Blog Surfing

I see that already some of my classmates have posted their blogs for class, so I decided to try and get a handle on what I wanted to do with mine. While I did read the articles from class, I don't feel like writing about them (at least not as if this was a book report). This is supposed to be commentary, so I'm commenting.

What I want to write about, what really sort of shocked me was what I found while procrastinating. You see, late Sunday night, early Monday morning is when I end up doing everything I've put off. So instead of jumping right in and writing off a quick blog, I decided to check out the profile page and all that other fun stuff. After playing around, I found that when you view your profile you can click on your interests (be it movie, book, etc.) and that will bring up TONS of profiles that mention the same obscure phrase, movie, or book - the one you thought ONLY you knew about.

Ok, maybe you're asking, so what?

Try it. Then think about it.

You can read about how there are millions of people out there in cyberspace, psychos, hackers, perverts, bored housewives, gossips, conspiracy theorists and the likes, but it's amazing to see it. And even more amazing to realize that you share some of the same interests, if not views, as any of them.

Now, how does this relate to blogs as a medium for communication - The answer is right here.

A blog, unlike most other news outlets, has no target audience. Your reader might be that kid in Hong Kong who likes Godzilla re-runs or that retired piano teacher in Idaho who adores The Great Gatsby. How someone stumbles onto your blog is wonderfully random. It means that you have the power, not just by content alone, to share your views (both big and small) with virtually anyone in the world.

As always, with power comes responsibility. Its one thing to bad mouth an ex-boyfriend to your gal pals -it's another thing to broadcast it to the world, pictures included. Earlier tonight (while procrastinating) I spoke to a web designer pal of mine; we ended up arguing about what constitutes art and who decides. Basically what it came down to was while some people might see a pile of dog poop with a twig in it and call it "art," other people would call it, well you know. Which sort of brings us back to blogs, while some people might call it journalism, other people might call it (see above). Who decides where to draw the line between art and poop and "real" journalism and gossip? When a line begins to blur, which side do you stand on? I guess it comes down to this; I wouldn't discredit Dali because Jackson Pollack threw paint on a canvas. I wouldn't just write off art as a medium because someone takes it in a direction that I don't care for. The same thing goes for blogs. They aren't created equally - but a discerning critic should be able to tell the difference between art and poo.