Kim is a talented ceramist and is one of the people who I can turn to and talk about artistic process and that giving over of the part of the brain to creating work – even when it’s hard, especially when it is hard. She is very generous with her gift, sending presents, giving out ceramic beads to conference attendees for starters. She speaks her mind, in a time when I feel when although we celebrate ‘voice’ a lot of people feel silenced. I think that takes courage.
Kim can be found at Frogpondsrock; Facebook; Twitter
This is the last post in my series on personal blogging and I do hope you’ve enjoyed it, maybe learned a little or given stuff to take away and think about. This Q&A should’ve gone up yesterday, however I got a migraine and was too ill to look at a computer screen.
Regular blogging will resume next week, once the festival is over. A lot’s happened in eleven days!
What first brought the concept of ‘blogging’ to your attention? Do you remember the circumstances? Or even the first few blogs you read?
In 2006 I had a sticker on the inside of my fridge that read, I drink to make other people more interesting. When visitors would see that sticker they would smile at the joke they thought they were sharing with me, but in fact that sticker was telling my truth. I had felt like an outsider in my community for a long time and I was very lonely.
My daughter Veronica had started her blog Sleepless Nights in August 2007, and even though I didn’t have a clue what a blog was and secretly thought it sounded a bit rude, a bit like a German sex aid, I was captivated by the conversation happening in the comments section of her blog. Veronica set up Frog Ponds Rock for me in October of 2007 and I took to blogging with all the enthusiasm of a starving woman at a banquet.
In the beginning, did you ever feel that what you were doing was ‘weird’ or on the fringes? Did you get any negative reactions?
Oh yes indeed, blogging felt very weird. I blogged furtively and in secret for a few months but I am not by nature a secretive person and soon I was telling my friends and colleagues about my blog and all the fun I was having on the internet. Some of my friends were very worried that I was living in this strange online fantasy world that I had obviously made up as they knew that BLOG wasn’t even a real word. A well meaning friend sat me down and very earnestly explained to me that all these blogger friends of mine weren’t actually real, they were all hackers and perverts intent on stealing my identity. I listened to her very politely and then went back online.
Like any new blogger I was totally addicted to my online life and spent hours on the computer commenting away and reading the hundreds of blogs in my reader. My husband was very cross with me until I was nominated for Best Australian Blog in the Bloggies in 2010. He was suddenly very proud of me and in the interests of marital harmony, I didn’t dare tell him that internet awards are pretty meaningless, I just let him think that I was wildly successful.
What were the best things about the Australian blogging community at the time? What were the worst things (if any)?
The worst thing about the Australian blogging community in 2007 was actually trying to find an Aussie blogger. 90% of the blogs I read in 2007 were American or European blogs which was wonderful and shrunk my world considerably but trying to find women of my age that weren’t mummy bloggers was difficult.
When you look back at those early days – from 2012’s perspective – is there anything you miss?
I miss Plurk, a clunky social networking platform with a sideways scrolling interface that was a lot of fun.
In your opinion, is the blogging community better now… or just different?
The blogging community is very different now because it is growing so rapidly and the art of conversation seems to be dying. Facebook has trained us to just “like” something without having to put the effort in to articulate why we actually like or dislike an article. The sense of all being in this giant internet adventure together has faded and been replaced with a broadcast mentality.
The rising influence of bloggers also has brought about a concurrent examination of money and power. Is there too much emphasis on the latter? Or is it justified?
I would say that the blogging community is facing a lot of challenges brought on by the rapid expansion of the blogosphere, coupled with brands finally waking up to the fact that they have this whole new area to exploit. Blogging superstars are being created and along with this trend towards celebrity, a worrying culture of silence is also developing. I would liken what is happening to the blogosphere as what happens to a small country town when gold is discovered in the paddock behind the cricket club. There is an influx of newcomers keen to make a fast buck, fast talking entrepreneurs and developers materialise out of thin air, the merchants make a tidy profit, a lucky few strike it rich and the locals are left shaking their heads trying to sort out what happened to their town.
It is an interesting time to be in blogging that is for sure.
Will you ever stop blogging?
I don’t intend to stop blogging any time in the near future as I have far too much to say and some of my best friends live inside my computer.
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Other participants in this series are Allconsuming, Magnetoboltoo, Sleepless Nights and Stuff with Thing
