In what is mostly likely to be the most *douchiest* thing that has ever been written by Jason Calacanis, he now declares blogging “dead”.
The funny thing is that this particular meme has some legs under other titles, such as “the evolution of conversation”, or “the further maturation of blogging”, or “the atomization of attention”.
But to declare blogging dead, and THEN spout off a list of reasons that are so myopic they border on cluelessness — its just plain narcissistic.
Here’s why.
His big claims as to why blogging dead revolves around a few ideas (I have parsed these heavily)
i) bloggers are dying to be heard via social “accelerants” like Digg or Techmeme
ii) they therefore spend more time promoting their posts than spending time *on* their posts, via Digg, Techmeme, or Twitter
iii) to excel in blogging means excelling in saying inflammatory things — i.e. link bait (yes, the irony is towering and overwhelming, I know)
iv) email lists avoid the promotion machine
v) email lists avoid the “problem” of an open conversation
I’m not going to debate each point, because, by now, I’m sure you’ve already seen the fallacy in each statement (but for a breakdown, see Steve Hodson).
But to suffice it to say that I found these ideas to be terribly narcissistic, only in so far that it seems narcissistic to condemn an entire way of communicating based on observations that really — by and large — involve experiences that are central to the way that a very narrow band of individuals have experienced them.
There are many, many, many other bloggers who don’t read Techmeme, and who don’t care. In the niches they occupy there aren’t “social accelerants”, because they don’t yet exist for those niches. And they may never yet. Try submitting something to Reddit on the wonders of single parent hood / mommyhood, or Digg on some interesting, yet obscure, scientific factoid, for example. You already know they’re not going anywhere.
And yet there are groups and ecosystems of bloggers out there, having a ball writing about these kinds of things. They are just as valid and just as existential as tech bloggers, and other heavy weight, or wannabe heavy weight bloggers that Mr. Calacanis is basing his opinions on.
In fact, the kind of phenomenon Mr. Calacanis is describing really describes, I’d say, a tiny, tiny percentage of bloggers out there. I mean, besides the tech blogging community, how many other bloggers are actively and as aggressively pursuing technologies like Twitter, Friendfeed, or Seesmic as a portion of their daily blogging “activities”?
You all know the round-about answer to that, and the answer of course is “nearly nil”.
So, to castigate and declare “dead” an entire medium like blogging based on some very narrow opinions is — well, yes, quite douchy indeed. And I dare say its narcissistic as well, as you’re assuming “everyone” (i.e. the blogosphere at large) is experiencing the same malaise over blogging that one person (or a small group of people) are.
Blogging is maturing, that’s true enough. There are tools now that didn’t exist years ago. Its even easier. And yet there are even more ways to broadcast your opinion and have other people interact back with you. Its not that blogging is *DEAD* so much that blogging is changing, and its role is changing within the ecosystem of conversations and online communications.
And if you can’t see that? Well, maybe you didn’t really get blogging in the first place.
July 13th, 2008 at 10:38 pm | Permalink
I agree with you completely. I was at an event the other night with two consultants who are tech futurists. One told the audience that blogging was on the verge of extinction. I challenged his comment and asked if blogs were maturing and changing instead, just like print has changed over time. It hasn’t died as some predicted it would in the mid-’90s.
July 13th, 2008 at 11:06 pm | Permalink
Good post that calls it as it is…Jason is declaring that he is opting out of his form of link-baity sensationalistic blogging and declaring the whole medium dead.
July 13th, 2008 at 11:09 pm | Permalink
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July 14th, 2008 at 12:30 am | Permalink
Blogging is Dead! Long live Blogging!!
Is it okay that I’m perfectly fine with someone who doesn’t really want to have “an open conversation” quitting blogging?
Seriously. Old media = creators + audience -> one way. Trying to keep your audience from responding is a step backwards.
July 14th, 2008 at 12:51 am | Permalink
if it’s the douchiest, why do you write about it? because he has a name? you lower yourself to what you are criticizing.
July 14th, 2008 at 7:49 am | Permalink
I can’t believe people are even paying attention to the noise he makes. Then again, this is the blogosphere and everyone is entitled to their own voice however “douchy” and “narcissistic” it is.
July 14th, 2008 at 1:49 pm | Permalink
And here I thought I’d coined my new buzzword for the week (tardsourcing) and you come up with douchiest. Too rad!
July 14th, 2008 at 6:01 pm | Permalink
@Andy — “tardsourcing” isn’t that bad either. ;)
July 14th, 2008 at 6:02 pm | Permalink
@jhay — true say, sir, true say. ;)
July 14th, 2008 at 6:05 pm | Permalink
@gregory — I disagree. We can talk and write about it because its about the larger issue of what blogging is and what it isn’t; and, where its going and how its evolving.
July 14th, 2008 at 6:10 pm | Permalink
@geekmommy — I think its a bit more complicated in Jason’s case, but I think I know what you mean.
July 14th, 2008 at 6:11 pm | Permalink
@elliot — thanks :)
July 14th, 2008 at 6:30 pm | Permalink
@Tony - isn’t *everything* a bit more complicated in Jason’s case? ;)
Seriously tho - while I believe he honestly intends to do this, I also believe that he will reconsider sometime within the next year. Blogging sort of gets in your blood. It provides a level of interaction that email digests and microblogging doesn’t.
Jason, for all his ups & downs, has proven that he’s a smart guy. If he reanalyzes it and decides he wants to start blogging again, he will.
But sometimes you have to try a thing in order to decide whether or not to discard it.
E-mail digests are a step backwards from even Usenet - which while wonderful in its day, was even more time consuming than blog interaction.
July 16th, 2008 at 12:02 pm | Permalink
How is it that I’ve been posting the same comment about Calacanis for like the past 3 years?
He’s an idiot douchebag and deserves no attention.