Pen-Elayne on the Web

Newbie Notes

Tim Dunlop (link at sidebar) offers up his advice in Letters to a New Blogger. This is one of those times I shrug and say, "but isn't all that just common sense?" before remembering that I've been doing one-to-many communications since I was 13 years old and passing around stories (a page at a time, right after I'd finished writing them) in homeroom. During my high school and college years I had up to 150 penpals. After college I self-published two overlapping zines for a decade each, wrote for apas, then Usenet and message boards and now blogs. Everything Tim says about blogging can easily apply to most of these other endeavors; the scope and tools and pace may have changed, but it's still essentially one-to-many writing. So if you truly are a newbie to this kind of communication, I'd recommend the Letter. Otherwise, keep on keeping on with the same kind of sensibilities you've used in your other 1-2-M writings.