Comments on: Disconnected, Distracted and Directions

By: Ivy

Ivy — Sun, 02 May 2010 08:00:59 +0000

Thanks for sharing! Good to know that there are other “mixed” bloggers out there. Unlike you, I haven’t got the experience to write well about professional matters…yet. (Gimme a few more years!)

By: Walter

Walter — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 22:43:32 +0000

I think lines between personal and professional (or niche) blogs may be increasing blurring with the convergence of lifestyle activities and work interests. Like you, I adopt a mixture of special interest posts interspersed with occasional bouts of self indulgent natterings. While my vacation and leisure outing posts do generate a fair amount of interest, most of my readers know that its the marketing, social media, PR and business perspectives that I focus more attention on.

By: Ivy

Ivy — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:03:43 +0000

Thanks for all your great feedback! It’s quite a difficult topic so I think this warrants a dedicated entry instead of my usual individual responses.

By: Blogential Angst at Aigoo-ChamnaNET

Blogential Angst at Aigoo-ChamnaNET — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 14:26:49 +0000

[...] it’s because I’ve been blogging since 2000. A decade has passed and personal blogs have really come a long way since. I’m not saying I’m an expert of blogs or anything, [...]

By: Sigg3

Sigg3 — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 11:35:35 +0000

It all depends, really. If you write a personal blog it should be for personal reasons. When I first started blogging on my own (I first wrote a web log for my rock band), even before the word blog had arrived (I subscribe to the Weblog crowd – GET OFF MY LAWN!), it was to provide a place for people (RL family and friends mostly) to keep tabs on my whereabouts and what I was up to.

And it still is. I don’t care if I don’t have anyone’s stamp of approval or get listed at the top in my country or internationally, because I’m not writing for fame. Fuck that. I write for me. That’s why you see a whole range of bizarre posts from photo mashups to technical documentation and HOWTOs. That’s my life in nutshell and a jar of pickles.

With that in mind, let me just add that I often feel that you are in fact writing as “Nanyate, Inc.” because you often focus on gadgets and use a lot of buzzwords. Not that I don’t appreciate it, but I appreciate more your personal thoughts (such as this post) where you give us some tidbits from your life.

But this may be because reading reviews and tests are a part of my paid job, as well as testing and crushing devices..

What I’m failing to say is that this is more like a work blog than a personal blog.
Feel free to join the 3 comments together. I hit enter before I’m done:)

By: Lissy

Lissy — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 17:47:40 +0000

I still read personal blogs. I like reading about peoples’ daily lives and getting to know them, though sometimes posts can be boring. I read all different sorts of things online. My favorite blogs are the ones written by good writers. The better someone can write, the more interesting they can make even the most boring topics. Or if they can’t write, short blogs are good too You fall into the good writer category btw, so I think you can write about whatever you want and people will read it.

btw, for some reason, old blogs you’ve written have been showing up in my google reader lately. Any idea why? Didn’t really bother me, just strange.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 16:10:17 +0000

Glad to see you back and blogging I had no idea Facebook and Twitter were banned in China, I can’t imagine not being able access those sites.

I do agree with you on some aspect, that I find myself subscribing to more and more niche blogs than personal blogs. But I find that I actually enjoy reading personal blogs more because I can relate to the the entries (to a certain extent at least) and I like the wide variety of topics. However, my idea of a personal blog is not what it was 5 years ago. I still consider blogs like yours (and many others) personal ones because to you still relate whatever the post topics are to your personal life. They are informative yet personal at the same time, not stiff like the niche blogs.

I’d actually prefer if you kept your blog the way it is now, since one thing I like about it is the wide array of topics. I don’t think personal blogs per se are a dying breed, but they are definitely changing to be more reader-oriented than before.

By: JJ

JJ — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 14:51:55 +0000

I’ve seen the evolution in my own blog–instead of writing about my life, I tend to write about books and publishing. Possibly because my own life is uninteresting. In the years I’ve had my blog, it evolved from being purely personal to being more of a niche blog as well.

By: Steve Law

Steve Law — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 12:07:48 +0000

In my search for twitter social media bloggers a while back, Nanyate.com stood out the most because of the ‘Social Media is like Dough’ topic.

I believe there’s always a way to inject a little personality into each blog post, especially if you write about what interests you .

By: Tara

Tara — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 11:44:30 +0000

Yike, sorry to hear about you being sick. O_O; I hope March proves to be a better month for you. I had no idea China blocks all of that. Jeebus X_X;;

As for your blog . . . I think it’s fine the way it is, but if you want to add or change stuff, go ahead! It’s your blog! I like what you write, and as long as remember to write for yourself, that’s all it matters in my opinion.

I think personal blogs have changed over the years, definitely, but I don’t think it’s a dying breed per se. I just think a lot of us bloggers from the old days have changed our routes a bit or whatnot, but I still think personal blogging is a good way to connect with others and to relieve my stress somewhere else. XD