Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Blogs on hiatus

I've noticed another disturbing trend in blogging: bloggers are putting their sites on hiatus.

This is hardly anything new, to be sure. What disturbs me is that it's happening with some blogs that I used to read on a regular basis.

One of the first bloggers to do this was Fran at Fran's Funky Blog'O'Love. She hasn't updated since March 3 of this year. But I have chatted with her very recently, and for as busy as she was before she went on hiatus, she's even busier now.

Lisa at Amazing Grace hasn't posted since April 2. I have also chatted with her since then, and I am hoping she will begin blogging again sometime soon.

M.J. Simpson officially stopped posting to Planet Magrathea on April 17, for reasons given here. Of all the sites that I visit, his was the one that I always knew would have one or more new posts each day, always about things that interested me. Several of us hope that he will someday relent and resume posting, but for now that doesn't look very likely. Too bad for us.

Chloe's last post to Watermelon Punch was May 15th, but as of this weekend her site has been replaced by a generic page. I'm hoping everything is OK with her. Her daily visits at the beginning of June were about 100/day; as of a week ago, they were 400/day; as of this weekend, they were down to zero.

Finally, SuperG announced this past Sunday that he's done with My Distractions In This Modern Age. I'm hoping he comes back soon.

I've set the links to these blogs aside in a "Blogs on hiatus" part of my sidebar. As they come back online, I'll restore them to the main "Blog links" section. I look forward to the day that I can do that for each of these blogs.

6 comments:

rimalicious said...

and what of those of us who are posting much more regularly? do we get props or something? or are you being a realist and expecting it wont last long?

Super G said...

Perhaps it represents some kind of blogging Zeitgeist. Whenever I take some kind of action, I always figure it is being acted out by other people at the same time. Our actions are never really unique, but really us doing it is parter of some greater trend.

The "glass half full" type interprets that as all of their actions are meaningless. My egotistical side interprets it as that whenever I do something, others will follow. My logical side tells me there are so many people that the forces acting on me are also acting on others in similar situations.

So, you observe a cluster blogs ending. Is it a sentinel event or just an coincidence? I think it may be a sentinel event.

D.B. Echo said...

Rima, you'll get props! I do these "metablogs" - entries about blags and blogging - once every few months, and I think I've given y'all a shout-out a time or two before. I will again, soon! (By the way, it's just a little past the one-year anniversary of your first comment on my blog!) In this case, I'm just observing something I'm hoping isn't a trend - I don't wanna play "last man standing" (or in this case, "last blogger blogging".)

SuperG, I honestly think it's a case of people realizing that their lives are rich and full and interesting enough that they'd rather spend their time living them than writing about them. Which is more a comment on me than on anybody else. Or, as a certain Physicist-drummer (not Richard Feynman) put it, "If I had enough time to write everything about my life in a blog, I wouldn't!"

Super G said...

My day tends to start before 6 am and end around 9:30 pm. Blogging was a break from me.

We're changing things dramatically at my company. It requires my full attention but there is a big potential pay out in the end (or we'll have to lay off some people - sort of do or die). I'm hoping to come back with more with a regular website when things calm down. Places like globat.com are so cheap that you can't really lose anything.

There is also some kind of psychological aspect in cutting things off, but I haven't figured it out yet.

Anonymous said...

harold, to me it seems that all of the blogs i have read thus far read like diaries. people have written daily journals from the beginning of writing i suppose.
this seems like the electronic form?
my guess is anyone who did it on a steady basis will pick it up again at one time or another. let me know if i'm right?

Anonymous said...

Speaking of schlongs...Ricky informed me last night that he had a rash on his "Scranton".
On further investigation it was a small rash on his "scrotum" from wearing bathing suits etc.
When I corrected him on the word he said "Well, can I just say nutsack?"
I do not have a clue where he heard any of the above.....