Catching up on my usual suspects of bloggers and their recent posts I noticed that Joi blogged the fact that Technoroti has tracked it's 3 millionth blog – of course when I read his post headline where he claimed that “Technorati Tracks 3M Blogs” I immediately thought of the once incredibly innovative Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company (3M) but soon realized he was using “M” as millions. Though in the advertising industry and direct marketing I always found that M was used to track thousands. Yet in tech “K” is for thousands. So much for standards. Good lord.
So Mary notes that a Blog really isn't abandoned unless you stumble upon a 404 error, stating simply that “I think the archives of blogs, and their linking histories are actually very interesting, so the fact that Technorati keeps them in the index to me is important and useful”. While I don't disagree there is a difference between fresh and preserved. What would you rather devour? Fresh or preserved foods?
But what caught my eye in Mary's post was her observation that many bloggers she tracks are travelers:
[…] I know a number of bloggers who are only travel bloggers, so they post when traveling, say over three months through South America, and they email us when they start up. And then when they return home, the blogging stops for a while, until their next trip. Or the ones who do it for knowledge management, and so, blog over the school year, but take the winter break and summer off. Or for research projects of limited duration. Or the ones that blog for a specific event, leading up to it, through it and just after, and then not posting again for a while, until the next big event.
So while this quick paragraph reduced my blogging anxiety for a fleeting moment due to the fact that for the past few months the majority of my active posts have happened while I have frolicked somewhere around this grand planet, the fact is I feel that like a newspaper, magazine or newsletter the key word is “periodical”. Now define this as you wish but for me a blog is a published piece. And as such it should be updated on a regular and recurring interval. Hence, the result of my anxiety when I have a lapse of week (let alone a day) or two where the pressure (on myself) to blog mounts until I finally grapple with some material I feel to be of value and interest to readers of the Digital Tavern.
The second anniversary of The Digital Tavern passed without me making any fuss in May of this year. This is back when Technoroti was barely a twinkle in the eye of David Sifry and the number of blogs were barely six figures. Today, we're in the millions. And I feel lucky and happy that the Digital Tavern has been alive for more the 2 years. And it will continue to live for years to come.
Thanks for stopping by!
