I’ve always been a fan of blogging, actually one of my goals in life -digitally speaking- is to set up my own blog and write about topics I’m really interested in sharing with the world. But here’s the struggle: since I was a teenager I haven’t found the required inspiration for getting it started plus my perception of the popularity of blogs being opaqued by social media has been increasing in the last couple of years.
Personally I believe that my excitement of writing a personal blog has decreased since the birth of social networks and vloggers (video bloggers), all this need for being read and heard when I was younger has been replaced with a single status in my Facebook profile and a picture uploaded in Instagram, therefore the likes and comments are my “readers” showing their engagement in my posts.
Honestly, by the time I knew I had to open a blog account for the course, my first thoughts were: But if we have so many new ways of communication, why blogging now? Is it still relevant nowadays? Now that the time for writing has finished, the answers started to appear by themselves.
Blogging is the method in which the authentic model of communication through words is developed, years before social media was even born, having your own blog was all that you needed to express yourself and it worked very well.
For example back in my country there is a very famous blogger called Romina Sacre who set her own blog a few years ago and now she is being followed by thousands of Mexican young adult females. I was analyzing her blog a few days ago and what I could appreciate about it was her seek to make you feel like her friend therefore she speaks in a very casual and authentic way.
I consider that one of the most important things for blogging is just being yourself through words, it may sound like a cliché but it happens to me every time I read something: the more you feel the writer is being genuine in her/his words, the more you feel empathic and interested as a reader.
Image from: Olivia’s Cuisine
That’s what I learned from this experience of setting a blog, even though the posts had to be related with topics about digital marketing or the MOOC you made it easier for your fellow classmates if you used a friendly tone inviting them to read about your thoughts at the very beginning. Furthermore I feel that at least for non native english speakers writing in english enriches our academic writing and enhances our critical thinking.
Generally speaking I feel that the spirit of blogging still remains, however having a blog means having readers as well and I perceive that reading at least between teenagers and young adults has become an effort more than a passion, so I consider that this type of exercises help us lighting the writer inside of us.