Rant about blogging pressure part 2
Feb. 23rd, 2008 11:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
msagaraRant about blogging, part 2 sort of
ETA: No one is pressuring me to blog; for some reason, no one ever has. So the pressure I resent is not being applied to me -- it's making people I really like miserable.
But the real reason I hate all the pressure to blog besides the fact that so many people don't understand how it works?
Because it's being applied to people who, being writers, often already shoulder enough doubt and fear, and it's being sold as "you're failing your book if you don't." I'm sure that people don't intend to do this, but it's bullying, and it's something that a lot of writers – balancing careers, children, day jobs or schooling in any number of combinations don't need. It's like being told to go out and join the in-crowd or the popular crowd when you're in junior high and you're a geek because then you will be ... more popular. Most of us have outgrown that paradigm – but just in case you want to stay on that side of the fence, there's the reminder that your books need this.
It brings back all kind of awkward, and people don't need that kind of awkward. And if the people offering this advice paid a bit more attention to the dynamics of blogging, I think they'd be less likely to apply this kind of pressure.
It's like telling someone that the sure-fire way to be a bestselling writer is to be a movie star – and then expecting them to go be a movie star; the scale is smaller, but the phenomenon is not appreciably different, imho. Some of us can act. Some of us can't. Most of us will never be movie stars, even if we are all forced to audition. But the auditions, such as they are, and stretching a metaphor to near-breaking, can make the entire process of dealing with the writing insecurities so much worse.
Look, I blog because I enjoy it. I tend to say more or less what I'm thinking about a narrow range of subjects. There are things I won't talk about because I don't feel I own them completely (my kids, for instance). But I enjoy blogging in part because no one is standing over my shoulder metaphorically breathing down my neck and telling me I have to somehow endear myself to people that I don't know and might never meet, with the subtext of failing-your-book wedged in there.
ETA: No one is pressuring me to blog; for some reason, no one ever has. So the pressure I resent is not being applied to me -- it's making people I really like miserable.
But the real reason I hate all the pressure to blog besides the fact that so many people don't understand how it works?
Because it's being applied to people who, being writers, often already shoulder enough doubt and fear, and it's being sold as "you're failing your book if you don't." I'm sure that people don't intend to do this, but it's bullying, and it's something that a lot of writers – balancing careers, children, day jobs or schooling in any number of combinations don't need. It's like being told to go out and join the in-crowd or the popular crowd when you're in junior high and you're a geek because then you will be ... more popular. Most of us have outgrown that paradigm – but just in case you want to stay on that side of the fence, there's the reminder that your books need this.
It brings back all kind of awkward, and people don't need that kind of awkward. And if the people offering this advice paid a bit more attention to the dynamics of blogging, I think they'd be less likely to apply this kind of pressure.
It's like telling someone that the sure-fire way to be a bestselling writer is to be a movie star – and then expecting them to go be a movie star; the scale is smaller, but the phenomenon is not appreciably different, imho. Some of us can act. Some of us can't. Most of us will never be movie stars, even if we are all forced to audition. But the auditions, such as they are, and stretching a metaphor to near-breaking, can make the entire process of dealing with the writing insecurities so much worse.
Look, I blog because I enjoy it. I tend to say more or less what I'm thinking about a narrow range of subjects. There are things I won't talk about because I don't feel I own them completely (my kids, for instance). But I enjoy blogging in part because no one is standing over my shoulder metaphorically breathing down my neck and telling me I have to somehow endear myself to people that I don't know and might never meet, with the subtext of failing-your-book wedged in there.
Authors, blogging, and websites
Date: 2008-02-29 03:33 pm (UTC)That being said, there are a few authors that I've learned to avoid reading anything they've written beyond the published novels. Occasionally I've run into comments by particular authors that have been so mean and rude that it makes me start to dislike their books as a reaction. Despite the fact that the writing hasn't changed, it makes me reluctant to support the author by buying any books, and colors my opinion of her writing, because I've gotten a glimpse of the poisonous person behind it all. You know, how you may be predisposed to hate something simply because you don't like the person who recommended it? Or, in a more appropriate analogy, like discovering that your favorite author is a member of the KKK and pedophile to boot. Whenever I come across someone like this, I shake my head in amazement that she can't see how damaging such remarks can be. The author I'm most appalled at has the worst habit of commenting on negative reviews of her books, and she typically responds in a provocative, insulting manner that sparks an avalanche of MORE negativity, then she 'tee-hees' and starts bragging about how much money she makes from her books! It's really quite amazing.
It's rare that an author is so inflammatory that it affects what I think of their books, but I do think it is one potential downside of having such close, instantaneous communication between reader/writer.
I don't think that an author should feel pressured to keep up a blog - I rarely keep up any sort of regular journal myself, so I definitely don't see why I should expect more from anyone else. To be perfectly honest, I think what is more important in terms of a career is actually to maintain a good website. While I LIKE blogs, I don't think they are necessary; whereas I really get annoyed when authors do not update websites with new information. If they don't have one, that's fine, but I more or less consider that when an author DOES, he is obligated to keep it somewhat current. At least by posting upcoming release dates/titles and hopefully a list of previous books (usually a blurb is welcome, but unnecessary since I can search one out). I keep bookmarks of authors' sites, and regularly check through them to find out any news. Nothing drives me crazier than to find the site completely out of date (seriously, one author still has tentative dates for 2004 listed!) because it might as well not exist if I have to find the information elsewhere. I think that up-to-date info and sometimes teasers like short excerpts whet the appetite of a reader and makes it more likely that they will be anticipating the next book eagerly. It's so much nicer when I KNOW a book I want is coming out, rather than coming across it by chance at a bookstore or library (that can be a nice surprise, but how long was it out before I found it?!). A lot of people rely on the internet for information like that, and a well-organized, maintained author website is the first place to look.
Again, it doesn't need to be fancy or super in-depth...just an update every few months at least. I don't expect books to come out any faster than that anyway. I think it's a valuable tool for an author in this increasingly technology-reliant world, and not enough people seem to be taking advantage of it.
Hm. I didn't mean to ramble on so long. Today is one of my check-author-sites days (that's how I ended up here, actually), and I'm disappointed in the lack of news from some authors that I KNOW have books coming out soon. It's kind of a pet peeve of mine=)