Thoughts after the Australian Blogging Conference
I wanted to post this last night but ended up getting a migraine and going to bed. I’m a bit sad that I wasn’t able to just head on down to the Normanby after the conference for drinks with the blogosphere but I have a toddler at home who needs my love too.
During the conference I couldn’t help feeling like I wasn’t meant to be there because a lot of the focus was on high readership blogs that have a brand and fulfill a purpose. Defining what is a successful blog was really on my mind for the whole day. I was asking myself whether I could be doing more on this blog, whether I should be aiming for something, setting some kind of goal to boost my readership or focus on a particular thing. At one of the panels it was noted that personal blogs rarely gain much readership where as blogs that have a “brand” are able to grow. I guess this is because a blog brand will change and adapt to try and capture an audience. When I say brand, I’m talking about this in a broad sense: not that we have a catchy logo but that the blog has a persona that is constructed carefully to appeal to a target audience.
If I have one criticism of the day, it was that blogging for mass readership and possibly money was emphasised over blogging for a small audience with not much agenda. Many people have personal blogs that they write just for the joy of writing and expressing themselves. If I had two criticisms of the day, I’d say that we didn’t spend enough time allowing conference attendees talk about their blogs and experiences blogging – although that kind of thing would have dragged on if it wasn’t carefully managed.
Another thread that ran through the day was discussing the role or place of blog related forums like facebook, twitter and tumblogs. I thought a good point was made that these can sometimes improve the quality of your blogging by giving you an outlet for things that you might just want to point to but would make a poor blog post. My own experience of the more closed social networks (where you only speak to your friends) is that they tend to have more discussion because not everyone will comment publicly on a blog.
On the whole I enjoyed getting away from work for a day to mix with people whom I’ve never met but whom I have some familiarity with through their blogs. I enjoyed being present in the vibe of a whole bunch of serious bloggers getting enthused about their art. If you missed this conference, it will probably be around next year in another city and is well worth it (especially because it’s free!). If you like, check out my twitters from the day (you might have to page through to 28 Sep 2007)
tags: blogoz
Posted: September 29th, 2007 under Blah, Culture.
Comments: 6
Comments
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Time: 30/9/2007, 5:46 pm
[...] Perhaps the most profitable part of the day was the networking over coffee and the evening spent at the Normanby Hotel networking with people like Des Walsh and Matthew Smith (Bogosity). It was great to meet up with Megan Bayliss from the Australian Carnival, and with Elliott Bledisloe at Creative Commons. Elliott and I were able to compare notes on the recent furore over Virgin Mobile’s use of Flickr images for their Are You With Us or What? campaign. [...]
Comment from Des Walsh
Time: 4/10/2007, 11:22 am
As one of the presenters on the business aspects of blogging, I believe “authentic voice” is and hopefully always will be more important than “brand focus”. Do you want to be remembered as the guy who wrote interestingly and from the heart, with passion, and gained a readership not necessarily huge but appreciative, or the purveyor of a cool, focused brand? :)
Your post throws into some relief the fact that it is still early days, in many respects, for blogging in Australia. I was pleasantly surprised that, given the setting, the day was not more academic in tone than it was. Reading your post, I see that there is room for more diversity in future.
Now if you were in the USA, or if you were able to hop on a plane next month, you could take in a more diverse scene at BlogWorld Expo and conference in Las Vegas. There is even a whole conference going on in parallel for people such as your good self, blogging on religion – GodBlogCon ‘07 is on at the same time, and also in that citadel of decadence.
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Time: 4/10/2007, 9:49 pm
[...] Matthew Smith who writes thoughtfully and with quiet passion on religion and other matters at Bogosity was not sure that this was the conference for him: During the conference I couldn’t help feeling like I wasn’t meant to be there because a lot of the focus was on high readership blogs that have a brand and fulfill a purpose. [...]
Comment from Ben Kraal
Time: 5/10/2007, 4:47 pm
There seems to have been two sides to BlogOz. On one hand there was the side you describe above, focussing on business-related sites with a goal of high volume traffic.
On the other hand, the Blogging Research and Blogging in Academia sessions seemed geared towards the experiences of “doing blogging” more so than others which seemed to directed at blogging for a business-oriented purpose.
Comment from djfoobarmatt
Time: 5/10/2007, 10:13 pm
Yeah i think some of my insecurities meant that I was highly attuned to anything that suggested to me that my blog is crap. I definitely went into the day feeling a bit on the ‘my blog is a non-event’ side of the blogging cycle. Reading other’s blogs of the day has made me remember that there was a lot more variety in the types of blogs talked about then what I chose to focus on at the time.
Comment from blue milk
Time: 30/9/2007, 12:08 am
Was a bit disappointed I couldn’t make it to this, hopefully hear more about it from you some time soon.