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How can I stop being called a ‘blogger’?
Since 1996, I’ve written online. Sometimes it’s good and useful, other times it’s banal and mean, but the point is, lots of writing of words has occurred.
The thing called ‘blogging’ has undergone quite a transformation from its early days, when cats and cheese sandwich stories ran amok on the Web. To a certain extent, that kind of thing still happens. There are blogs for newspapers and blogs on topics and blogs everywhere for any reason, for any business model, for any purpose.
The idea is that of ‘voice’.
The label, though, is getting to me. It starts to feel a little sub-human. The fact that we like labels as humans isn’t a surprise to me, however. Look at how many address each other by the software they use. “Seesmicers” or “Youtubers” or “Second Lifers”.
The issue is jargon. My split life between alpha geeks and normal people shows this. I rarely hear about my ‘blog’ outside of the tech circles I live in– no, I hear about my site or ‘that piece you wrote on your site’.
By not being a ‘blogger’, I don’t for a minute think that I’m a journalist (don’t know if I’d ever want to be one), nor a columnist (which journo friends say I could be. Being called a ‘writer’ has a far more important vibe to it, perhaps the opposite of ‘blogger’, which seems to have a more amaterurish flavor about it.
I’m not necessarily the best writer of words, yet I’ve never expected to have ever written so many words. I want to get better, I want to learn skills of journalism and such. I just feel that label is more a curse than a blessing. While that mind sound drastic, there’s nothing unique about it anymore if everyone does it. (Which is my beef with social media not really being an industry if everyone supposedly does it– maybe we need a ‘breathing industry’?)
Anyway, I’ve think of this every time I look at my URL which has /blog in it. I think of this every time I hear something about ‘bloggers’, like those that can write and gain an audience are some weird breed of caged monkey flinging feces at the computer screen (lately though, well, yeah, you get the idea). I also have been deeply involved in many forms of online media at very early stages. Depending on who you ask, some would call me a podcaster, vlogger, blogger, and my absolutely least favorite, a Second Lifer. Why does no one call me an ‘XBOXer’ or ‘Playstationer’ or uh, yeah, you get the idea.
I’m not sure how to change this other than working as hard as possible to drop even the most gentle jargon. If I recall correctly, none of my podcasts ever had the WORD ‘podcast’ in it, to avoid the isolation that might inadvertently come if I pursued deals in mediums other than automatically-downloaded-media-files.
And out there, in scary, scary normal people land, explaining this takes time away from talking about content and talking about definitions.
How can I (or you) talk about the next great idea if we have to spend so much time explaining the lingo?
Anyway, these are my idle thoughts and musings for a warm Saturday afternoon. I have no bitchmemes to link to, I have no me-too comments. I just have this minor conceptual problem floating around in my head.
Maybe you do too?
Discussion
for “How can I stop being called a ‘blogger’?”
A dozen or so moths ago, I traveled to Öland, a small island south of Sweden. There I met a guy whose job, believe it or not, was that of a Minstrel. Not one of those colorfully clad losers you see at Ren Faires, no, he spoke no faux Shakespearean, and he didn't tell stories of Kings and Knights. Instead, he was the news, a constant source of new and old tales and stories, and he did what we all do - he remixed content he'd heard, adding his own narrative and observations, becoming a voice of his own.
Unlike the so-called A-List, this assembly of egos and headcases, he made an art form out of relaying information, taking pride in being a conduit, and inviting others to remix his works further, in telling those tales and news to whomever had not heard them or wanted to hear them again.
It is who we are, we remix information, add our own two cents, and hope, to some degree, that someone will find them interesting enough to remix them themselves and retell them, again adapted and injected with opinion and new knowledge. Say what you will, I like calling myself a modern versifier. It gets people interested and gives me a chance to explain more. Writer comes close, too. Maybe start calling yourself a Minstrel and see what happens :)
Eric, you crack me up. I think you are just suchan early adopter that when things start leaking into the mainstream, it signals you to move on. Or, in this case, 'up.'
I consider you a writer. Writer's write. To most 'normal' people, you are a blogger only because you write online and they don't have to pay to see what you write. Most people don't blog. Or write. Still, they like to be snotty about quality, and paying for something makes people automatically think it is quality.
Maybe you should start charging for subscriptions! You'd probably get HUGE.
The problem with being pigeonholed is that sooner or later, most of us get tired of being pigeons...
I know exactly how you feel.
Watch. Listen. Read.
How serendipitous. I recently addressed this same issue on Utterz. Find that post here: http://www.utterz.com/~u-NTA2MDQ2OA/utt.php#utt.... Long story short. I agree that blogging is simply a way that you express yourself. But what are we really doing with a blog? We're entertaining, educating, expressing an opinion, providing a service. That's what you really do. Blogs (and podcasts while we're at it) are simply methods of distribution via the web.
I started responding to you, but there was too much. I ended up posting it here.
This is the same reason I wrote the article "I am a producer, not a podcaster: a while ago. I prefer the more generic term. I also agree that I get tired of explaining what podcasting is. It does indeed take to long and detracts from the conversation.
Douglas
Being called a blogger in these times is a little like being called an "emailer."
Just take the word "blogger" and change it to emailer and people might just GET what we're talking about.
Blogging is ten years old. That's a long time to talk about something as being novel and emergent. Now it's just another content delivery form. That's it.
Selah, brother.