molly.com
Saturday 5 January 2008
Twitter Sucked the Blogging Out of Me
I often post pictures and words about weather. Bits of me here and there. Then, somehow, Twitter sucked the blogging out of me. Made me write in 140 characters less.
People ask “why don’t you blog so much anymore, Molly? Is it your work?”
Nah, it’s Twitter. Sucked the blog out of me in 2007.
I’m almost ready to make 2008 Twitter-free.
Close to making it IM-free too.
How about you?
Filed under: community, molly asks you, policies, pop culture, society, software
Posted by: Molly | 16:18 | Comments (49)
Would be sorry to see fall off IM, but understand. I’ve just done the social network clean up too.
Looking forward to you blogging more though.
- Neil.
That’s actually something that I’ve noticed recently and have thought about. I think it’s important to find a good balance between the tweets and blog posts. You can always write a 140 character blurb about something, but it’s great to expand on that on your blog. Twitter and blogging could potentially compliment each other quite nicely! Besides, I’ll miss your tweets! =)
I’ve never had time to twitter… i hardly get away with constant blogging
oh i so wish i had invented twitter…
For me, 2008 will be as Twitter free as 2007 was.
The first thought I had about Twitter when it became popular, was “why would I Twitter when I can blog”, and I suspected that Twittering would take time and energy away from blogging. So I just didn’t Twitter.
To me, blogging is about writing what comes to mind, and if you already Twittered it, there’s nothing left to blog.
You are the first Twitterer I see that came to the same conclusion, and I hope you manage to quit the habit
I think you have to find a balance – the feeling of connectedness with my far-flung peeps that I get from Twitter is not something I would want to give up. The trick is to know when to tweet and when to blog. Then you can tweet about your blog – hey, that’s where I saw this
I avoided Twitter like the plague last year, and I’ll do it again this year, and the next, and so forth. Why? Mainly because I can’t stand the name “Twitter” and the “word” tweet. I’m sorry, but if I wanted to vomit upon seeing the abuses of the English language that Twitter happens to be (in my opinion), I’d, ugh never mind.
But then again I’m not suicidal either.
I blame my own lack of blogging squarely on my being too busy all the time, and Twitter has filled in the gap lately.
Hey Kay!
http://twitter.com/meyerweb/statuses/490683462
Hey, I just checked out twitter to see what it was, and you are on the front page. It says “mollydotcom wishes she could sleep … recovering from trauma. 2 days of d… web.”
While this is (arguably, and/or probably) not my wisest statement: I simply don’t see the point with Twitter.
140 characters is not enough for a coherent expression to describe a smile.
Carolyn Ann
After almost a year of not blogging (for reasons which, um, I guess I’ll have to blog about at some point … ha ha HA!) I finally joined the Twitter party in December.
I didn’t know what to expect at first, but I’m starting to find Twitter to be rather liberating.
Perhaps it’s because I’ve been away from blogging for so long, but I’m enjoying the stream of consciousness vibe. The text limit forces me to get right to the point. That’s not to detract from a well crafted blog post (no matter what the length). It’s just a different mode.
That same text limit makes it a no-brainer to chime in from anywhere, if/when the moment strikes you.
Then again, perhaps this is just an adjustment/honeymoon phase. I like Kay’s takeaway: “The trick is to know when to tweet and when to blog.”
You and me both. Not long after I started using Twitter I realized that it basically killed my blogging–which was tenuous enough to begin with.
Totally agree, like twitter satisfies that blogging desire. Very strange,
hmm I have the reverse effect… I would say that twitter has in some ways given me more blog posts than I have time to produce them.
Mind you a do use Twitter as a test forum for the blog topic allowing my ideas to formulate and then solidify for the blog post. There has been times when a twitter conversation or link has lead to complete blog post.
I have found that I post less on forums than I used to. I also read less feeds in full.
@kay Yes that is correct it’s all about balance. When the item is good as a tweet and when it is good as a blog post.
These comments are actually very interesting. People love or hate twitter – that’s what makes something great as opposed to good. If everyone loved it then it wouldn’t last. If everyone hated it we wouldn’t have heard of it. By being like Michael Jackson (or dare say Paris Hilton – as it was her the marketing truth was discussing) the cycle perpetuates back and forth between both groups… love / hate.
Now if I could only be savvy enough to come up with an idea for a truely love / hate product this year
I haven’t got a clue what Twitter is supposed to be and I’ve stopped blogging at the end of 2007, since blogs are so 2005. I’ve also stopped taking pictures.
I’m experiencing a word and photograph overload and everything starts to sound and look alike. I can hardly distinguish pictures from London, Barcelona or Copenhagen anymore, but when you drop me blindfolded in a city, I can tell you where I am from the vibe of the place. So, if anything, I’m more for experience in 2008 and bring the web back to what it is supposed to be in my opinion: a great source of information, not 140 word ramblings on your cat being sick this morning.
@Martijn
You stopped blogging, yet you still take the time to read blogs
I don’t know…to me it’s like saying you’ll only talk on the phone instead of writing a letter. It’s not all or nothing. There are appropriate times for both, and the key as many say, is finding that balance.
For me, I find that Twitter helps me to get clarity and focus on an idea. By the time I’m ready to blog in long form about it, the post is better than if I danced around it with shorter posts first.
Yes, Twitter has changed my blogging but I feel that what I do blog is generally of a higher quality than before. Less is more?
Don’t know a damn thing about Twitter except that the name sort of makes my skin want to crawl as far as it applies to social networking. Instant messaging’s only practical use, for the most part, has been for flippant onliners. Even when used, or attempts at use, for technical or professional communication, its use, for the most part, is extremely limited. Even at its best, the speed of thought far outstrips the speed to keyboard.
The biggest problem with social networks and what is obviously the seductiveness of the venue is in its limitations and people’s desire to interject three dimensional human interaction into a linear medium and how the human mind, too often, extrapolates what is written and creates an emotional mess or, at least, incorrect assumptions made. Expectations of Internet communication need to be ratcheted down in terms of social networks. People are not linear.
As far as blogs, they provide a forum for thought, at least the technical and professional blogs/forums. For more general blogs/forums and if such represent a cross section of humanity, I quite frankly wouldn’t be surprised that if “God” read those that he/she/it would immediately vaporize the planet and start over.
Holzschlag, as far as your blog, I am always amazed and appreciative that you have let me in considering my propensity for flippant one liners, sarcasm and warped sense of humor. Your willingness to share your humanity always amazes me. Personally, I would gnaw off my damn leg before doing such a thing. [Oops. That flippant one liner thing.] I have learned much from you and from the participants of your blog, as well as from other technical blogs. I am grateful for that.
[...] molly.com » Twitter Sucked the Blogging Out of Me (tags: twitter blogging) [...]
It’s reading twitter that I find sucks my time. Perhaps if I could just get a relevant digest every day it would work better for me. But then, I haven’t blogged regularly since 2001, so there must be some other reason as well
I’ve always avoided Twitter and since I’ve been at uni, their crappy packet filter has been blocking my use of Pidgin, so I can’t use IM either. I haven’t missed it.
Molly, come back to IM now. I beg you. You know I wouldn’t say that without truly meaning it. Oh, and I’ll post something more relevant later.
I agree with Gary in how Twitter complements blogging rather than replaces it. I’ve come up with ideas not blog-worthy that have been discussed on Twitter, or thoughts I’ve had that I’ve sought for assistance on Twitter rather than blogging about it … and if a discussion on Twitter spills out onto my blog because I’ve found clarification of thought on Twitter then so be it.
Twitter has sucked my time, sure – but I have no plans to drop it; it’s too valuable to me.
Just. Unplug.
and the world feels so much better.
I think this is an interesting and well argumented opinion on why twitter might suck more than the blogging out of you
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2007/03/is_twitter_too_.html
Dubost wrote:
You hit the nail on that head.
Am I starting to see some active social involvement from the W3C with that statement and the following?
http://www.w3.org/QA/2008/01/open_data_you_and_me.html
If so, give ‘em hell and thank you.
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Molly: Hey, you’ve become a Microblogger!
I don’t Twitter as I just don’t need another online app in my life (what the hell would I write on it anyway? It would be pointless! Haha!)
I’m sticking with the blog on my site because it involves writing articles, which require a bit more substance. Microblogging (such as Twitter and Tumblr) with it’s ease of posting short messages, really benefits individuals who use mobile/portable devices to regularly connect to the Web, and as I don’t do either – there wouldn’t be much point me having a Twitter account (I don’t see the sense in being a Desktop-Twitter User!)
I’m not ‘Anti-Twitter’ though, I mean, it is obviously very popular for good reasons….it’s just not for me.
I don’t know. I see twitter as a collective IM, a replacement for IRC, in a way, especially when you work in a company whose intranet-internet behaviour is Fort-Knox-like.
In the end, is blogging per se important?
Either you want to say things and you write your thorough thoughts on it, in blog form or article for a magazine (online or otherwise), or you want to throw an idea to the crowd, or want to vent out, or want to have a one-minute piece of fun with online friends and you use twitter or email.
I’m considering dropping all the social service stuff, and twitter would be part of the deal. But actually I’ve found that when I don’t use it I don’t miss it, and when I use it I do enjoy it.
It’s a balance. Pairing it with my gtalk account means that I’m either all-IM (twittering and gtalking with several people at once) or no-IM-at-all when I forget to launch gtalk.
Oh, and as Karl said, a bit of fresh air helps a lot.
Let us not forget, too, that sometimes we don’t need to blog. We just need to open a good bottle of wine, have a nice drink and breathe. Simple as that.
My rule of thumb: work is an effort enough in itself, so if my blogging is an effort I won’t do it. If I get more pleasure from something else, then I don’t blog.
(And to end on a personal note: my 2007 was too busy organising a conference, I didn’t take time for myself. This 2008 year is going to be about recentering)
[...] As January rolls forward and 2008 steadily increases its hold on our calendars, I have – like so many others – decided to take the beginning of yet another revolution around the Sun as an opportunity to make a (hopefully) lasting change in my life. This will be the year, I say, fully aware of the cliché; this year will be different, I predict, knowing as I do so that I’m echoing the thoughts of countless other individuals bent on a “fresh start.” This year, we all chirp in unison, this year we will be different. [...]
I love what twitter has done for me. I now only blog when I have something important to say. I like how twitter sucks less time from my RL. Most of my twits come from my phone while I’m “in the moment”.
I should also say…I don’t run any twitter monitoring tools. I only check my twitter friends’ feed when I’m impatiently waiting for a computer to finish doing something. It is a wonderful way to see ‘wassup’ with my buds.
I will admit I hated twitter at first, I thought it was inane. But the value of hooking in to the stream of consciousness of people I care about is priceless.
And when it comes to Mollyisms…I’ll enjoy them no matter what the medium!
What is the point of twitter?
The point? Think: Borg.
One of the facets of the Borg – one of the more hideous elements, to be sure, of the Borg is their ability to preclude discussion because they know what the membership is thinking.
Valeria Maltoni (on her blog “The Conversation Agent”) recently made a comment about how the implications of a HAL-like computer. (It was in reference to her review of “The Big Switch” by Nicholas Carr) I would counter that HAL is the least of it – when you consider Twitter. When I see statements like “but the value of hooking into the stream of consciousness of people I care about is priceless”, I not only worry – I have a serious debate about whether I should or shouldn’t be paranoid! I don’t know – I just think there’s something seriously wrong with taping into anyone’s consciousness. Even if they willingly, eagerly, seek such intrusion.
So many speak of Twitter as a “stream of consciousness” that I can’t help but think of the Borg. They had no privacy, no “self”; their every thought was transmitted, and those that were unacceptable – well, those thoughts were suppressed. What happens to freedom of expression in such a world? Is Twitter really an example of free expression – or just another means where the unwitting can fine tune their thoughts?
Speaking of the arguments regarding Internet (contemporary?) privacy – and how they become so farcical in the face of an application like Twitter. The debate isn’t about privacy -it’s suddenly morphed into “how do I control how people perceive me?” How do you argue for privacy when all you think is broadcast to an audience of voyeurs in 140 characters or less?
How do you value your opinions if they have to be distilled to sound-bites? Is that an opinion, or just a pithy quote? Or did the difference get confused in the process of adoring those 140 characters?
(Disagree? Think about it, and let’s “talk”)
Carolyn Ann
Carolyn, it seems you’ve thought about it a bit more than myself and perhaps reading into it, making analogies and comparisons … but to me, it’s just a tool. It’s just a social networking communication tool. There’s IRC, there’s Messenger or Yahoo! chat, Tangler, SMS … and there’s Twitter. And that’s about as far as it goes – pick whichever one you like, if any. Each one is used in different ways, and because of it’s accessibility and convenience I use Twitter more frequently than I might’ve used Messenger – but that’s primarily an IxD/UX issue.
Value of opinions? Freedom of expression? Assimilation? Sorry – but that’s delving too deep for me
Totally agree
I wonder if this is also happening to me? Maybe Twitter is making us lazy. I guess I will have to put twitter to a minimum this year.
[...] While Molly blames Twitter for her lack of blogging and Mark life, the reason for my lack of blogging of the past few weeks can be attributed to the new train and my desire to get back to a reasonable level of fitness. [...]
Twitter and IM can be a time sink, but all the same I’d hate to lose the contact they bring into my life. I keep in touch with people via Twitter that I simply couldn’t keep properly in touch with any other way. IM has dropped off a bit recently but similarly it keeps me in contact with people I rarely see face to face.
I’ve often used this analogy: with Twitter, you can tune in and out. It’s like sitting in a cafe with a bunch of friends around the room. You can tune out without offending anyone, or you can zone back in on conversations that tickle your fancy. No other tool has ever quite managed that “ambient intimacy”. IRC and IM always seemed to expect immediate replies or one-on-one focus; email is too slow; phone calls too expensive or unworkable due to timezones.
I’m thinking the trick for 2008 will be for us all to manage these things, to get the benefits without succumbing to the information overload. We need to be blogging properly, not just twittering!
With the Open Social, open data, reputation ratings and all of the other silliness that is pushing Web 2.0, things are getting damn worrisome. The recent data issues with Facebook and ’spam’ problems with a couple other social networks point out that things, just in these small areas, have not been well thought out.
If, for example, the P3P recommendation had been revisited and corrective implementation been made, just on a basis of planned abandonment, wherein ‘opt out’ and been moved to an ‘opt-in’ policy, those relatively minor issues could have, possibly, been prevented.
Social networks have literally been used as vehicles that have cost people their lives. That is not melodrama, it is plain fact. If that, alone, is not enough to rattle bird cages to point of immediate action, I don’t know what is.
What does all that have to do with Twitter and this thread … well, not much, I suppose. I just simply took the word and condensed it down to ‘twit’. From that point, it became obvious.
It’s been unfortunate that you haven’t blogged much. I really am interested in how it’s going with this weird Microsoft/web standards marriage that everyone says won’t work out.
i love this blog. i am really interested in …
we climbed a ladder to the to p of my house, never letting go of your hand, I gave to you my ugly brown coat, you made it pretty when you put it on, the sky trades the moon for the sun my girl, the sky trades the moon for the sun
[...] Another shift that has occurred is more to do with the web standards community: there just seems to be less web standards blogging going on in general. Some people have different thoughts as to why that’s occurred – me, I think that we’re getting to saturation point. The people who are listening already get it. Specifications move slowly – there’s been nothing new in HTML or CSS for a long time. There’s just nothing much to write about. [...]
[...] Twitter has been getting a bit of flak over at Molly’s post Twitter Sucked the Blogging Out of Me – although she doesn’t actually bag Twitter; Molly simply observes how Twitter has taken her attention away from blogging and that this year she’ll be moving away from Twitter and returning her focus to blogging. However it’s in the comments and responses to her post and in other blogs where people don’t hold back in their criticism of Twitter; how they don’t see any value in it, how it’s making people “dumb” and just haemorrhage half-backed thought onto the Internet. [...]
[...] Twitter sucked the blogging out of Molly, but I was already well down that path long before I think Twitter was a glimmer in Obvious eyes. [...]
[...] Still, I played on the sidelines. I knew of Twitter but did not see much use out of it, especially when I was told from coworkers and the Internet that once you start a Twitter account you cease to blog. I held onto my reservations until I did some reading about the iPhone applications Twitterific and Twinkle. [...]
thanks
thanks