Since then, popular blogs have been commercialized; added comment sections and video; migrated to social media platforms; and been subsumed by large media companies. The growth of social media in particular has wiped out a particular kind of blogging that I sometimes miss: a text-based dialogue between bloggers that required more thought and care than dashing off 180 or 240 characters and calling it a day. In order to participate in the dialogue, you had to invest some effort in what media professionals now call “building an audience” and you couldn’t do that simply by shitposting or responding in facile ways to real arguments… More here.

Excellent article linked above and it highlights the fact that blogs are in many ways a dead format now.

Barring a few exceptions I suspect that most blogs as run by people who just like to write and share their thoughts, and who have little ambition in monetising the time taken. I do this, kind of out of habit, but also because it is an outlet for my thoughts which in someways makes no sense. I never look at the stats anymore and I so I don’t know who is linking to the site, who is visiting directly or if it is popular or dead. It is a conscious decision not to look because I would fully expect to see declining numbers year over year and I would rather now know.

Blogs require the person visiting to spend more than 1 minute to read the content and to, hopefully, make them think about what they are reading. In the age of YouTube, TikTok and social networks, asking for that level of commitment is crazy! You want more than a minute of my time? No Way! I have no attention span any more so it’s too much to ask.

I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not, it is just what it is…

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