blogging dying?

Anything but blogging!

I've definitely been writing less on my personal blogs, and it is partly because I'm loving Twitter and getting deep into feeds on GoogleReader, but I certainly don't think blogging's dying. It's just evolving. On many of my favourite blogs, posts are shorter, more immediate, and provide little more than a jumping-off point. As people's readers become stuffed with feeds and their follow count rises and more commercial interests muscle in, there's just less room for updates and fully-formed opinion on absolutely everything.

How many tabs do you have open right now?

And then we get on to the subject of concentration span and how long one web page will hold anyone's interest these days…

Hmm and this one says it even better. I do feel that my ramblings on what a great surf I had are now no longer relevant to anyone, and I update and post much more frequently on the professional blogs I maintain. So often, in fact, that I often have to pretend I am one of my other colleagues so I don't look like a total geek. And to make them look good.

brain droppings

Gosh, where have I been? Head down on SurfGirl, mostly, and dreaming up a fantasical magical fantasy novel.

Seren's new catalogue popped through my door, and I want…all of it. But especially the Mabinogion retellings. Another idea that I never quite followed through on. Literally cannot wait for the Niall Griffiths one! (I am determined to make it to his Ty Newydd workshop.)

Death of the iBook is also making life difficult. I dream of a backlit keyboard and unibody, 13 inches and 250GB of Apple goodness…

Headline Analyzer

"What is the Headline Analyzer?

This free tool will analyze your headline to determine the Emotional Marketing Value (EMV) score."

Cool huh? I must be a pretty poor copywriter, because I'm not getting very high scores! And I'll admit, I was actually looking for a headline generator. When your editor has decided that a good title for an article about Europe would be, er, 'Europe' and you have to think something up at the last minute, boy would a headline generator be useful. I'll keep looking…otherwise I might have to use my brain, and it's not co-operating today.

Oh this is fun too - word association. I had it passing after 105. (Why do my threads always turn to filth after about 20? Hmm.)

mad mac

New MacBooks! There's just nothing like popping the lid on a well-designed piece of kit to ease you into a creative frame of mind…if I'm creating something beautiful (I hope), I want to use something beautiful.

'Just put your fingers on the crisp keys and you’ll feel pure typing bliss.' It might sound like bullshit…but I just know it's not.

'The amazing new trackpad doubles as a button — just press down anywhere and consider it clicked. No separate button means there’s 39 percent more room for your fingers to move on the silky glass surface. Now that Multi-Touch gestures have come to MacBook, all the function is in your fingers.' SideTrack has been my best buddy for a long time…this generates paroxysms of delight.

All just in time for Christmas lists!

Jobacle

I saw this article on the web and though, well, seriously though - is anyone surprised that lots of people waste lots of time at work? I have met some absolute masters at it, and I have to admit that having my own head down from nine to five, no stopping, is nigh on impossible…

So I wrote about it, and then thought, why not share this one? So I fired it over to Jobacle, which is the best job website I've ever come across – actually useful, funny and irreverant, it does a great job of helping you through your working life. Anyway, they published it!

Also check out True Office Confessions for a laugh (but careful, all that whinging might be contagious).

Freedom to write

And here's an answer to the internet addiction…turn it off for as long as you need! Freedom is a (Mac only) way to disconnect yourself, and only a restart or some UNIX fiddling will get you back online before the time you specified.

A bit scary?
A good idea.

Funny how these things turn up!