Sunday, May 30, 2004

On Writing Styles in Blogs



To write or not to write, that is the question, especially in deciding on the appropriate style for blogging. I still haven't gotten it down to a science, and I notice such a variety of styles on the blogs that it's hard to know if there is any such thing as the universal blogging style. Probably not, at least not yet. So I could write a post in many different styles (some a lot better than others, of course). Here are some variations:
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Hiya, guys and gals! Jeez but things are slow today. What's the effing matter with all youse? I'm busting my ass off writing for you, and when I eyeball my visitor stats for Sunday, what do I see: a f****ing 120 oglers so far today. Come on, give me some respect here!
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According to Slack and Slick, 2004, Journal of Blogometry, vol. I, no 1, pp.1-109, the average visitor frequency in a randomly drawn sample of blogs (n=1) was 120. The relatively low number may be attributed to the day of the week, viz. the general slowdown of internet usage during weekends when a large number of internet users are otherwise engaged. In a rejoinder, Glick and Glack, ibid. hypothesize that this may cause great distress to those bloggers whose output is especially large on Sundays. All researchers conclude by noting that internet users could be encouraged to increase their visits by suitable incentives, such as lotteries for a two-week expenses-paid vacations to a location near the Equator with some minor mythical goddess.
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Solitude. Silence. The night spreads its cloak over me and nobody calls. I bend over my keyboard; a stray tear rolls down my cheek but I persist. Can you hear me, silence? Can you hold my grief, emptiness? Hollow footsteps, just audible from somewhere. Where did it all go? What was it all for? You never visit me anymore. Only silence stands and looks over my shoulder as I write.
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Today was a day like all other days that are also called Sundays. The same slowness, the same newly starched faces in all the same church pews, the same drunks at the street corners worshipping in their own way. I wake up with a hangover next to the face of a stranger. The whiskey bottles on the floor are empty, and I have a headache down to my kidneys. Remind me not to go out with gorillas in the future, especially when the keyboard sits there idle, filling me with guilt. I slug down the eau de toilet from the bathroom cabinet and light up a stogie end I find under the sleeping gorilla. Time for some heavy lifting. The audience is out there, somewhere, and one day they will hear about me and even pay me. Until then I'll be ok with the booze and my karate skills. The roads are hard for a gal all alone but you knew that already.
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And so on. I could keep on writing this for many more hours, but it probably wouldn't be that profitable. You get the idea, anyway. So what is the appropriate blog language?