Have you ever wanted to look up information on something. You do a search on the Internet, and read a few “informational” blog posts, only to find that you don’t really feel like you found any information at all. It’s enough to make you wonder why you got rid of your encyclopedia set.
With day jobs and time scarcity many bloggers end up writing their blog posts on a deadline of 20 minutes. But they have an insatiable craving for readers and they start out believing readers are looking for quality content. So they search for ways to give readers a blog quality comparable to no other–but without going over their deadline. They begin the hunt for the elusive beast: “blog quality on a time budget.” And they end up chasing it, ceaselessly, like someone caught up in a wild faerie hunt.
Many readers crave simplicity and succinctness. They come home at the end of their day tired, and with precious little time of their own to spare. They want something short and to the point. Something that can be absorbed by just scanning the highlights. A good chunk of them were already staring at a screen all day. Maybe it’s become pure survival instinct to numb their mind to what they see on a screen.
Writers begin to pick up on this and decide that if they want to get an audience on a time budget, then they should cater to that crowd who wants to read on a time budget.
The need for speed afflicts both readers and writers and it is changing the face of information as we know it. Somewhere along the way, the Information Age has transformed into the Information-bite Age.
It’s also a well known fact among bloggers that blogging at least five times a week will increase your traffic. So not only are they publishing posts in bite size pieces, but they are also posting them frequently and these pieces and fragments are starting to pile up. Some of the people involved in this mess have good intentions and some don’t but both are paving the same road. I can’t help but wonder sometimes: Where is it all leading?
Is blog quality on a time budget a mythical beast or have we created a monster?
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Man, I’m lucky if I can get a blog posting up once a week! At least five times a week! Wow! I can’t see that in my near future. Not that I disagree with you. Time is definitely a problem–but so is priority. I guess my blog is pretty far down the priority list for me.
Right, well I think if I have to chose between writing posts every day just for the sake of boosting my traffic and writing something that I have put a lot of thought and effort into then I will stick with my once a week posts!