Blogicide

Or the habit of terminating blogs. I've seen this happen on several occasions. Someone maintains a blog for a reasonably lengthy period of time... and then the entries start to become less frequent... and then, one day, *poof*, the blog is gone. I've done it myself, and I'm beginning to suspect that it's a fairly common occurrence.

I'm not sure why it happens. Hell, I can't even satisfactorily explain why I killed my own blog. Sure, I grew disinterested in blogging, but that doesn't explain why I terminated the blog. I could have just left it there to gather dust, an archive of my mindless ruminations on the web. I deleted a helluva lot of posts. Perhaps it's because I hate reading over stuff I've written, especially when I look back on it years later. Perhaps I didn't like the idea of having stuff that could be associated with the "real me" left lying around on the web. Not that I was saying anything controversial mind you - just that I'm paranoid and worry about things coming back to bite me in the ass.

As to why other people do it, one can only speculate. Their reasons may be the same as mine. Or they may be reasons that I can't even imagine. Either way, I find it interesting and just a little amusing. It also makes me wonder whether they set up shop someplace else, like I did. Maybe to re-invent themselves, or to break free of the shackles associated with their old blogs.

I decided to go the anonymous route this time around. My first blog was known to people that I knew in real life, and while this seemed like a good idea at first, I grew to dislike it. Somehow, knowing the people who might read (although, admittedly most of them hardly ever checked it out) affected what I wrote, and the way I wrote it. I'm insanely private and keep even my banal thoughts close to my chest, and the whole 'open to the world' thing made me uncomfortable. Ironically, even though I write more freely now than I did before (i.e. without overthinking it), the stuff that ends up written is pretty similar!

There were some readers of my previous blog for whom the above does not apply... I didn't really worry about their perspective on my perspective (or something). I didn't bring them along for the ride though - I thought a nice, clean, anonymous reboot would be better. I regret that decision, and I miss the interaction... but it's too late to go back on it now... it's been too long. To them, I no longer blog. If they have (or ever do) tracked me down somehow and end up reading this, I'd like to let them know that I'm sorry for slinking off in the way I did. If you know me at all, you'll probably understand.

As for this blog, why do I update it? Why do I bother writing? I guess it's because I enjoy doing it and I regret deleting all the stuff I wrote before, no matter how bad it might have been. I write for myself now. I'm no longer concerned about who checks it out, or if people bother to check it out at all, be they friends, strangers, or ewoks. I used to be too caught up in the idea of blogging; I was too self-concious. I was obsessive enough to keep track of people's visits and so on. But not anymore. Now, the blog just is. And I'm much happier about it. The next time I get bored, I'll go into hibernation and pick things up again where I left off, instead of committing blogicide again.

This has been a rambling, unstructured, and somewhat more candid post than usual. I didn't intend to write all this when I started, but I went freeform for a while there. It was kinda fun! I should do it again sometime...