The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Blogging

How Often Do We Need To Post?

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I put the question mark at the end of the headline for the sole purpose of attracting attention as I think more people will come visit than if I don’t use it.

Been blogging for about 19 years now and if I am not mistaken been at this particular location since about 2010.

I imported most of what was written elsewhere so this serves as a pretty good collection of things I have written but it is still incomplete.

Don’t write here as often I as I used to but it is very important to me for multiple reasons and it is absolutely the first self-hosted blog I ever had.

Since I got into the game earlier than many and built up a decent reader base I don’t have to post every day to maintain traffic but there is no doubt it is nothing close to what it once was.

That is ok with me and I am not sure if I could get it back to that level even if I wanted to. It is not because of an inability to push multiple times a day or even daily because if I wanted to it would be easy.

But because there are 10 million other distractions now.

When I started there wasn’t any competition from Twitter, Facebook, Medium, Pinterest, YouTube, TikTok or so many other content providers and news sources.

Comment sections were wildly active and if you put a little effort into engaging with others online you could build your own community.

It is much harder to do that now, though not impossible.

news typewritten on white paper
Photo by Markus Winkler on Pexels.com

The Answer Is:

The answer for me is to post as often as it feels comfortable, reasonable and important.

I write here less than before because of time constraints and focus on other things and because some things get different coverage than they do elsewhere.

There is nothing I couldn’t cover in these other places because semi-anonymity means recognizing that some people know I am not Bruce Wayne or Clark Kent in real life.

Not all of them would recognize me on the street but they know me and plenty who know me in the important ways do too.

Writing is a profession, hobby and tool for my sanity. Sometimes it is nice to blow off steam and mull over thoughts and feelings in print in a place where I am less likely to be challenged and questioned.

Not afraid to be challenged or questioned on almost anything but if I am writing it down here chances are it is because I am working on something.

If I want or need someone to know my thoughts and feelings you can be assured I will find them and make sure they know it.

You can’t do what I do and be shy.

****

Anyhoo, the real purpose of this post is tied to the headline and that is to say you ought to post as often as it serves the purpose of your blog.

If you are interested in building a community, acting as a brand ambassador and or anything related you probably need to be consistent.

Or at least consistent enough that your target audience knows how often to visit to receive new content.

BTW that Golda Meir quote is a personal favorite and a reminder to myself that no matter how good I think I am not everyone will see me that way.

Blogging brought that to the forefront to me because I have seen some very popular blogs that I thought had awful content.

Used to make me crazy to see some of them do so much better when I knew my work was better. Might have some typos and errors in it but it wasn’t riddled with crap.

But I learned that sometimes there are other things and some had it where I didn’t. Just part of life.

 

When Civility Is No Longer Warranted

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The man told me it is ok to agree to disagree and I said he was dead wrong.

Why?

Because he told me Sandy Hook was fake and spouted three other ridiculous conspiracy theories.

“There is a moment when civility is no longer warranted and it starts now. I will not let you push offensive knowledge that isn’t based upon fact or rational thought as if we are having a simple disagreement.

This is not you and I debating whether you can put ketchup on a hot dog or if chunky is better than creamy.

If you believe Sandy Hook is fake, that the earth is flat and that nothing happened on January 6th you are delusional and in need of help.”

They pushed back and said I had been taken in by propaganda.

I refused to listen and said it was convenient to say that anything you dislike is fake and anything you agree with is factual.

“Toddlers do that. I am ok with two and three-year-olds figuring out what is real. That doesn’t extend to adults who push the lies you are trying to.

It is not only offensive it is dangerous to let idiotic claptrap be pushed out as having some sort of science or peer-reviewed support when no such thing exists.

There are some things upon which there is no room for disagreement and this is one of them.”

Unexpected Guests

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Sometimes our cyberhomes receive unexpected guests and we celebrate their arrival because their presence adds to the overall experience.

Sadly the converse is true and sometimes we receive guests we prefer not spend time with us.

There are steps we can take to help encourage them to haunt a different home but they are not always as effective as we might like.

The latter is where things are at so I am thinking about borrowing SQ’s giant black purse so that I can provide both digital and physical motivation to go.

But then again might not have to do so given that some visitors have provided more details than they might wish.

Funny how you can point out time spent on frivolity instead of work and suddenly get people whipped into shape.

Pressure and motivation come in multiple forms. 😉

The History Of A Girl’s Life

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Today was the last day of school for a high school senior who calls me father. Ok, that is not the term she uses for me but it is accurate because I am her father.

I started blogging while she was what some would call In Utero and given it won’t be long before her 18th birthday rolls around it occurs to me I really have been doing this for a while.

In many ways this blog in all its aspects (blogger and self-hosted) is the history of a girl’s life. It is not what you would call chapter and verse but it is not supposed to be.

Many of the best and or most interesting stories have been left out because she deserves to build her own digital footprint and because I don’t have ownership of it all anymore.

There are multiple boundaries that I try to be cognizant of because in the world she is growing up in it is not uncommon for people to search for information about others. Some of her friends have found bits and pieces of things and we have had discussions about that.

It is strange sometimes to realize how much of a life she has that I am barely aware of. Makes sense because it was the same when I was her age, but still surreal in a way.


Conversations

The time of her living at home on a full time basis is coming to an end and so I find myself trying to engage in more conversations about multiple topics.

We talked often before this time arrived, but something about it has pushed me to try to cram more in.

Pushed me to reiterate lessons I hope she has learned and information that may not have sunk in because she was younger when she first got it.

I recognize in many ways she is who she is and that if her character isn’t of a certain nature already it is too late.

The good news is I am pleased and proud with and of who she is but it doesn’t mean there is no interest in a gentle push here and there

I shared the Ben Franklin quote above with her and she asked what point I was trying to make.

“Lots of people will try to motivate you to do different things with quotes from famous people. Lots of them won’t ever have given any thought to what the quote means or what context it was originally given in.

Never stop thinking and don’t let people tell you that rights that have been held by all Americans for decades ought to be adjusted just because a minority dislikes them. What we give away cannot aways be taken back with any sort of ease on both large and small scale.”

****

She sat with it for a while and then I told her she could take it solely on a political level or she could see an application on a personal level too.

There might be better quotes and or better ways to drive home the points I want her to take but there isn’t time to get too deep into searching for them and that is ok.

It is surreal to think she is almost on her way out of here, the baby isn’t a baby anymore.

Yesterday she was in preschool and I was so much younger myself. Today we are both far older and tomorrow, well we’ll leave tomorrow where it is as it will come soon enough.

How To Define A Dying Blog

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“Jack, is your blog dying, or is it dead?”

I asked the writer of the email how to define a dying blog but I didn’t get a response to the question I asked.

Heck, I didn’t get a response or any indication they received it, not even a remark about how annoying it can be to answer a question with another question.

We could build a 1000-word post on this without much effort and could probably go deeper but there is no interest on my part.

I am on vacation and if the subject doesn’t move me I don’t intend to move. Nonetheless in this circumstance, I am prepared to share a few thoughts.

A blog doesn’t have to have to comments to be considered a living blog, just new posts or comments that advance/continue the discussion on old posts.

You don’t need a specific editorial calendar or schedule of new posts either. You just need to update it periodically and voila, the blog is a living thing.

The mighty JackB isn’t dead though you could argue it has periods of semi-hibernation compared to what it used to be.

If you keep visiting you’ll keep seeing new posts and various changes that could include a resumption of a daily or weekly update.

Remarks of my death, the JackB are greatly exaggerated.

Five Minutes Of Writing

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Got five minutes to tell you about how I started this blog as a self-hosted venture that was designed to take my Blogger blog into a more professional setting.

Had no idea what it would become or where it would go but the Shmata Queen told me she thought I was a fine writer and that I was making a mistake by not working with my gift.

Wasn’t certain I agreed with her about having a gift because I never thought much about my writing compared to others.

Figured I wasn’t as good as some and better than others. Based upon some nonscientific gut feelings and some awards I won for pieces I wrote elsewhere.

Never worked hard on trying to take this to the cliche people call Next Level because if I had I would have done things differently than I did.

Would have spent more time trying to produce the kind of content that resonated with many instead of a few.

It would have built a bigger readership and led to more opportunities

Did ok for myself overall and well, here I am 18 years later still writing, but not like I used to. Too many things going on in too many places so this one doesn’t get the coverage it used to.

Can’t say it will stay like this or not, life has shown me things change and not on our schedule.