think people would notice. And I like that. It is helpful to get feedback on problems I'm dealing with, to hear alternate perspectives, to share joys and frustrations and not feel isolated in an experience ... all of these are great reasons to blog and can be focused on either professional or personal issues.
I'm kind of going on a tangent, here, I think ... but I'm a selfish blogger/commenter, so who cares :)
And now I'm going on a trip. To the grocery store.
But interesting questions that you raise. I'm sure I'll continue to ponder them.
"1. I think the answer to this is the same in day-to-day life. I feel more responsible to people that I "know" better in the blogosphere than people I don't. Right now, you're just starting out but as you go on perhaps you will feel more compelled to comment/respond, just as when you enter a new social group you might not immediately call a person back whom you've just met."
Dr C, this makes sense. I'm going to try to think about this kind of "compulsion," and the way it might differ (if it does) from the "guilty" kind of compulsion.
Profgrrrl, I feel like you do, about "why do I have to belong to a genre," etc. I guess I wonder to what extent the implied genre might have to do with what and how I post things though, even without me being conscious of the influence. I mean, since I kinda declared mine an (at least partially) academic blog... does it mean (unconsciously) I'll pitch things a certain way?
This could be good and bad both, I suppose.
Dammit, I was all sure I knew what my dissertation was going to be about and that it wasn't going to be "about" genre but I'm obsessed with the question.
oops. obviously comment that was me, Blurt.
oops again. What am I, drunk?
Coming to this late, but I had to laugh b/c I thought I was the only one who obsessed about comments etc. Sometimes (b/c I have bloglines going, like, ALL THE TIME) I find out right away when someone has posted something, and I read it, and I want to comment, but I think, "I should wait a little bit before I comment, so I don't look like I was just sitting here waiting for whoever to post, and so I don't freak them out by being a comment-stalker, commenting within seconds of their post." Kind of like you can't pick up the phone on the first ring or you look like a loser who's just sitting by the phone waiting for someone to call.
Okay, I realize that worrying about that is just lame...
I comment a lot. I don't think any comments are required but I do feel an obligation to comment on certain blogs regularly because I have done so for a while and I don't want people to think I don't care anymore (god this is sounding very high-school-girl-ish). In a way, I want to comment so that the authors know I'm reading and appreciating their posts, so they'll be encouraged to continue posting, b/c I want to continue reading! Conversely, thouh, I don't feel that way about comments on my own blog - no one is/should feel obligated to comment unless they find a post interesting/thought-provoking/stupid/whatever (except I have to confess that occasionally if I put a lot of effort into a post and get very few comments I am a little disappointed - am turning into a total comments whore...).
Then there's a set of blogs that I read but rarely comment on. (I read WAY TOO MANY blogs.) These are either things outside my area of expertise (a couple of science blogs), or like wolfangel mentioned, blogs that either don't have comments, or have SO MANY that mine are never going to be noticed/add anything new.
The genre thing is frustrating. I pretty much never talk about my own specific research, but I do talk about teaching and the state of the profession, and also about my own life. I started blogging to join a community and get support as a young academic, but I don't think therapy and scholarly have to be separate (I love Prof. B's comments on subtext along these lines). I'm extremely anecdotal but I like to think that doesn't mean I'm just shooting off my mouth with nothing useful to add (of course y'all may disagree... ;-D). I think my biggest problem with blog "genres" is that the people who are trying to codify/genre-fy blogs always seem to try to categorize what I do in opposition to/in absense of what they do, and that pisses me off. I'm doing what I do, and it doesn't have anything to do with other people's ideas of what is and isn't a "scholarly" (or "unscholarly") blog. Hmm, have no idea if I was going anywhere further with this....!
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