1. Apologies for not blogging, with a resolution to blog more.
2. Tiny posts summarizing mundane events.
3. Lost-post gravestones like my previous entry.
But I would keep the navel-gazing. Though this interesting but bafflingly complex article at Spiked has given me second thoughts, I think that the potential of the blogosphere has been largely misunderstood.
In every mention of "weblogs, or 'blogs'" in the news today, the emphasis is on their potential as rivals to the entrenched media outlets. The most popular blogs, after all, talk about current affairs and usually try to dissect a single piece of news in an interesting (and, hopefully, unique) way.
But there's another larger element that's often ignored, even dismissed, in stories about the growing popularity of blogs: the diary element.
Now I wasn't thinking of Graham's "Imagining the Blogosphere" article when I started writing this
� I read it months and months ago and I can no longer remember the details � but I see that he's already made the point I'm trying to get at:
Though the active core of the blogosphere has received the most attention for its effects on the global mediascape, the much larger periphery of diarist bloggers represents a vital part of this online community.
I assume, of course, that Graham and I appreciate the diarist bloggers from our usual contrasting angles. He sees something living and connected and ephemeral, and I, with my ever-present fear of the merely ephemeral, see something lasting and important. Something "literary."
Those of you who aren't rabid Joseph Epstein fans might not know this, but there are professional essayists. They're the people who churn out articles for highbrow magazines and occasionally parlay those articles into half-philosophical works of nonfiction. Expert navel-gazers like Jeremy Bernstein, Judy Ruiz, and that guy I already mentioned.
I like reading a good essay, and I try to read a few every day so that I can act better than everyone else. I like essays
� which actually tend to be more provocative and even-toned than book-length pieces � but even I can see that the economic model is shot.
Collections of even the best essays are hardly bestsellers; the personal essay may rank next to the short story, or even poetry, as the most underappreciated literary form in American popular culture. But like the short story (and, arguably, unlike contemporary poetry), the essay is still a form with demonstrable potential and talented practitioners.
How will we save the essay?
Blogging. The base is already there. And while most diary-weblogs are mostly garbage (present company included) there are some good blogs that don't care about the news.
I'm taking this as an article of faith. I don't have any links to give.
If more bloggers can move away from exhibitionistic or nonexistent appeal (the Spiked article above identifies some hurdles) and focus on writing stuff with lasting relevance
� and, though it's obviously too much to ask, it would help if the posts weren't trite � we could have a legion of dedicated and experienced, albeit amateur, essayists.
If the web is, as they say, a meritocracy, then the cream would rise to the top. The best navel-gazers and storytellers, the unique and the talented: there's a place for them in the blogosphere, and it's an important place. It's far-fetched, but someone out there could already be blogging a Remembrance of Things Past for the Information Age.
That's all well and good. We all know that there are people out there who, like myself, are willing to waste countless hours scribble scribble scribbling for no reason. And presumably some of them are quite talented. But the economics?
Well, Spiked is my guide there. Their essays are more topical than what I'm thinking off, but it's just one of many sites to make an online-only business model work. Whether through contributions (like Spiked) or with ads (like Wonkette), some blogs do make money. This could be a profitable avenue for professional essayists as well as (assuming the stigma against online publishing could be tamed) quixotic university presses struggling to work with capitalist business models.
For a tenure-seeking professor, having an essay published through a university press website could (and should) have the same cachet as getting a paper copy. For an amateur essayist, any cachet is good cachet.
So this is the part where I come in, sorta. I know that if I stretch for profundity in every post I'll end up falling flat on my face half the time. And I have no use for uncensored navel-gazing; I'm not about to whore out my private thoughts for attention when I have a perfectly good journal to whine to.
But I can at least raise the bar, somewhat, and hope that others will do the same. So here's one for all the diarists out there: I hereby abolish the three "bad" types of posts I mentioned above from this website forever. And I'll use the spellchecker more. It's a start.
