Monday, December 04, 2006

Spreading The Word

I’ve always enjoyed bloggin’. But, to be honest, it has never really worked out for me. A couple of years back I set up and maintained a LiveJournal blog. I really enjoyed the writing and publishing, but I was upset that I never received any significant amount of feedback. So, my blogging, at that point, was short lived. I truly enjoyed our blog requirement for 506, and I’m guessing this is because of the constant feedback that I received.

A big concern that I’ve had recently focuses around the question of whether I will enjoy continuing to blog. I’ve made another blogger blog so that I can rant about pointless things; although, I’m concerned if it’s going to be a long-living construction or not. This fact got me thinking… is there a way to network my blog so that I can get more feedback? Low and behold – there is!

I’ve signed up for blogexplosion. This is a site where you can register your blog(s) so that a mass of people will be exposed to it, and what you have to say. I’ve only signed up today, but I’m excited to see the outcome.

I would guess that this site would be something that high school students would not be able to participate in, right? My first impression would be that there would be enough feedback in the class blog without this application. But, I could also imagine how happy I would be, as an 11th grader, to see someone outside of the class comment on my class blog. Maybe it would even be someone of significance (like Will Richardson’s comment on Dave’s blog).

I haven’t had much time in a classroom, and I’m not sure of what the regulations would be. Any ideas?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ray, what a cool idea. Let us know how you do with your new network connection.

My experience is often access to blogs is restricted in schools. I know at Liverpool HS where I supervised today internet access still did not allow me to access the 506 or 374 blogs. A shame!!

I'm interested to see you returning to Alex's earlier post questions about what it means to be a blogger.

Alex Reid said...

Ray, I think building a community begins with thinking about ethos. What I mean by this is that you must begin by imagining the ethical obligations you have toward your audience and then seeking to meet those obligations.

Here are two examples:

1. Many of your prospective readers are also bloggers and/or readers of other blogs. Visit other blogs. Comment on those blogs. Write about other people's blogs on your blog. You might find that if you comment on my blog, I'm at least fairly likely to come take a look at yours.

2. Think about what you have to offer your prospective audience as a writer. People will come back to your site if you regularly offer interesting and/or usable content.

Good luck.