I remember reading somewhere (and please excuse my memory for not remembering where) that the first step towards creating something that makes an interesting read is the title. It's like if you make a good impression on the reader, he will read your stuff and the way to making a good impression is to have a most eye-grabbing, attention-catching title. The author went on to elaborate how short titles are always more preferable to long ones (Guess Borat makers didn't read this stuff.) But that isn't going to stop me from putting up this post with this title, because I'm part of this non-conformist world driven by an undercurrent called the Information Revolution...because there is no longer one right way and many wrong ways to do things...because new ideas are welcome today...new thoughts are appearing at will because of our willingness to accept each person as a different individual with thoughts, behaviour and mentality completely different from the person beside him/her...because at last, we realize that just as many problems can have multiple solutions, many things can be done in multiple ways.
So how has this river of non-conformism and independent thinking swept us away? I don't know for sure, although I am a part of this. Probably it is the sudden upsurge of people expressing themselves that has created so many independent threads of thoughts - all snaking about, intertwining, sparring, concurring and debating with each other. The sheer number of these leave me wondering whether there are new thoughts at all...But that's something I'll leave for another post...
I just returned from a short break from home yesterday and let me tell you, I had more than my fair share of blog posts to check out - Saurya, Rachit, Nilanjana, Swapnil, Ramya, Rajat, Rishabh (not necessarily in the same order - I've got to be politically correct here) - with each blog having multiple posts. And then the thought struck me like a bolt of lightening that is all so common in these rainy days - how do people whose blogrolls stretch on and on, keep track of what their friends are writing? If there are say, ten people on your blogroll and each of them posts 10 entries per month - that translates into 100 different threads of thought every month. Just imagine that the number of people in the blogging world is many thousand times the number I just quoted in the earlier example.
This, for me is the real power of blogging, of internet, and of freedom of speech in general. Discussions are no longer confined to being held in hurried whispers with fears of being caught hanging like a spectre over one's head; opinions are no longer withheld for fear of not meeting with approval. People want to be heard, they want their thoughts to count or they just want to release their thoughts and feelings out of their systems - and many (yours truly being one of them) have, among other things turned to blogging to do just that.
The concept of a thought sphere - a ambiguous, non-real entity supposed to contain all the info in the minds of all the people on this earth - is now truly realized in the form of the blogosphere. It contains info, opinions, general crap - everything. But above all, I feel it tells me how all humans differ from each other, especially when two people see the same thing, yet write different interpretations of it in their blogs.
12 Responses:
I guess time is ripe for you to subscribe to feeds. I had this problem when I entered into blogosphere. But a year and a half later, I have got all my feeds neatly categorized.
And if you follow any of the professional blogs say FSJ or Engadget, without a feed reader you are dead, man.
Yep, blogging has replaced chatrooms and soon will hopefully take over social networking sites(you can already access blogger thru ORKUT).
Blogging is a nice way to vent, express our thoughts. But most importantly, we blog so that we can share out thoughts with the rest of the world, whether they liked it or not!
Yeah..use something like feedblitz or that..you need not visit each and every blog after that..You inbox will have all the recent posts.But the idea of blogosphere was really interesting! Good comeback!!
@rachit & harshad: Yeah, thank God for feeds!
@rishabh: Blogging is a way to break out isn't it? Sort of gives you the freedom to say 'f*** you' to the world and its philosophers. :o
Nice Post.
there is no longer one right way and many wrong ways to do things.
Have been thinking bout dis for a while now. The boundaries are vanishing. Its all fuzzy. Suddenely, the sentence "Its my opinion" seems to have become the one you hear the most. Agree with the new ideas coming in part also, though its more about us changing than the world. We, more mature than a year ago, are more willing to absorb ideas.
People want to be heard, they want their thoughts to count or they just want to release their thoughts and feelings out of their systems,
While there might be many of those, blogging to me looks like a tool. If it weren't here people would have carried on discussions the normal way. I don't think there's a sudden surge of getting out to the world. Its always been in us. To be understood, acknowledged leading upto being respected. Its like a small child who always wants to play, and if he gets the toy, he surely will.
vineet: There will be a surge because blogs serve a larger audience compared to a "normal" discussion. The feeling of reaching out to a lot of people is exhilirating.
The number of blogs in India has shot up in the last 2-3 years.
Good post...i was struck by the line "are there any new ideas at all"...i'm looking forward to your views on that...
@vineet: i love the toy and child analogy. Concisely put indeed.
@saurya: maybe a couple of posts later. At the moment, m thinking of some other things
hmm have to check out this feed reader thing...well written post. organised flow of thought as usual.
blogging is an addiction
wow! arent the lot of us on the same train of thought! I just posted an entry on this !!
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