Thursday, June 07, 2007

24 hour blogging

I found the novelist Clare Dudman's account of her (nearly) 24 hour blog weirdly fascinating yesterday. I particularly liked this paragraph about the reaction of her teenage son:
According to Hodmandod Minor the act of blogging in itself is tragically sad and embarrassing - but this experiment of mine today has, to be frank (and he always is), has plumbed new depths.

'No offence.' He says. Finally.

It's made me think about the average age of bloggers - how many teenagers are there out there 'doing it'? I can't think of many - my daughter started a blog when I did, but got bored after her first entry, whereas I've kept on. And on. And on. Or is it just that the over-twenty-fives (and much over) aren't reading teenage blogs, or linking to them? Perhaps it is all 'tragically sad' and blogging is the new equivalent of getting everyone up on the dance floor as soon as 'some decent music' comes on just so you can strut your (much more considerable these days) stuff.

Oh but hey, we're still allowed some fun, aren't we? And we're not doing that much harm, tucked away in our little corner of the dance floor. After all, it's keeping us off Facebook and Myspace where we could really let ourselves go. OI!! WATCH THOSE FLAILING ARMS, GRANDDAD!!!!!!

And I'd happily do Clare's experiment myself, except I'd reveal just how many games of solitaire I play in the average day.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks Sarah, and glad it gave you food for thought. It really did make me realise just how much time I waste . I just wish I could do something about it. And yes, the teenage HM is just as sad in his own way - quite often I go past his room and hear him chuckling away at his computer as some message comes in.

L.M.Noonan said...

My teenagers fight for their net access time in order to MSN friends they've spent most of the school day with. They think my new recreation-blogging; bodes insanity or some age related illness.
Until you pointed it out however, I hadn't thought about how most 'bloggers' are mature...chronologically speaking

Sarah Salway said...

My pleasure, Clare. It really did make me think - a brave move on your part! And yes, l.m.noonan - I hadn't really thought about it before, but a lot of us are of a certain age. I'm not sure if it's because we DO have something to say, or are just so happy not to be interrupted by the freneticism (sp?) of life! I think the former - I continually get so much out of reading other people's blogs and finding out things I'm sure wouldn't come up in normal conversation.