Hugh Macleod at gapingvoid.com has decided that, after 10 years, he will no longer blog his cartoons:
But like a lot of the folk who have been blogging for a long time, I’ve started to feel that over the last few years, that the blogosphere has just gotten too big, noisy and anonymous. I’ve started longing for the days when things were ’smaller’, ‘clubbier’, intimate and, well, human. When the people I met were truly like-minded.
Like many bloggers, I’ve used Hugh’s cartoons to illustrate my posts and presentations and today’s reflects the zeitgeist, especially amongst my fellow free agents:
Hugh’s decision reminds of Virginia Yonker’s observations about blogging:
I am feeling that I am coming into the middle of a conversation (or the end of a conversation) that was started somewhere else (such as twitter or facebook). It appears that blogging is the reflective or summary of those conversations. Karyn Romeis still has a very conversational style, but she will refer to other conversations she has had on facebook. Harold Jarche will refer to others at aggregated blog sites where he is collaborating with colleagues. As a result, I don’t feel that there is as much “conversation” on blogs as there used to be. In addition, I have noticed that Michael, Harold, Karyn, and Tony all have easy access to Twitter on their sites. Ken Allan has moved into a different rhelm this year: 2nd life. His posts often include graphics taken from 2nd Life. In fact, some blogs that I have been reading for the last couple of years either took hyatises or have not had posts in months.
It’s amazing that as new as blogging is, it’s already feeling old. These changes in media are only going to speed up and soon we’ll be wishing for the good old days of Facebook and Twitter. I don’t think that the answer is to constantly look for the next big thing, but each person has to find their own rhythm in the digital flow. Life in perpetual Beta is interesting, if nothing else.
