Hello world

I started keeping a diary in July 2005.  I had just finished my A-levels and I was nervously awaiting my results, desperately hoping that I'd done enough to go to university in Edinburgh.  It was a summer of change, of strengthening friendships, getting my head around having an overdraft, moving out, feeding myself up before moving out, being 'a proper adult'.

In 2005 the blogosphere was probably less crowded than it is today, but it wouldn't have been too 'far out' to ditch the notebook and blog about my university experiences as a fresher.  Interestingly the thought never crossed my mind.  The idea of a blog is an online journal, and yet the paper and web-based versions are massively different things.  One is self-publicising, open to dialogue and impossible to delete.  The other is a totally private arena where you can express any opinion, write about absolutely everything because it's only you who you intend to ever read it.  One hopes that everyone respects that, of course...

I hope that writing this blog about work will give me a fresh insight into blogging as a whole.  I already tweet (@OliverRobert if you know me), but I protect my tweets after frustrating experiences with endless spam.  This probably defeats the point of tweeting at all, it hardly allows me to enter the global debate or break news.  But I find it works me for, as I mainly tweet about tea and political outrage, communicate with friends and just read the headlines while I do other things online.  When it comes to 'macroblogging' (coined a term?) for an exercise like 23 Things City it makes perfect sense to reflect in an accessible arena, to help us share our thoughts and ideas.  Blogs seem like an excellent way to share information, whether it's a workplace blog, a product blog, or on a specific theme.  A couple of friends of mine write hilarious and informative posts about their adventures travelling in India on the Frankelby family blog, which is a great way for us all to know they're doing well.

However, I think for too long I've had a prejudice against blogs.  I associate them with all those people who excitedly type away, or even make vlogs, about their (is it too harsh to say mundane?) every day lives. As a militant diarist I don't know why they'd want to disclose so much without going off on random tangents, adding personal confessions, remembrances and rants.  But, I suppose, one persons mundane is another persons intrigue.  In our open, globalised world, you never know who is going to be reading.  I could end up a minor celebrity on some far flung pacific island as a result of this.  But maybe that's my problem: I really hope not.