Me? Blogging? Seems I’m the last person on earth to get with it – hence The Last Post… (cue bugle).
I’ve had a hold-your-nose approach to the whole damn thing. It seemed all a bit ‘look at me’, up there with personalised number plates.
Some time ago the brilliant writer/broadcaster Paul Morley told me with a smirk that his old NME contemporaries were giving their writing away for free by blogging. The last time I looked, he’s only blogged twice in two years on Guardian Online, so he must still think that’s the case.
Either the Guardian/Observer have contracted him to do one post per year, or else, more likely, he’s told them to sling their hook. There’s one guy who doesn’t need a blog to aid his ‘personal brand building.’
Only a few months ago I was nodding in agreement when someone in the blogosphere remarked that the daily wave of online stuff was ‘a tsunami of drivel.’
It’s the phrase which stuck in my head after reading a column by Mark Hooper in The Word magazine which explored the purpose of blogging.
Hooper bravely admitted that some of his blogs had occasionally been lazy journalism. And he made the point that his Top Ten lists got more hits than his finely-crafted words on some worthy cultural issue.
Funny, but on the web, I could not find the phrase “a tsunami of drivel” and was unable to locate a source. So did I make it up? Anyone else read it?
The key difference between blogging and journalism is that a blog is unmediated – no sub-editor to check spelling, grammar, meaning or layout. Or an editor to read with a furrowed brow, and state without mercy “spike it.”
But bloggers are unpaid, passionate specialists. And I suppose they would say that old media practitioners can have an excess of professionalism at the expense of passion.
I’m old media. I’ve been getting newsprint on my fingers since I was in short trousers. I’ve published magazines, interviewed MP’s and film stars, filed news reports and come out of shows to dictate reviews down the phone.
And all the while, in my head, imagining I was in some film noir wearing a snap brim hat and punching out the wiseass quips.
Ah. The romance. Even the lowliest hack in the smallest town could feel a deep connection with Waugh’s Scoop’ Woodward and Bernstein, and the hard drinking legends of Fleet Street’s finest.
Yet here I am blogging. It’s time to start some conversations, publish some observations. It’s not enough what I have been and done – a magazine publisher, a daily columnist of a big city newspaper, all that.
That’s old stuff. Not digital. Some of it exists in yellowing archives of newsprint, in photographs in cupboards, in published books, and in memories and anecdote.
But none of it is online. So, welcome to The Last Post.
Tags: Blogs, journalism, magazines, Media, movies, newspapers, Radio, social media
But blogging also requires the skill of great copy. Sometimes the fact that anyone can do it is not enough. Being able to write well and communicate well is what’s required to stand out for an ever growing crowd
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 12th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
Thanks for that. Not sure what constitutes great writing in a blog. Short and snappier the better, I suppose. I am well-known for going on a bit. We’ll see.
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Welcome to the the blogosphere! No snap brim hats or yellowing archives here, but you can keep the wise cracks coming and continue with the hard drinking!
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 12th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Hmmm, thanks. I think I made up the last bit about hard-drinking. The Glaswegians say if you have the constitution for it you ‘take good bucket.’ I don’t really.
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The hat would have suited! you used to have the look of a hungry gangster prowling the boulevards and alleys trying to secure your quote for the day.
So what is this to be -stream of consciousness or corporate caution?
Whichever it is I will try to keep up with interest. Good luck and enjoy yourself.
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 12th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
Thanks Nigel
I have the hat somewhere. That prowling-for-a-quote role is now yours! Your question neatly captures the dilemma of the PR man’s blog. I have resolved to try to make it interesting without going out of my to be controversial for the sake of it. We”ll see.
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congrats on your first blog andy. I’ll will read with enthusiasm. c
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 14th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Thanks and keep me posted on what the London ad agency world is thinking about social media.
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Blimey, ten years on and Spin is getting with it. Gordo is much impressed, but concerned that the boy may well be having too comfortable a life in The Heatons to have some edge to his blog, but, lets see. Remember, a blog is not just for Christmas, you have to graft at it me old son. xxx
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 12th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
Thanks Gordo, I reckon if you can’t beat ‘em, blog ‘em. If having ‘the edge’ is swanning off to Paris on a junket, I’d gladly swap my comfortable life for some of your ‘edge’! God bless yer.
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It grows on you, this blogging. I was tentative at first, then enjoyed the freedom, then started to take care with the style, and finally got the big buzz of finding out that someone in China or California is bothering to read your thoughts…
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 12th, 2009 at 10:36 pm
Indeed, it is growing on me, I am waking in the night thinking ‘that would be a good subject for the blog.’ Hopefully my blog will also grow on people on the West Coast – Blackpool and the Wirral, of course..
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Welcome to the 21st century andy,think the tsunami was a phrase used when we met, anyway nice to have you on the www, now for twitter, facebook and linkedin!!
Look forward to reading your word of mouse comments
See you soon
Ian
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 13th, 2009 at 9:01 am
Thanks Ian, you can have the copyright on that phrase!
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Here’s to start of something blog!
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 14th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Absolutely.
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Welcome to nasty world of drivel-making…. it’s more fun if you can offend a few people along the way…
Liam
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 13th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
Nasty? Drivel? You are in the wrong blog, surely, good sir!
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Hello again
This makes two first posts already on Last Post … come on, come on … you’ve cleared your throat … let’s have a song, la … you can do it!
And perhaps you can do something with your blog software to inter-collate your answers with your visitors points?
Either by nesting comments with a reply to this option. or by setting your times to fall between.
Don’t know that I can on mine … but that’s just blogger.
best w
Chris p
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Andrew Spinoza Reply:
February 15th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Thanks CP, it’s clearly something that needs to be sorted…we’ll be looking into it Monday morning.
Andy
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