As I scroll through the popular pages of the World Wide Web in the new year of 2016, I find myself reminiscing my Xanga and Blogspot years where I spent hours writing, not for eprops, but for the pure pleasure that writing brings to my daydream-prone brain. Nowadays in the big WWW, I see clickbait like “46 Life-style Changing Tips Every Woman Should Know” (Yes, it’s real), #hashtags, and moving pictures like in Harry Potter (disclaimer: GIFs bring me much joy).
So where’s all the actual blogging?
“Tumblr!” people say. Even so, Tumblr is a fairly loud platform with users posting 20+ images, GIFs, repostings, linked to FB and Twitter, shares, and other ways for more people to read your innermost and deepest thoughts as if you wanted to publicize it all. It’s as if everyone wants to be known by everyone! The absurdity. No, I wouldn’t count that Tumblr as a pure blogging site.
I notice that many company or organization’s sites have blogs, but I don’t count them since they’re probably paid to write. Either that or they’re asked to write for them. No, not quite a blog in the sense of an individual writing to their heart’s content.
Do people even use the word “blog” now? As I’m writing this post, I’m not even sure if people born after 1998 will have the same definition of a blog as me. Weird. And interesting.
Perhaps I need to get with the times, join the bandwagon, and start adding cool ephemeral photos or those pictures with big white block-like letters… Yeah, memes. But there’s something raw and genuine I miss about reading the content of someone’s mind through the simple format of paragraphs, sentences, and words. Seeing the world through another’s eyes in actual words reveals who they are at their deepest core. Their voice emerges from the page and you begin to see where they’re coming from, what they’re feeling, sensing, thinking. The uniqueness of the written word is one of the most powerful forms of art, history, communication, and the heart. By no means is writing the only way to express what you desire to convey but it has developed with humanity as long as we’ve ever known.
And, well, here I am. Attempting to revive this old blog (or Tumblr) of NYNT, New York New Tiffo. I think I’m due for a name change by the way. That season has passed I’m ready for a new one. Hello, 2016. It’s me.
