Wednesday, December 18, 2002
After reading -e-'s intentions (later retracted) to quit the blog world, his reasons, and the comments made by various people, it got me thinking about a few things. Before I go on, this isn't about -e-, or anyone who commented... just that his post got me thinking. For the record, I'm very glad he's chosen to stick around.So what am I thinking? Well... I guess it's part observation, and part prediction.
There seem to be a number of paralels between the blog world as it is now, and cb radio (yeah, I do still have a number of rigs stashed away in a cupboard). When cb started, it was a trucker thing, at least it was in the uk, with just a few home bases used by people who chatted with the truckers. Then it became legalised, and soon after, massively popular... everyone and his dog had a cb. It wasn't long before the old hands who'd been there from the start began complaining about all the newcomers who didn't know shit and were ruining the whole scene. Many was the time you'd hear such remarks as "You're not a real breaker... you've only been on channel for a couple of years. I was here before it was even legal, so show me a bit of respect." and suchlike. Sometimes it was a valid point, sometimes not. Even an old hand can talk shit, but that's beside the point... the situation is similar.
Anothere paralel was the "I've had it with this thing, I'm closing down and not coming back" type thing. You've heard/seen it in blogland, it was the same on cb. I mean no disrespect to anyone who's uttered such things in blogland... we all have bad days when we just think "stuff it" and end up saying it out loud, only to think better of it later... it's just a way of venting. As a rule though, when I see it/hear it being said, I don't believe it. For whatever reason, the people who leave just leave. No big announcement, they just don't come back. Probably they don't care any more who knows about it and who doesn't... other people's opninions on their leaving are irrelivant, and they just get on with their lives without blogging. To announce it suggest that a person still cares about the thing, and so are less likely to actually leave.
The paralel that I like most though is that of notorious bloggers. Everyone's heard of them... outspoken, opinionated, sometimes offensive, often very entertaining. Some people love them, others hate them, but by god, you can't ignore them... or even if you can, you're still aware that they exist. CB had it's notorious characters too. Very often, they were pushing huge amounts of transmitter power (illegal over here) so EVERYONE could hear them. They'd sit on the breaking channel all day, every day, and if something was on their mind, you couldn't help but hear about it. I suspect it was an ego thing among these people... all of those mega base stations had huge personalities to match their transmitter power. Thing is, though they had their admirers, a lot of people hated them, be it antennae envy or just a personality thing. However, whenever one of those people closed down, be it through choice, or was forced off by the authorities, the cb was a vastly poorer place for it. They may have been loud, and often obnoxious, but they kept the whole cb phenomenon going. They gave people something/someone to talk about, a focal point if you like. The simple truth is, the cb needed them, and in the same way, I think blogging needs outspoken people, those with big egos and personalities to match, who're prepared to stir things up a little. It doesn't matter what their motives are, or whether you like them or not... blogland simply needs them.
So... my prediction. I'm not really saying this WILL happen, but if the paralels run true, it may happen. After a few years, when cb wasn't a new thing any more, all the kids drifted away from it. There were still a lot of people around, and to be honest, I think this was the best period. There were a lot of really good people still using it, but it was no longer fashionable to be on channel, so only those who genuinely enjoyed it used it. You've seen it happen in blogs... a person starts a blog, writes in it every day for a couple of weeks... then it becomes sporadic, and then it stops altogether. It just wasn't as much fun to them as they'd expected.
The next phase was a large scale exodus from the cb, as the internet became more popular. People found a new means of communicating, and only the real die-hard breakers stuck with it. Will that happen here? Maybe. The whole thing's still in the fashionable craze stage at the moment, but you never know what the next big thing will be.
Ironically, the only people who use cb now are truckers, the same group that started the whole thing off. I wonder if that'll happen here... the only people doing it in the end may be a small minority who have a specific reason for doing it. I hope it doesn't go that far, to be honest, as the post craze phase was brilliant in cb-land, before it began to really die.
Labels: blogging
Steve 11:32 PM [+]
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