Week 1
This first blog post finds me wondering what I learned in class all week. I remember talking about tumblr, the resurgence in the popularity of podcasts, how to write for blogs, and how bloggers are sometimes super bad ass and expose public figures for the bastards they really are.
As I'm writing this, my roommate asks me, "What even is blogging? I hate that word, 'blog.'" To which I say,
"Right, what even is blogging?"
back at him. I looked it up,
and, yet, it's still pretty loose in my mind, because what about Reddit and Wikileaks? When I started thinking about the discussion we had about those bloggers who exposed Dan Rather I immediately thought of the driven, info-maniacs behind Wikileaks and similar actors on the internet.
This would seem to be unlike blogging, yet, I'm sure there are certain posters who do so on a regular basis to a sharing site of some sort. Is this a blog?
Maybe not, but still interesting as far as internet vigilantes go.
It's incredible that anonymous, internet users have the capabilities and desire to out people on the internet with raw information.
It makes one wonder, who's the real "watchdog" of society at this point if more truthful news is published on sites by independent users than the mainstream news outlets? Further, are these Wikileaks users not just amateur journalists?
Although anonymous, the content of some of these posters has been more influential than any trained journalist could ever hope to be, for example, the releases that occurred in the last U.S. election.
Also these ones were pretty crazy:
And this information is readily available to anyone with an internet connection. Bless the bloggers/ hackers of the world.
I would never call myself a blogger, but I do have two different Tumblrs that I update regularly and one I do not really anymore. When I initially started a Tumblr, I didn't really know that it was technically a blog; each Tumblr url is its own blog.
I leagued it more with Facebook or Twitter, but it's really on a whole different plane.
What's on your Tumblr?
So, my primary blog I use as a journal/diary/for re-blogging cool pictures of art and nature and stuff that catches my eye. I mostly post a lot of poems and it's completely anonymous. I started it with the point of it being anonymous as some kind of creative outlet.
I've had it for a few years, post whenever I want to, and interact very little, if at all with my now 100 followers. 100 followers is not that much, but they often re-blog of like my poems, which is kind of nice.
Except for the fact that a lot of them are random porn blogs that have found me over the years? Thanks for the support, regardless.
My other blog, the one that I don't really use anymore, has no followers. There's probably a couple dozen posts, but I started it when I was first away from home.
This blog is just pictures of my face.
And I know that's super weird and I'm sure my own immediate reaction to hearing this would be a harsh assessment of this person's ego, but it's totally not like that.
I was pretty much super grossed out by my own face so I began posting pictures of said face not posing, or trying to take a good picture, without makeup, after I'd just cried, etc.
And, It was super uplifting, actually.
I don't really post pictures of myself, don't have an Instagram, have a snapchat, which I neglect now, but was pretty into a few years back. Pretty much, I was trying to desensitize myself to the natural, unpolished look of my face.
Which is like, why do you need to do that? You've had the same face forever?
But, yes, that was my rationale. So, I would scroll through these pics of my ugly face and it honestly helped me become more comfortable with my own imperfections and whatnot.
I think it's difficult among internet users, like me, to grow accustomed to not seeing images like this; especially those of themselves.
It's the whole taking a thousand selfies before one is mildly good enough to Snap with some unrelated caption that wore me out. No, that's not really what my un-contorted face looks like. Yes, I was paying heavy attention to the backlighting.
My profile pictures and the ones I would choose send to friends were obviously flattering pictures.
To a certain extent, I would almost pay more attention to these photos and have more exposure to them over and over again in my mind than my own natural reflection.
Can you believe that? And I'm sure many people could say this.
Not that I was staring at my own reflection in my phone all day, but I think sending out a flattering picture of oneself for others to see has more weight in their brain at the end of the day than the dreary character in the mirror first thing in the morning.
So, that was kind of all over the place.
Is that ok? I like things to be pretty free-form, conversational. Let me know if it was too all over the place and we can reel it in.
As I'm writing this, my roommate asks me, "What even is blogging? I hate that word, 'blog.'" To which I say,
"Right, what even is blogging?"
back at him. I looked it up,
This would seem to be unlike blogging, yet, I'm sure there are certain posters who do so on a regular basis to a sharing site of some sort. Is this a blog?
Maybe not, but still interesting as far as internet vigilantes go.
It's incredible that anonymous, internet users have the capabilities and desire to out people on the internet with raw information.
It makes one wonder, who's the real "watchdog" of society at this point if more truthful news is published on sites by independent users than the mainstream news outlets? Further, are these Wikileaks users not just amateur journalists?
Although anonymous, the content of some of these posters has been more influential than any trained journalist could ever hope to be, for example, the releases that occurred in the last U.S. election.
Also these ones were pretty crazy:
- Child sex trafficking emails discovered in Clinton email archive
- "Vault 7" by WikiLeaks, it is the largest ever publication of confidential, CIA documents
And this information is readily available to anyone with an internet connection. Bless the bloggers/ hackers of the world.
I would never call myself a blogger, but I do have two different Tumblrs that I update regularly and one I do not really anymore. When I initially started a Tumblr, I didn't really know that it was technically a blog; each Tumblr url is its own blog.
I leagued it more with Facebook or Twitter, but it's really on a whole different plane.
What's on your Tumblr?
So, my primary blog I use as a journal/diary/for re-blogging cool pictures of art and nature and stuff that catches my eye. I mostly post a lot of poems and it's completely anonymous. I started it with the point of it being anonymous as some kind of creative outlet.
I've had it for a few years, post whenever I want to, and interact very little, if at all with my now 100 followers. 100 followers is not that much, but they often re-blog of like my poems, which is kind of nice.
Except for the fact that a lot of them are random porn blogs that have found me over the years? Thanks for the support, regardless.
My other blog, the one that I don't really use anymore, has no followers. There's probably a couple dozen posts, but I started it when I was first away from home.
This blog is just pictures of my face.
And I know that's super weird and I'm sure my own immediate reaction to hearing this would be a harsh assessment of this person's ego, but it's totally not like that.
I was pretty much super grossed out by my own face so I began posting pictures of said face not posing, or trying to take a good picture, without makeup, after I'd just cried, etc.
And, It was super uplifting, actually.
I don't really post pictures of myself, don't have an Instagram, have a snapchat, which I neglect now, but was pretty into a few years back. Pretty much, I was trying to desensitize myself to the natural, unpolished look of my face.
Which is like, why do you need to do that? You've had the same face forever?
But, yes, that was my rationale. So, I would scroll through these pics of my ugly face and it honestly helped me become more comfortable with my own imperfections and whatnot.
I think it's difficult among internet users, like me, to grow accustomed to not seeing images like this; especially those of themselves.
It's the whole taking a thousand selfies before one is mildly good enough to Snap with some unrelated caption that wore me out. No, that's not really what my un-contorted face looks like. Yes, I was paying heavy attention to the backlighting.
My profile pictures and the ones I would choose send to friends were obviously flattering pictures.
To a certain extent, I would almost pay more attention to these photos and have more exposure to them over and over again in my mind than my own natural reflection.
Can you believe that? And I'm sure many people could say this.
Not that I was staring at my own reflection in my phone all day, but I think sending out a flattering picture of oneself for others to see has more weight in their brain at the end of the day than the dreary character in the mirror first thing in the morning.
So, that was kind of all over the place.
Is that ok? I like things to be pretty free-form, conversational. Let me know if it was too all over the place and we can reel it in.
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