Pundits, Diarists, and Egoists
January 30, 2005
In a speech she gave last summer in Vienna, Mena Trott, co-founder of the Movable Type Publishing Platform (which powers this blog), divided bloggers into three distinct groups:
the pundits, the diarists and the egoists.… I'd venture to guess that unless you password protect your weblog or publish a weblog local to your own hard drive, you will most likely fall into one of these categories. [read the full transcript]
Reading the speech got me wondering which category I fall into. I'm certainly not a pundit. Not knowledgeable—or opinionated—enough about anything. And a diarist, I imagine, would have to be more personally revealing than I am. So that leaves the egoist.
I've never thought of myself as someone with excessive concern for oneself, with or without exaggerated feelings of self-importance,
as the Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the egoist. But if that's what Mena says I am, maybe I should embrace it and report some satisfying information about this site.
In the past thirteen months, englishrules.com has gone from an average of about 45 visits per day to nearly 650. The graph represents the trend of visits over that time period by month. Also, my referrer log shows that a lot of people are coming to the site to find information on "English grammer." So, in an effort to pander to these folks, I'll be opening up a new section of the site dedicated to answering questions about the English language—grammar, punctuation, spelling, anything people want to know. I don't pretend to have all the answers, but I do pretend to have a lot of books that will give me some good leads, and a lot of smart friends who will be able to help in a pinch.
Maybe, though, there's another category of blogger, one that Mena forgot: the correspondent. As those who know me are already too aware, I'm a lousy correspondent through more traditional means such as letter, phone, or even email. But this blog thing somehow feels different to me. It seems practical, productive, and just geeky enough to hold my attention. I'm able to keep in touch pretty regularly with friends and family and anyone else who wanders into the site. So, I'll keep blogging for a while, and I'll leave the comments open, and I'll count on whoever reads my entries to post a comment, if only to keep my ego in check.
Comments (4)
"...Not knowledgeableóor opinionatedóenough about anything..." I don't know if I agree with you here. ;-) But, something doesn't feel right putting you in the egoist camp.
Jan 30, 2005 ; 9:18 PM
Okay, Steve. I admit that I can be opinionated at times, especially right before presidential elections. :)
Dad, not sure where the line is drawn for "correspondent." I suppose message boards and chat rooms are more egalitarian than blogs are. With this blog, I get to control the conversation. Which might put me right back in the egoist camp...
Jan 30, 2005 ; 9:31 PM
hey, karl, although everyone can see this I just wanted you to know that I finally tuned in and you are on my bookmarks. I hope all is well. Check out "The Arcade Fire" at your local store - they are pretty tasty and uber hip righ now-
p
Feb 3, 2005 ; 8:30 PM
Is "correspondent" more descriptive of those who participate in "message boards" or "chat rooms"? Where is the line drawn?
Jan 30, 2005 ; 8:51 PM