Bloggerific!

I've finally awoken from my personal development slumber to take a sneaky peek at other (far more proactive and diligent) participants' blogs. Reassuringly there are a few newbies, as well as the consummate and enthusiastic professionals that I usually follow and read (via Twitter) with a cup of tea and a slice of sponge.

A year ago I embarked on the Cambridge 23 Things programme @ Cambridge which forced me into introduced me to blogging for the first time. I'm still wary of blogging myself, but now use blogs daily as not only a source of entertainment (one of my favourite ways to waste 5 mins every couple of weeks) but to keep up to date with current affairs in and out of the library & information world. As mentioned earlier, I mostly come across blogs via the medium of Twitter, clicking through to new blogs nearly every day. Some I subsequently follow fairly religiously, others I will probably never view again. Which makes me ask "what do some blogs have, that others clearly don't?"

There are two types of blogs that I veer towards: either informative/provocative with excellent links and comments (some gentle humour included perhaps; a spattering of profanity sometimes appreciated) or the pure entertainment value blogs (shoes/cartoons/vitriolic moany types). I myself find it difficult to straddle any of these areas without feeling ridiculous, hence my coyness with my own blog.

I recently attended a lecture at the Engineering Department here in Cambridge entitled "Blogging & Social Media" to try and get my head around the reasons behind blogging and how to (hopefully) do so effectively. The presenters included a member of the Community Affairs Team (who deal with outreach) and one of the Naked Scientists/Skeptics in the Pub. Both seemingly prolific bloggers/tweeters. Both had the same message to make; blogging is a tool for pushing out information and digitally engaging with people who are seeking that information (comments/links). Most importantly the Naked Scientist (disappointingly not actually naked) pointed out that blogging can be and should be as social and representative of the body that YOU've decided to portray. NS guy also pointed out that in this day of social unrest, blogging gives the tax-paying public a great insight in to what you currently have to offer, which provides a certain amount of transparency and possibility for instant engagement and reaction.

The University uses Wordpress as their blog content management system. The clever templates seemingly remove the need to create whole new websites as everything can link in to that one easily managed blog. I know that the Judge Business School Information Service has done similar to great effect. Most importantly what I took away from this session is that blogging is perfect for outreach, no matter who your audience may be; should and can run alongside facebook and twitter accounts as forms of engagement and information dissemination; on a professional level is great for self-promotion without the restraints of the more traditional avenue of publishing.

Phewfff... Goodness, my first serious blogpost in about 11 months, all done before 7:45 am... Time for 10 minutes of Pilates and a nice cup of tea (and maybe a further perusal of the blogosphere)

Toodlepip!