Blogtrax

I’m fascinated by the fluidity of the blogosphere. As texts blogs often appear to be unbounded - they change their look, their relationships, their links, paying little respect to any notions of fixity. Over a relatively short period of time we have re-skinned our blogs - Dr Joolz has changed provider - and we have changed the tools, processes and styles in which we blog. This fluid world is also characterised by frequent changes in reference points as the blogosphere reshapes itself. Our audience re-groups, we change our relationships to each other and we re-calibrate our frequency of commenting. Topics refresh and morph into new areas and some of our frequently-posting friends have for one reason or another become occasionals (Mary Plain and Simply Clare are cases in point). New bloggers have appeared and disappeared, and new kinds of possibilities have emerged. Some, like Kate, experiment with new forms… Professionally, apart from this shared metablog, we are both involved in Lets Get Digital and Critical Literacies - group blogs which aim to provide a forum for research and academic ideas - both difficult to promote and sustain. Is it, perhaps, that the real social affordance of the blog is about a performance of identity something that is harder for a group to achieve? Looking at the social architecture of blogging as opposed to photosharing, im or message boards one gets the sense of the personalised page - my space (isn’t the popular MySpace appropriately named, from this perspective?), an online shopwindow, a showcase, decorated like mine with my books, my CDs, my pics and so on. And I do, from time to time expend a little energy in arranging this window…yes, it’s interactive, yes, it is intertextual, hyperlinked and so on, but the starting point is me. The social architecture of other online spaces is rather different, and for me less personal. Commenting on someone else’s blog though is much the same experience as dropping a comment on a Runboard discussion group, or chatting on someone else’s photostream.

Recently, because of a project I’m involved in, I’ve been interacting with people in a virtual world. In a sense this feels much more like neutral territory - the social architecture is different, the interaction is far more conversational. Apart from the world itself, which gives the impression of fixity, the communication is far more ephemeral. Once I’m used to the subtleties of turn-taking (and waiting) in synchronous chat there’s an interesting freeflow of chat. Last night I met Andrew, who I know on RL and we talked about approaches to narrative writing in a virtual park - he was a spider, I was a dalek. I’ve also spoken to Susan in Michigan (who’s she in RL?) about building terraced houses, Zola and Rich in Finland (seen his pic on a website). Next time I visit that world is back to normal. I haven’t left a trace of myself there. My text has evaporated, my words erased. So this suggests a continuum - yes the blog rolls over (but it’s still archived); yes the blog topics change (but the old ones are still there). There is a leading edge to a blog. It’s right there where you just left it. It has a life beyond your posting, as does Flickr or a Runboard discussion and the archived memory is a key feature. Chat in whatever format is very different in texture.

I got excited on Friday. I’d spent an hour or so working on a book review and had just run out of energy. I took a break, had some tea and surfed a bit. Playfully looking around, I came across a programme someone had written. It generated letters a numbers from other people’s Flickr images. I wrote my name, quickly grabbed the accompanying html and pasted it into my blog with a ‘wow look what I’ve found’ or words rather like that. Along comes Mary Plain with a ‘Pray tell’ sort of comment. And then, of course later I spruced up the original post with some reflections (yawn) and the link…the link itself which Mary Plain (being a cool hunter) really wanted. That then set me thinking about links.

1. We can be quite dictatorial in our links. I’ve done it. I’ve seen others do it. No real comment- just look HERE they say. Or HERE, HERE and HERE. This is cool. This sort of link tries to drag the reader away…but does it? Probably not.

2. There’s the hyper-referencing link. So and so (linked) argues that, blah, blah, blah, blah but I think blah, blah. There’s an option here you can read the original or pass on. The writer gives you that choice (a bit like academic referencing it points you to the source).

3. Then there’s the name- check link that takes you to the person’s homepage, blog or photo. This sort of link just adds local colour.

4. Hybrids of the latter- place, company or self-referencing (also adding local colour, providing free advertising).

5. Affiliation-linking sometimes includes 3 and 4, but really strives to demonstrate allegiances, networks and so on. Affiliation linking shouts out THIS IS WHO I AM; THIS IS WHO I KNOW; THIS IS THE KIND OF PERSON I WANT YOU TO THINK I AM.

6. Source-linking. Well I think that’s what Mary Plain was after. I want to play this too, but can you tell me where to find it.

One of the things about blogging as hyperwriting is that it gets you to understand more about how linking works. And this has a knock on effect when you start reading and following/not following other people’s links. I think you get more discerning. Either that or you slip into bad habits. Some places I go and don’t really bother reading - just follow their links. Other places, what the person writes is usually far more worthwhile than following the links.

Hyperwriting is about making choices. Deciding when to link and when not to link. I know I’m very unsystematic. On some occasions I find I’ve found a lot of cool stuff during the day and I end up stitching my blog together around the links. The links end up being more important (to me as the writer). Other times I’ve got something I want to say. Maybe it doesn’t really need links, so it’ll depend upon whether I’m busy or not. On such occasions I might add a few links to pep it up, to add another layer of meanings or just for fun. If I’m pushed, tired or stressed I’ll probably think ‘Ah what the hell who needs links anyway.’ Now funnily enough that must be hyperwriting too. Deciding not to include links.

I had an experiment in mind, but it may take some time planning (sounds like hard work already). That’s to make a text that has a very thin slice of meaning on the page itself but is composed almost entirely of links that would communicate meaning through their very juxtaposition. I expect someone’s already done that, but it would be worth a try. One thing for sure - it would get you thinking about linking!

In an unprecedented outburst yesterday on DrJoolz I ranted about an article on how a mother, whilst praising the new blog craze for teens, also talked about the need to write contracts for her children to sign.

(Mental Note: Must not use blog to rant as this can be very offensive to others. Have learned valuable blogging lesson.)

Writing about that has since prompted me to think much more carefully about my view of The Internet generally and my view of blogging specifically.

Whilst I was under the impression that I was being a good little academic and aware of my positionality in relation to my work, I realise now how my experiences of the Internet are ofa very specific type- and so are those of my family .

I had not thought before about how our cultural capital extends to our online identities and that this has protected my family and I from unpleasant Internet exeriences. And how we do not ‘go’ to places that are the Internet equivalent of scarey alleyways - just cos we are not curious in such directions …

I was thinking about how I do not, (unlike many people I know) receive porn in the form of e mail spam (How have I escaped?) . I was also thinking about how I have only ever seen online pornography once. This was a pasted series of images in a comment on Justin Hall’s blog in response to his infamous crying episode. That was a link I picked up through Guy.

In fact Guy was upset about this as he felt he had inadvertently put porn on HIS blog, because he had linked to it. He felt he was tainted by association.

And our blogs’ fabrics are constituted of our links as well as our words and pictures (etc). Other people’s texts become part of ours, because we weave them in. And when we do that, we have to be careful that we do not misrepresent other people’s views (as I did yesterday), especially as we can potentially lead new readers to read the source in a way the original author did not intend - so therefore Will and Anya defended themselves in comments on my blog. (This is a great use of blog comments, to come back and say something in one’s defence.) All these affinities can be very positive and lead in the end to greater understandings as we visit and talk with each other. But my point here, is about how our blogs are continuous texts with each other; our links tie us together and are mutually constitutive (if I can say that?) . So in building texts we constantly re-affirm and regenerate what the group is. We are our associations. And that is why it is important the associations start off OK.

But look. Guy is an academic; Anya is an academic. Will is an academic. We have found each other through common interests through a series of links, through degrees of separataion. We have traced paths via each other and kept within a group with some pretty high status cultural capital. No wonder we love the web; we talk to people ‘like us’ and we go through the links on many people’s blogs in this way. Our network is safe.

Ok, back to the point. Many rightly worry that their kids’ blogs (etc.) will become tainted through association with others’.

An example: A hairdresser comes every now and then to our house to cut my daughters’ hair. Earlier this week she was talking about trying to keep her son off the net because of all the filthy pictures his friends send him via MSN. She said ‘they talk dirty’ and are nasty to each other. My daughter and I were amazed. ‘Why doesn’t he block them?’ she said. Our hairdresser explained that these were his ’so-called friends’ who he did not want to block.

Now all my daughter’s friends are ones she has met online; some of them come from a core group connected to a message board run by a charity for kids with ME. The others have come via recommendations from friends through this. So somehow they have come through a vetting system. Cultural capital of a sort. (On the other hand maybe my daughter has missed out on this essential adolescent bickering… is it important to go through? Maybe.)

In my little family I think we have kept to paths without realising. Bauman has written about how people trace paths through cities and experience cities differently from each other - and would describe the city very differently from each other.

This is what the Internet is like and I think I have taken this long to realise. So the lesson is, ‘be more patient with those who are nervous. ‘ They clearly have reasons, since they may have traced through paths which lead to areas where I never go or maybe they have only heard of these scarey areas and they might not know there are many safe places to go on the Net. I think I need to respect this a bit more and to be more aware of my priveleged position.

I have written about how our lives off line are blended with our online selves but had not thought about this in terms of cultural capital before. Our identities online remain tied to our offline selves in more ways than we know.

I have found the DrJoolz site a lot easier to keep up with lately. (Easier to write than this site at least.) I have enjoyed just putting bits and bobs of interest on there; I have realised that as time has gone on I have been writing much more for a particular group of people who I know are reading. More and more people have TOLD me they are reading and it is this group who I think about as I write.
I wondered whether this was somehow ‘wrong’ to write for a particular group - especially a group so small, intimate even - and not really in the spirit of ‘real’ blogging. Yes I feel there is a right way to do it (!) and it is one which should assume no particular people / readers and just kind of ‘put out there’ in a sort of, I don’t know,
‘noble’?, ’self interested’?, ’self-absorbed’?, ‘intellectually pure’? way, a wholeload of things that demonstrate my mind as being purely consistent and only interested in one thing. That consistent thing would just be the theme of the blog; one thing that is pursued, that is very important, significant meaningful and deep. (Yes I know other blogs are like mine, but I feel that as an academic, there should be this worthy stuff being put out on a daily basis - preferably with some political earnestness there too.)

After I went to the UKLA conference though, I wrote a lot about it (here, here and here for example) and I realise now that I was pretty much writing to explain to Anya, as I am always grateful to her for sharing her conferences online, so I put down what I thought she might be interested in.

But I also wrote for others who HAD attended the conference; I wanted to share my view and get feedback on theirs. I knew that everyone would still be thinking about it and may want to continue to interact on the same theme. And indeed this is what happened. I got quite a lot of comments and someone even sent me a link to one of the films shown by a keynote speaker - Mizuko Ito. So why blog it? Why is this the chosen mode?
I think that one of the reasons is that people can look at any time to see what I think. It is a way of communicating to many. I can use all the affordances of the wb - not just language.

I guess I like to get the reaction of many. It is also, of course, a pretty exhibitionist activity, to blog; to hold court and then wait to see what other people will say and do as a result. In some ways it is like writing a letter, the same letter to a lot of people. Except with a blog it is a public writing; like reading out on stage or ike a town crier shouting out at people whether they want to know or not! (Although they can always ignore me online.) In other ways, I feel like the whole thing is a bit like one of those inane chat shows. I don’t like chat shows really as they are so bizarre; a group of people talking to each other,witnessed by many - a live audience in the studio, and then anther audience which watches an edited version a lot later. A blogger seems to assume someone wants to listen to her - how vain. And a blogger’s audience is also a bit multilayered; consisting of people who know her in real life and read her blog; peole who know her as a blogger only but read her posts regularly; people who might read her work (published academic stuff) and find out about her blog; then there are those whohappen across the blog once and never read again; there are those who come across it and gradually visit more and more (etc.) These readers may or may not leave comments. And so there is this thing of layers, of degrees of involvement. So it is all more compicated than being just one type of person sharing an affinity space. Some are casual, some are keen , some - wel, here and there. ( Icould maybe do a diagram here - (;-0)

It has always seemed really pretentious to me, this strange thing of chat shows where they pretending they are in a lounge at home or something, and refer to interviewees as ‘guests’ (they are paid after all) - (sofas; drinks; flowers on the table; some ‘guests’ even bring presents) - Yes, I think the blog has a lot in common with that; this sort of pretense at exclusive views on the ‘real’ thoughts and so on of a guest; and it is presented as if to a group of friends - even though it goes totally public, is not exclusive etc etc. Except that people do sometimes choose to reveal a lot of their ‘private lives’ both on chat shows and on their blogs. In this way that ‘private/public’ thing is shared by blogs and by chat shows.

Another characteristic of how I write on my blog, is that although I write with a group of people in mind, I am always hoping for more like minded people to listen - and join in. Thus the use of links for people to follow up on previous conversations, allows them to ‘catch up’. Many links will not be read by -regulars’ as they refer to old stuff. In this way it is like explaining a family joke, or a bit of social history to a new member of the group. And this of course brings us yet again, back even closer to a ned to refine ‘Affinity Spaces’ as a concept. The drive to involve more people, comes from my constant desire to interact with others; to be social; to find more like me; so I can learn from them, with them, find out stuff. Anything. I love to follow their links; I love to have a reaction from others. I like to see them

’show and tell’

too. - as Guy would have it. (When is he back btw??)

OK I am wanting to describe the affiliations we have on the web in our online affinities.
I am planning to write an article on blogging academics for Discourse, (and is this too public to declare that here? Is it dangerous? Or does it help me stake out a space at an early stage?)

And I want to include the idea of power, not just about a lovely, cuddly creative commons, as there is clearly a pecking order, a hierarchy etc etc. I also want something in there about how the coming together of people from a llover the world allows for exciting dynamics and the creation of new cultures online. Do these then impact on our work as researchers?

Nice phrases I am thinking about:

· Third space

· Co construction

· Satellites of temporary coherences

· Cultures of participation

· Affinity spaces

· Communities of Practice

· Emergent/divergent cultures

· Glocalisation

· Glocality

· Synthetic cultures

· Synergetic cultures

How about …. Digital Glocalities??

This is all embryonic but I am thinking hard.

1.Originally, I started keeping a blog to see what it would be like to write something that would appear online. Having written about others and their online interactions, I wanted to know if I was right in some of my assumptions. I admired what I was looking at and wanted to do it too.
2. I find writing helps me to think through some of my ideas and I like the discipline of writing regualarly - however busy my day is with other things… I try to force myself to write daily.
3. I like the hybrid nature of the writing - it is part work and part play. As Anya said, something about boundary shifting. I think it is true that the boundaries of work/play merge for most academics and their inability to to distinguish is reflected in the blogs of many academics I think. Thanks to Anya for this insight.
4. I like the public/private tension of the space.
5. Writing helps me develop my ideas and I write them in my blog in a semi formed state; not ready for peer review as such, but open for peer commentary.
5. I like being part of an affinity space. This space is slightly uncertain as it is transitory to a degree and I am not quite sure where its boundaries are.
6. I like taking things from my meatspace experiences and rearranging them in cyberspace to look at as new text, s a narrative of sorts. These reconstructions come in the the form of digital images I take with my camera; words on the web-page that narrate aspects of my life; hyperlinks to show places I have been, things I have read, etc.
7. I like being part of digital culture network; I like the interaction.
8. I like producing texts that have hyperlinks and that have a range of modalities; it seems important as a cultural develoment and I want to be part of it.
9. I think this is a new form of writing and I want to research it.
10. I can communicate with people I know and people I do not know; I like not quite being sure who is reading.

Apologies that this post repeats a lot of what has gone before … but that is the nature of developing ideas and learning… it is circuitous.

I have just flipped through the open windows on my laptop and come to this helpful piece:

Blogs exist right on this border between what’s private and what’s
public, and often we see that they disappear deep into the private
sphere and reveal far too much information about the writer. When a
blog is good, it contains a tension between the two spheres, as delicate
a balancing act as the conversation of any experienced guest of
the French salons of the 19th century.

from page 8 in here.
(This links to the piece I posted a few minutes ago - look on the post below.)
It takes on the notion of the public private tension being more nuanced on a blog and mentions the comparison with face to face interaction.
And this here is so helpful too:

In some manner, the
writer is putting his or her daily experiences into a larger context, discussing
micro events in relation to the wider universe of events. The
weblog connects the public arena with that of individuals.

(Page 10)

This notion, that Turkle also writes about, in relation to online gaming of ‘writing oneself’, is highy pertinent I think. Here is Turkle on the topic:

‘as they participate they become authors not only of text but of themselves, constructing new selves through social interaction’, (1995:10)

Gorgeous.
I have used this in relation to online teen interation - on their message boards and their home pages etc.

(Caution, this post may offend)
For the first time I have started to feel nervous about putting posts up that may offend … that I may write something which is unacceptable .
This is a sign of my naivete. The private/public tension is an important dimension of the online world, I have always known that and I thought that I understood it was both these things. But I have had my epiphonous moment a bit late. Guy blogged ages ago that he was shocked when he found out Colin and Michele had read his blog; I have had a little bit of a shock wave go through me and I realise that nuances of what I write can carry across the web with different effects to what I imagined or intended.
Again I have always known that what ever anyone writes, if they put it in the public domain anyone else can do with it what they want, interpret it how they want and so on. They may read into what you have written something that you did not know was there or that you had not realised was there. Once your text is in the public domain, it is no longer just yours. And I guess I have experienced this properly now… and I feel really strange that I have offended someone - especially as in meat space I tend to inconvenience myself not to do so. I think this whole area is more nuanced on the web as most online publishing is instant - not edited or reviewed by others. (Especially blogs of course which are by nature more subjective, reflective, personal etc.)

Maybe in meat space we (I?) am more able to avoid culture clash miscues as I can see who I am interacting with and will adjust what I say, how I say, etc.This is much less easily done online and indeed if we try to avoid offending all possible readers, then what we say may become impossibly bland and non commmittal to the point of not being able to express one’s view. So,maybe online communities, which I have observed to develop mini cultures, need to do so in order to define parameters that are over and above ‘other’ culture affiliations…
So how therefore did I offend someone online? Maybe because the person I offended was not really in my affinity space at all and maybe because global nettiquette is still developing … hmm perhaps I need to think about the notion of micro cultures in relation to affinity spaces.

OK the info for this post actually is lifted straight from the comments from this morning’s post. But it is all so interesting I want it out on the front level (so to speak) with a chance for me to reflect on it a bit..
There has been a bit of a row Anya told me and Torill gave me the headsup here
Apparently people have been saying that to have a blog roll means that it delimits the blogs that are read; it prioritises the work of a smaller community and means that people are not so experimental in their reading. This narrows the blogosphere and makes a few people more powerful. Others have argued that blogrolls are useful as references for they allow you to explore avenues of like minded individuals and in fact spread the word rather than limit. You can trace bits of the debate here.

And of course, ironically some of these sites have excellent blogrolls.

However I don’t want to think about this within that kind of parameter; I have written elsewhere about the way links work to define communities; to lend coherence; to foster a sense of belonging and to show where more can be learned. I have also thought a lot about how such links (and other things) support the accumulation of social capital and that sites are often structured to do so. I think it is probably always going to be the case that somehow all activity online will be situated within some kind of power construct .. (am I becoming a Marxist after all?)
Funnily enough, witnessing this grown up row amongst veteran bloggers (after all I am only a newbie) made me feel like I was standing outside the kitchen door while Mum and Dad were arguing on the other side. There is a whole old social history behind all that lot and I have not been part of it. They all knew each other while I was scratching out my name on parchment. Bitch PhD referrred to big bloggers (!) at one point which I think rightly recognises the status (right word?) pervasiveness (?) of some blogs in the academic community of which hers is no doubt one. (Hey, but who exactly is she? Does ANYONE know?)

Anyway it is all fascinating and I am grateful to Anya and Torill for letting me in on all this.

And hey Guy!! If you ever read this … the great Torill Mortensen left a comment on our blog. We are on the map my chicken!!

Middle Earth Duck Pond
Originally uploaded by BobJack.

My ephemeral digital posts lengthen with time, expanding with a confidence to say new things, and garnished with a certain recklessness. More involvement with an online community of bloggers, readers (both known and unknown), and Flickr-sharers is a causal factor, put together with an increase in blog consumption. So my/our blogs evolve, including this one, as we develop heteronymic works, discover new voices, new ideas and new skills.

Dr Joolz has talked about the kind of osmotic learning that takes place around blogging: a bit of html, the subtle art of tagging and so on. Recently, I’ve been wanting to index my posts but found the Blogger advice too dense. Easy to get lost in the hinterland of geek technology. Then I got into Blogstreet, attracted to the neighbourhood/proximity concept, but I find I’m out of my depth there too. And most recently of all I’ve been looking at RSS feeds but can’t quite grasp how they work, or even if I’d have the time or energy to engage with them.

Is this technological hinterland a place to colonise, or is it best left alone if all you’re interested in is the writing? The trouble is the writing itself and the technology to write subtley infuse one another. Perhaps, to be lost in the hinterland is to wish for a map.