Given the relatively few technology bloggers (of Technorati 100 blogs, that is) to readers, there tends to be a large number of complaints per blogger, to put it mildly. I used to be on the other side of the fence, back in the TechGeist days, but now am peering from the other perspective.
I write for a big blog, with a good sized staff, and great community. I am a lucky writer. Given all of that, I wanted to take some space (thank you Holden), and talk about what I think a bloggers responsibility is, and comment on what the responsibility the community and startups have in relation to it.
To begin most basically, a blogger needs to report the news. I live in the tech world, so I can only comment on that: a blogger needs to seek out, find, parse, condense, and explain the technology news as quickly as possible. And you thought it was simple.
As a quick aside, tech blogging can be damn hard. From wire story, to post, can sometimes be less then ten minutes. You have to read, write, fact check, research, edit, publish, and promote at light speed. Or, lose the pageviews.
Second to a story is very nearly last. It is a constant, friendly, gladiatorial match, with all the major tech blogs battling it out for the pageviews. I hate to say it, but if you are not on the Suggested User List, or have less than 100,000 followers, you are probably not in the game.
So, bloggers need to get the news out there. But there are many, many more stories that do not get covered, than do. Startups would love coverage for every single update the push, but you can’t do that. Only websites that impact more than around 10 million or more people get that love. So you have to decide, which news bits are going to make it, and which aren’t.
You end up trapped between posts that you know you have to cover, and are then racing, and figuring out what is worthy of coverage. But this is not just your decision. There are the companies to think of, and your readers, which make the whole damn thing possible. If you don’t cover the company, they are dissapointed. Most take it very well, “thanks for your time, we’ll keep you in the loop.”
Say that, and I will be much more likely to cover you in the future. Some of course do not take it well, pestering you forever. That is that, nothing can or will be done. A blogger has to keep the balance, not be bullied, and focus on the story, and not perhaps the prickly people behind it. But, we are only human. Bias is impossible not to come by.
So you balance what is fair, with the constant worry that what you do not cover, some one else will, and it just might blow up. Editors cringe at that.
The community of readers in the tech world is vocal, and acerbic. I would have it no other way. But, having honest readers can be quite painful. Bloggers make mistakes, especially when the preassure cooker of time is on. So when we blow it, big or small, we get it back, double. Get on Digg (always fun), and have a typo? Expect a seven comments chain on how foolish you are. Drop a fact, or break a link? People will bemoan the decline of the publication, in real time.
Google and Twitter have a big week? People will complain that the site has become a shill for those two services (any two, really). Blogging is a bit of blur, generally, so its hard for me (I could be an exceptionally slow blogger), to keep perspective all the time. Something breaks that passes the postability-test, and I cover it. I don’t keep a tab of XX posts on this and XX posts on that. Maybe I should.
But I need to keep the readers happy, and that means two things: posts about Facebook and Twitter. Let’s be real, what are two of the biggest ways that posts get passed out? What are the two hottest social services that exist? You get it.
So it boils down to the following elements: postability, speed, consciousness to other blogs, keeping readers happy, balancing content, getting the right startups covered at the right times, doing it well, and spelling things right.
Now, take all that and do it five times or more a day. Can you do 100 posts a month, some 30,000 words or more? It is far from simple, but we love it. To be a pro-blogger is a great, great damn job, and I love it. But, it’s hard. We do what we can, nearly all the time to make it as fast, and well as we can.
But please, keep doing your part. Startups keep emailing us all the time (alex.w@thenextweb.com), and tweeting at us (@alex). Readers, keep giving us hell, we need it to stay sharp. But just remember that this is not an easy job. It is sure as hell a fun job, but just remember all the work that goes into it before you open that can of hate.
Want to comment? Sorry, I have disabled those, but I respond to nearly every e-mail I receive. So why not drop me a line at holdenpage@pagesaresocial.com
A Bloggers Responsibility
I write for a big blog, with a good sized staff, and great community. I am a lucky writer. Given all of that, I wanted to take some space (thank you Holden), and talk about what I think a bloggers responsibility is, and comment on what the responsibility the community and startups have in relation to it.
To begin most basically, a blogger needs to report the news. I live in the tech world, so I can only comment on that: a blogger needs to seek out, find, parse, condense, and explain the technology news as quickly as possible. And you thought it was simple.
As a quick aside, tech blogging can be damn hard. From wire story, to post, can sometimes be less then ten minutes. You have to read, write, fact check, research, edit, publish, and promote at light speed. Or, lose the pageviews.
Second to a story is very nearly last. It is a constant, friendly, gladiatorial match, with all the major tech blogs battling it out for the pageviews. I hate to say it, but if you are not on the Suggested User List, or have less than 100,000 followers, you are probably not in the game.
So, bloggers need to get the news out there. But there are many, many more stories that do not get covered, than do. Startups would love coverage for every single update the push, but you can’t do that. Only websites that impact more than around 10 million or more people get that love. So you have to decide, which news bits are going to make it, and which aren’t.
You end up trapped between posts that you know you have to cover, and are then racing, and figuring out what is worthy of coverage. But this is not just your decision. There are the companies to think of, and your readers, which make the whole damn thing possible. If you don’t cover the company, they are dissapointed. Most take it very well, “thanks for your time, we’ll keep you in the loop.”
Say that, and I will be much more likely to cover you in the future. Some of course do not take it well, pestering you forever. That is that, nothing can or will be done. A blogger has to keep the balance, not be bullied, and focus on the story, and not perhaps the prickly people behind it. But, we are only human. Bias is impossible not to come by.
So you balance what is fair, with the constant worry that what you do not cover, some one else will, and it just might blow up. Editors cringe at that.
The community of readers in the tech world is vocal, and acerbic. I would have it no other way. But, having honest readers can be quite painful. Bloggers make mistakes, especially when the preassure cooker of time is on. So when we blow it, big or small, we get it back, double. Get on Digg (always fun), and have a typo? Expect a seven comments chain on how foolish you are. Drop a fact, or break a link? People will bemoan the decline of the publication, in real time.
Google and Twitter have a big week? People will complain that the site has become a shill for those two services (any two, really). Blogging is a bit of blur, generally, so its hard for me (I could be an exceptionally slow blogger), to keep perspective all the time. Something breaks that passes the postability-test, and I cover it. I don’t keep a tab of XX posts on this and XX posts on that. Maybe I should.
But I need to keep the readers happy, and that means two things: posts about Facebook and Twitter. Let’s be real, what are two of the biggest ways that posts get passed out? What are the two hottest social services that exist? You get it.
So it boils down to the following elements: postability, speed, consciousness to other blogs, keeping readers happy, balancing content, getting the right startups covered at the right times, doing it well, and spelling things right.
Now, take all that and do it five times or more a day. Can you do 100 posts a month, some 30,000 words or more? It is far from simple, but we love it. To be a pro-blogger is a great, great damn job, and I love it. But, it’s hard. We do what we can, nearly all the time to make it as fast, and well as we can.
But please, keep doing your part. Startups keep emailing us all the time (alex.w@thenextweb.com), and tweeting at us (@alex). Readers, keep giving us hell, we need it to stay sharp. But just remember that this is not an easy job. It is sure as hell a fun job, but just remember all the work that goes into it before you open that can of hate.
tl;dr – there, I said it for you.
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