Since
I'm resolving, as a cis person, to talk about transgender issues more
often, I wish to explain the personal trajectory that lead to my current
perspective.
I first started identifying
as queer in 2009. More specifically, I'm gay gray-A, meaning that I'm
on the boundaries between asexual and gay. Back then, I was nominally
accepting of trans people, but I didn't think about them that much. And
the reality is that in this society, transphobia and ignorance are so
pervasive that if you haven't thought about it you are almost certainly
the holder of many problematic views and behaviors.
But
I would say I was eager to learn, and here enters the asexual
influence. Asexuals were a small group that hardly anyone in the queer
student
groups understood or spoke of. Transgender people were in the same
boat. Clearly we should be friends.
Essential commentators
I
didn't actually have a personal friend who was trans until 2010. We
were both affiliated with queer-themed housing and were outcasts of
sorts from the main cliques (which consisted of gay men and straight
women, naturally). We ended up talking a lot about trans issues, often
so she could vent about things that other people in the house were
saying.
This was of course very eye-opening. But the
most eye-opening stuff I learned was not trans 101, but learning about
the turbulence of trans politics. The very first thing I learned about
were trans-exclusive feminists. And then the real kicker was learning
about transphobia among trans people. The overall impression I had was of a bunch of people on a boat
that's been hit with a missile. As it sinks, everyone shouts over whose
fault it was and then tries to throw each other off the boat.
That
isn't what you'd think of as an ideal introduction to a subject. But I
tend to think inter- and intra-community conflict is intriguing and
hashes out a lot of details that would otherwise go undeveloped. And
sometimes skipping to the advanced issues makes the basic issues seem
all the more obvious and urgent.
Since
then, I've found trans writers to be essential commentators. I don't
mean to treat trans people like magical social justice wizards, but
over the years I happened to like a lot of social justice critics who were trans activists. I don't know if I could really pin down the emotional
reasons why. I would say... progressive movements are absolutely
essential to trans people, but trans people also tend to have a healthy
degree of cynicism about the same movements. I also need those
progressive movements, and need that cynicism.
Non-binary aces
Most
of the trans writers I'm thinking of are trans women. But my central image of a trans person is someone who is non-binary. Because being in the ace community, non-binary people are
everywhere. There are more non-binary people than there are men.
A few anecdotes might establish that
non-binary people weren't simply present, but taking important roles.
Back in 2011, I wrote a short history of the Livejournal asexuality community. That history was based on an interview I had with
the founder, Nat Titman; Nat is non-binary. They're like the dark
knight of asexuality. They played a very important role, but dropped
out of public view for many years, partially out of concern that people
would confuse asexuality with gender.
Also in 2011, I
conducted an interview (not available online) with Charlie, one of the
figures in the Transyada community. The Transyadas were a big deal in
2011. They started out as a massive thread on the AVEN forums, but
later decamped and moved to the Transyada forums. Note the reason they
decamped was because they were dissatisfied with the amount of
transphobia on AVEN, so that's a hint while non-binary people have
always been around, ace communities haven't always been friendly to
them.
Aside from that, I've had many colleagues, cobloggers, copanelists, interviewees, and friends who were non-binary.
That
said, I've never made any concerted effort to learn about non-binary
issues. What I know about non-binary people is
mostly from osmosis over the years. I understand pronouns, and much of the vocabulary, but that's very much on a different level from being able to blog about it extensively.
On blog focus
When
you have a personal blog, your choice of topics is a very personal
decision, and one that I don't need to defend. But I'll briefly comment
on why I haven't blogged much about trans issues in the past despite
considering them important.
The basic reason is that I mostly use
this blog to share original thoughts. When it comes to trans issues,
the most appropriate thing is not to share my original thoughts, but to
amplify trans voices. And I don't have very much power to amplify so
what's the point?
I feel the same way about Black Lives Matter.
It's a very important movement but also I don't know what to say about
it. When I comment on an issue, I tend to complicate things and add
nuance. But do I really need to bring any nuance to the issue of police
being violently racist? That strikes me as straightforward.
But now I want to talk more about trans issues. Following my usual blogging style, that means adding nuance. But I'm keenly aware that
as a cis person, my ability to add nuance is limited, and I will ultimately make mistakes. I hope I have
enough trans readers around that they'll poke me if I say something
wrong.
TL;DR
-Trans issues are
important to me, and I also find trans women activists to be great
social critics in general.
-In my experience with the ace community, I
interact with a lot of non-binary people, but I don't necessarily
understand their issues in great depth.
-As I begin to comment more on
trans issues, I try to be aware of the limitations in my cis perspective.
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogging. Show all posts
Friday, August 28, 2015
Wednesday, August 5, 2015
Sometimes you de-escalate, sometimes you escalate
In the past week or so, I've been watching not one but two blogging controversies. If you follow both my blogs consistently, you've already heard all about them. Otherwise, this is vague-blogging.
The first blogging controversy, from the atheosphere, concerns a certain individual. I'm very critical of her, but also I think she already has more criticism than she can handle, and I'm worried that the whole thing will blow up in a bad way. It might still blow up in any case, and I don't have much control over that. But for the time being, I'm choosing not to speak directly about it.
The second blogging controversy, from the asexosphere, concerns a certain website. Among other things, I got a Life Achievement: threaten to take down a website for copyright violations. People had more politely raised the issue months ago, and the website just twiddled its thumbs until more people recently got angry about it. Escalation was necessary.
These two controversies provide an interesting contrast. Note that my chosen strategy goes against the conventional wisdom in the respective communities. The atheosphere is very confrontational and escalates every conflict; the asexosphere is very conflict-averse.
My take-away lessons: No single strategy works everywhere. Communities too often stick to whatever strategy has worked in their past, without regard to the current context. Criticism should be moderated if you think you're just contributing to a pile-on. If you don't want people to get angry, you better not wait until they get angry to address their concerns.
The first blogging controversy, from the atheosphere, concerns a certain individual. I'm very critical of her, but also I think she already has more criticism than she can handle, and I'm worried that the whole thing will blow up in a bad way. It might still blow up in any case, and I don't have much control over that. But for the time being, I'm choosing not to speak directly about it.
The second blogging controversy, from the asexosphere, concerns a certain website. Among other things, I got a Life Achievement: threaten to take down a website for copyright violations. People had more politely raised the issue months ago, and the website just twiddled its thumbs until more people recently got angry about it. Escalation was necessary.
These two controversies provide an interesting contrast. Note that my chosen strategy goes against the conventional wisdom in the respective communities. The atheosphere is very confrontational and escalates every conflict; the asexosphere is very conflict-averse.
My take-away lessons: No single strategy works everywhere. Communities too often stick to whatever strategy has worked in their past, without regard to the current context. Criticism should be moderated if you think you're just contributing to a pile-on. If you don't want people to get angry, you better not wait until they get angry to address their concerns.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Popularity contest
(This is not in reference to any particular incident.)
When big name bloggers argue with each other, one of the ways they can insult each other is by belittling the size of the other's audience. You do realize, that most readers of your blogs have smaller audiences still?
I guess the thrust of the insult is to say that someone has little power, and their arguments have failed to persuade any significant number of people. But yeah, this insult has problems, and speaks to the bias that popular bloggers have as a class of people.
Now, when the same insults are used by the blog commenters... I don't even know what to say about that.
When big name bloggers argue with each other, one of the ways they can insult each other is by belittling the size of the other's audience. You do realize, that most readers of your blogs have smaller audiences still?
I guess the thrust of the insult is to say that someone has little power, and their arguments have failed to persuade any significant number of people. But yeah, this insult has problems, and speaks to the bias that popular bloggers have as a class of people.
Now, when the same insults are used by the blog commenters... I don't even know what to say about that.
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
In which I am mean to trolls
Recently, I got one of my first trolls since the comments RSS feed went down. It was rather amusing.
They were saying, asexuality is bullshit. So I responded in a particularly mean way: I asked them to explain their opinions, and then justify them with reasoned arguments. It's funny because your average troll doesn't know how to offer reasoned arguments for shit. This particular troll didn't even seem to understand why it was necessary.
A little background. Given that my blog is not that widely read, and does not have particularly active comment sections, I generally don't attract trolls. The trolls that I do attract, are typically wayward googlers (as I tend to think of them) who found some old page in my archives on the second page of some search term I don't care about. Usually they're just incensed by the topic and don't respond in any way to what I wrote.
Before, other people could theoretically see the trolls' comments via the "recent comments" on the sidebar or following the comments RSS feed. There weren't many readers tracking comments in the first place, but now that these features are broken, the only person who can possibly see the trolls' comments is me, because I alone have access to the moderation queue. If the trolls are trying to get attention, they are doing it in about the least effective way possible.
In short, the only trolls I get are the ones who are thoroughly incompetent.
There are basically four reasons why I might care about a person's opinion:
1. The person has power.
2. I care about the person.
3. The opinion is backed up by arguments.
4. The opinion is succinct, eloquent, novel, or otherwise intrinsically interesting.
In the case of incompetent rando trolls, they don't have power, I don't care about them, they are too incompetent to argue, and too tedious to be interesting. I like to poke at them until they either make coherent arguments or realize they've been wasting their time all along.
Of course, I'm much nicer to commenters who don't appear to be trolling. Even when commenters don't offer supporting arguments for points of disagreement, I at least tend to care about their opinions by #2.
They were saying, asexuality is bullshit. So I responded in a particularly mean way: I asked them to explain their opinions, and then justify them with reasoned arguments. It's funny because your average troll doesn't know how to offer reasoned arguments for shit. This particular troll didn't even seem to understand why it was necessary.
A little background. Given that my blog is not that widely read, and does not have particularly active comment sections, I generally don't attract trolls. The trolls that I do attract, are typically wayward googlers (as I tend to think of them) who found some old page in my archives on the second page of some search term I don't care about. Usually they're just incensed by the topic and don't respond in any way to what I wrote.
Before, other people could theoretically see the trolls' comments via the "recent comments" on the sidebar or following the comments RSS feed. There weren't many readers tracking comments in the first place, but now that these features are broken, the only person who can possibly see the trolls' comments is me, because I alone have access to the moderation queue. If the trolls are trying to get attention, they are doing it in about the least effective way possible.
In short, the only trolls I get are the ones who are thoroughly incompetent.
There are basically four reasons why I might care about a person's opinion:
1. The person has power.
2. I care about the person.
3. The opinion is backed up by arguments.
4. The opinion is succinct, eloquent, novel, or otherwise intrinsically interesting.
In the case of incompetent rando trolls, they don't have power, I don't care about them, they are too incompetent to argue, and too tedious to be interesting. I like to poke at them until they either make coherent arguments or realize they've been wasting their time all along.
Of course, I'm much nicer to commenters who don't appear to be trolling. Even when commenters don't offer supporting arguments for points of disagreement, I at least tend to care about their opinions by #2.
Thursday, May 7, 2015
Feedback on Feedly plug
Last month I was talking about selling RSS to people on Tumblr, so that they might follow things that aren't on Tumblr. This is a fairly small project. I'll simply make a post on Tumblr, and hope that it reaches a lot of people.
Here is a draft of the post. I would appreciate feedback, particularly from people who are new to Feedly. Since I've been using Feedly for years, I don't have a good sense of what might be confusing.
ETA: This project is done. See here.
Here is a draft of the post. I would appreciate feedback, particularly from people who are new to Feedly. Since I've been using Feedly for years, I don't have a good sense of what might be confusing.
Follow Aces in All the Places!And here are the startup packages I'm using:
Isn't it great that Tumblr lets you follow all your friends in one place? Don't you wish you could also follow Wordpress, Youtube, and webcomics in the same place?
There is a way!
Try Feedly. It's a place where you can gather subscriptions to all kinds of websites. You'll need to create a new account, or connect to your Google account, but it's well worth it. (Also see iOS and Android apps.)
FAQ Below
[cut]
How do I add subscriptions?
On the left bar of Feedly, click on "add content". Type the url of the website you want to follow. Then click on the + button to subscribe. It's that simple!
Alternatively, on the website you can look for a link with the word "RSS" or "subscribe", and often the link will let you subscribe on Feedly.
It's too hard to add all these subscriptions one by one!
It's easy to import all the Tumblrs you follow. Go here and download the OPML file. On the left bar of Feedly, click on "Organize". Then click on "Import OPML", and give Feedly the file you just downloaded.
I don't even know who to subscribe to!
Here are a few startup packages. Any of these can be imported by going to the left bar of Feedly, clicking on "Organize" and then "Import OPML".
Terrific Tumblr Aces (thanks to Arf)
Wonderful Wordpress Aces
Yes! Youtube Aces (thanks to Ivy)
Webcomics with Ace Characters
All of the above!
I don't like how everything's mixed together!
On the "Organize" page, you can create separate "collections" for different kinds of things. Then when you browse Feedly, you can read one collection at a time, or everything together. For instance, I keep separate a separate collection of websites that I mostly just skim.
I don't like some of those subscriptions!
On the "Organize" page, you can unsubscribe to subscriptions by clicking on the x next to it.
Feedly is ugly!
Feedly's appearance is more customizable than Tumblr! On the left bar, go to "preferences" and try a different default view. The options are "Titles only", "Magazine", "Cards", and "Full Articles".
Additionally, on the left bar you can try looking at "Themes" to change the colors.
Feedly isn't showing old articles!
That's because Feedly won't show articles you've already read. You can change this in the preferences. Turn off "Hide read posts".
Feedly isn't showing the entire article! And how do I reblog stuff?
If you click on the title of an expanded article on Feedly, it will take you to the original page. You can reblog from there.
I use Tumblr Savior or XKit. Can I use it on Feedly?
For Feedly, you can try an add-on called SPOI Filter. I don't think you can block based on tags, unfortunately.
How do I follow Tumblr tags, reblogs, and asks?
I'm afraid you can't, except on Tumblr. No one ever said you should stop looking at Tumblr. It's just that if you also use Feedly, you can easily follow things outside of Tumblr in the same place.
Wow! How does it work?
Feedly is an RSS reader. RSS stands for "really simple syndication."
You can search for RSS readers and you will find many others with the same function. Some people have suggested Bloglovin, NetNewsWire (for Macs), or Newsify (a Feedly app for mobile).
Many people consider RSS to be old fashioned, and it is. But it's practical! One of the reasons Tumblr is great is because it borrowed ideas from RSS, simplifying it for the masses. My only complaint is that Tumblr is a bit selfish, and only lets you follow Tumblrs. That's why I'm advocating RSS.
I hate Feedly! But I want those startup packages.
Well I tried. You can find the startup packages here [link to be added]. You'll have to follow them one by one.
Terrific Tumblr AcesSince I'm clearly such a Feedly shill, do you think I could get them to pay me anything?
Concept Awesome
Becoming a Person
TL;DR
Wonderful Wordpress Aces
The Asexual Agenda
The Asexual Census Blog
Asexuality Archive
Prismatic Entanglements
The Ace Theist
The Notes Which Do Not Fit
A Life Unexamined
Acing History
Next Step: Cake
Cinderace blogs
Critique of Popular Reason
Cake at the Fortress
YAPBNWECA
The Minus Roots
From Fandom to Family: Sharing my many thoughts
FISTFELT
Asexual Artists
Yes! YouTube Aces
Swankivy
AmeliaAce
Aces Wild
QueerAsCat
Webcomics with Ace Characters
Shades of A
Supernormal Step
Ignition Zero
David Doesn't Get It
Girls With Slingshots
ETA: This project is done. See here.
Friday, March 13, 2015
Destroying Tumblr with RSS
Let's say, purely as a hypothetical, that I wanted to destroy Tumblr as a medium. What would I do?
My idea is this: People on Tumblr are stuck there, because it's the only way to keep track of their news feed. If you have friends on Tumblr and want to keep track of them, it's the only way. Unfortunately, the news feed does not let you track anything that isn't on Tumblr. So at that point, you simply stop reading things that aren't on Tumblr.
However, there is another way to track people on Tumblr! There's something called RSS, which is used by old-timers like me. All you need is an RSS reader, such as Feedly, and then you add subscriptions to anything you like.
For instance! If I wanted to keep track of the Hiveswap tumblr:
RSS offers many advantages compared to Tumblr. You can subscribe to blogs that aren't on Tumblr. You can subscribe to webcomics. The world is ripe for the taking!
The Tumblr news feed also offers a few advantages:
Does anyone have any suggestions? Which RSS reader would work best? How can I write the sales pitch? What sort of pitfalls might a person encounter when switching from Tumblr to RSS, and how might I solve them?
My idea is this: People on Tumblr are stuck there, because it's the only way to keep track of their news feed. If you have friends on Tumblr and want to keep track of them, it's the only way. Unfortunately, the news feed does not let you track anything that isn't on Tumblr. So at that point, you simply stop reading things that aren't on Tumblr.
However, there is another way to track people on Tumblr! There's something called RSS, which is used by old-timers like me. All you need is an RSS reader, such as Feedly, and then you add subscriptions to anything you like.
For instance! If I wanted to keep track of the Hiveswap tumblr:
http://hiveswapgame.tumblr.Then I simply go to the rss feed:com/
http://hiveswapgame.tumblr.And then there's the option to put it into Feedly! This isn't tech-geek level stuff, it's really simple syndication (RSS)!com/rss
RSS offers many advantages compared to Tumblr. You can subscribe to blogs that aren't on Tumblr. You can subscribe to webcomics. The world is ripe for the taking!
The Tumblr news feed also offers a few advantages:
- What the hell is RSS?
- The Tumblr news feed is easily accessible.
- Tumblr doesn't keep track of how much you've read, so there's no anxiety over unread counts
- Tumblr lets you keep track of tags, which as far as I know, have no associated RSS feed.
- I've already subscribed to a lot of Tumblrs and it's too much work to subscribe to each and every RSS feed.
- What the hell is RSS?
Does anyone have any suggestions? Which RSS reader would work best? How can I write the sales pitch? What sort of pitfalls might a person encounter when switching from Tumblr to RSS, and how might I solve them?
Thursday, January 8, 2015
So you want to start your own blog
This was written for The Asexual Agenda, and cross-posted here. It's primarily geared to people looking to start ace blogs, which means I will refer repeatedly to the current state of the ace blogosphere. But most of the advice is generalizable.
It says on our about page, we're not just here to talk about asexuality, we're also here to stimulate blogging. Lately I've seen a number of people starting their own blogs. (For purposes of this post, I'm referring to non-Tumblr blogs only.) Since I'm possibly the most experienced blogger in the ace blogosphere, having blogged consistently for over seven years, I'd like to offer a bunch of miscellaneous tips.
What do you want out of your blog?
When I first started blogging, I dreamt big. I wanted all the readers, and I wanted to influence the conversations I saw on other blogs with lots of readers. Naturally, none of that happened, and at first I felt very disappointed. But I continued writing because I discovered there were other things I got out of blogging in the short-term.
The fact of the matter is that most blogs don't get a significant number of readers, and those that do acquire them over many years. If you really just wanted attention you could probably do better by being a troll on tumblr. There must be something else you want, so what is it?
I asked this question in an earlier question of the week. Some of the answers provided:
Most of this post will focus on acquiring readers, since that's the main thing I can give advice for. There's not much I can say to help your venting be more cathartic or your analysis be more exacting. But keep in mind what you really want, and recognize that you are not failing just because you don't have many readers.
Where do readers come from?
Let's get into the nitty gritty of blog readership. Take a look at these site statistics from the past month of my personal blog.
Here's a brief explanation of the pieces of pie:
But of course, every regular reader used to be a one-time visitor. So if you want regulars, the main issue is how to "hook" those one-time visitors. When I consider reading a blog, it's usually after seeing a link to an essay I like. Then I look at the "about" page to see what kind of perspective is offered, and then I browse the front page or tags for anything interesting. If I like what I see, I look around for a subscription service.3
Writing a blog for readers
Writing well simply requires practice, and there's very little advice I can give to help you write better. I can, however, say what readers generally want:
Outside of Tumblr and Livejournal, it really doesn't matter what blogging software you use. Where Tumblr can connect you with a "Tumblr community", using Wordpress doesn't really connect you with a "Wordpress community", and using Blogger doesn't connect you with a "Blogspot community". You make your own connections with old-fashioned links and search engines. So the playing field is pretty much level.
That said, I think Wordpress looks a little more "professional" than Blogger. But unless you get the paid version of Wordpress, Blogger gives you more freedom to tinker with its code. For example, he reader statistics above come from Google Analytics, which I can install on Blogger but not on Wordpress.
The state of the ace blogosphere
The Asexual Agenda is currently the biggest asexual blog around. That means that one of the ways to attract readers is by getting us to link to you. We're aware of our power to direct eyeballs, and we try not to abuse it. This is all to say, ask us nicely and we'll link you. Of course, making readers stick around is up to you.
You might ask, where do our readers come from? Most of our referrals come from Tumblr--links from AVEN and Reddit are much less fruitful. You can always go to the source and try to plug your blog on Tumblr. There's a fairly common Tumblr/Wordpress hybrid model, where people get readers from Tumblr and have structured discussions on Wordpress. This is an easy way to get the best of both worlds.
Of course, the current state of the ace blogosphere can change. Why should The Asexual Agenda be the most popular? There should be many popular blogs. I hope to see more in the coming years.
-------------------------------------------------------
1. I think it takes a while for Google to notice that a new blog exists, so this might not be true for brand new blogs.
2. Depending on what you're doing, you might actually cater to search engines. For example, Asexuality Archive is aimed at providing resources, and so search engine hits are important. But I think this is true of very few blogs.
3. I'm not sure how many people use subscription services or what kinds. I use RSS feed, but I read lots of blogs and webcomics so I'm probably unusual in this regard. You can add widgets to advertise subscription services, although experienced users might figure out how to subscribe regardless.
It says on our about page, we're not just here to talk about asexuality, we're also here to stimulate blogging. Lately I've seen a number of people starting their own blogs. (For purposes of this post, I'm referring to non-Tumblr blogs only.) Since I'm possibly the most experienced blogger in the ace blogosphere, having blogged consistently for over seven years, I'd like to offer a bunch of miscellaneous tips.
What do you want out of your blog?
When I first started blogging, I dreamt big. I wanted all the readers, and I wanted to influence the conversations I saw on other blogs with lots of readers. Naturally, none of that happened, and at first I felt very disappointed. But I continued writing because I discovered there were other things I got out of blogging in the short-term.
The fact of the matter is that most blogs don't get a significant number of readers, and those that do acquire them over many years. If you really just wanted attention you could probably do better by being a troll on tumblr. There must be something else you want, so what is it?
I asked this question in an earlier question of the week. Some of the answers provided:
- To talk about things that you can't talk about offline
- To reach people
- To order your thoughts
- To spend time
- To connect with readers
- To get reader's thoughts
- To find communities with shared interests
Most of this post will focus on acquiring readers, since that's the main thing I can give advice for. There's not much I can say to help your venting be more cathartic or your analysis be more exacting. But keep in mind what you really want, and recognize that you are not failing just because you don't have many readers.
Where do readers come from?
Let's get into the nitty gritty of blog readership. Take a look at these site statistics from the past month of my personal blog.
Here's a brief explanation of the pieces of pie:
- Referrals - People follow links to your blog, often from tumblr, other blogs, or forums. Site statistics will track incoming links, which is very useful to know your audience.
- Organic search - People find your site by search engines. Site statistics will track search terms, and it's often hilariously obvious that people won't find what they're looking for on your blog.
- Direct - People go directly to your blog by bookmark or typing in the url. These are probably regular readers.
- Social - Mostly Facebook. Facebook makes it impossible to tell what people are saying about you.
But of course, every regular reader used to be a one-time visitor. So if you want regulars, the main issue is how to "hook" those one-time visitors. When I consider reading a blog, it's usually after seeing a link to an essay I like. Then I look at the "about" page to see what kind of perspective is offered, and then I browse the front page or tags for anything interesting. If I like what I see, I look around for a subscription service.3
Writing a blog for readers
Writing well simply requires practice, and there's very little advice I can give to help you write better. I can, however, say what readers generally want:
- Consistency in the long term - Good writing can acquire more readers, but it won't matter if people have forgotten about your blog by the time you post another update. Basically, quantity can be more important than quality.
- Unique personality - Your individual voice will distinguish you from just another essay we found on the internet. You can adopt a particular tone, a particular writing style, or format. You can tell personal stories, bring up new issues, or think about old issues in new ways. Even attaching pictures to your posts can go a long way to adding character.
- Shorter is better - I'm a very verbose writer, and I understand how long-form writing can be essential to my personal goals in blogging. But as far as the goal of acquiring readers goes, new readers generally don't want to invest a lot of time in a blog they just met.
- One small issue at a time - It's tempting to write big manifestos that say everything you ever wanted to say about asexuality. But this tends to lead to big sprawling posts that take forever to write, and of course the next week you remember something else you forgot to add. Having a web of many posts is easier, and encourages people to follow the web as it grows.
Outside of Tumblr and Livejournal, it really doesn't matter what blogging software you use. Where Tumblr can connect you with a "Tumblr community", using Wordpress doesn't really connect you with a "Wordpress community", and using Blogger doesn't connect you with a "Blogspot community". You make your own connections with old-fashioned links and search engines. So the playing field is pretty much level.
That said, I think Wordpress looks a little more "professional" than Blogger. But unless you get the paid version of Wordpress, Blogger gives you more freedom to tinker with its code. For example, he reader statistics above come from Google Analytics, which I can install on Blogger but not on Wordpress.
The state of the ace blogosphere
The Asexual Agenda is currently the biggest asexual blog around. That means that one of the ways to attract readers is by getting us to link to you. We're aware of our power to direct eyeballs, and we try not to abuse it. This is all to say, ask us nicely and we'll link you. Of course, making readers stick around is up to you.
You might ask, where do our readers come from? Most of our referrals come from Tumblr--links from AVEN and Reddit are much less fruitful. You can always go to the source and try to plug your blog on Tumblr. There's a fairly common Tumblr/Wordpress hybrid model, where people get readers from Tumblr and have structured discussions on Wordpress. This is an easy way to get the best of both worlds.
Of course, the current state of the ace blogosphere can change. Why should The Asexual Agenda be the most popular? There should be many popular blogs. I hope to see more in the coming years.
-------------------------------------------------------
1. I think it takes a while for Google to notice that a new blog exists, so this might not be true for brand new blogs.
2. Depending on what you're doing, you might actually cater to search engines. For example, Asexuality Archive is aimed at providing resources, and so search engine hits are important. But I think this is true of very few blogs.
3. I'm not sure how many people use subscription services or what kinds. I use RSS feed, but I read lots of blogs and webcomics so I'm probably unusual in this regard. You can add widgets to advertise subscription services, although experienced users might figure out how to subscribe regardless.
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Writing a novel: Month 8
This month was a relatively successful one, for my novel. I doubled my word count, and sent it out to some (not all) of my test readers. Feedback was negative, which is a good thing because I can improve!
Today, I'd like to talk about the mixed messages I get as a writer.
At Thanksgiving, one of the questions my mother asks me is "Are you going to continue with your PhD?"
I can't believe I'm hearing this! I try writing a novel, and suddenly people ask if I'm continuing with my PhD program? Nobody ever asked that in relation to any of the other hobbies I pick up. When I started blogging, no one ever asked if I would continue with university. When I picked up guitar, no one ever asked me if I was planning to switch to being a rock star. When I picked up origami (and even made a small profit from it), no one ever asked if this meant I was giving up physics.
Let's put this in perspective. I wrote about 7k words of my novel, and there were about 10k words in the novel I scrapped. This is less than 20k words over the course of 8 months. How many words did I write for my blog in the same amount of time? I estimate 50k words. But somehow, writing a book signals a greater time commitment.
Another thing that happened this month was National Novel Writing Month. Every November, hundreds of thousands of people attempt to write a complete novel with at least 50k words. This is quite an undertaking, and most people don't succeed. I've heard that the resulting novels are usually terrible and require a lot of editing.
But still, this isn't something people quit their jobs for, not for just one month. Writing fiction can be a career for some people, but for most people it isn't. More often, it's just a weighty hobby. For me, it's not even that, it's a light hobby. There was no way I'd write 50k words in a month. I wrote about ten times less than that, mostly while riding the bus to and from work.
Here's another kind of writing that people do: fanfiction. Personally, I can't stand fanfiction. The quality is just too low. The only fanfic I ever really read was HPMOR, and even there I feel like I'm struggling with Yudkowski's awful prose and peculiar plot obsessions.
But I don't begrudge people writing for the pure love of writing and stories. On the contrary, I admire it. And who is to say my writing is any better? Test reader feedback isn't positive enough to justify such a view.
And that's fine with me. I would love to be a great author and get published, but that's not the real goal here. If the small amount of time I commit isn't enough to get to the finish line, it's not a big loss. The goal is to enjoy myself, and I am already accomplishing that.
Today, I'd like to talk about the mixed messages I get as a writer.
At Thanksgiving, one of the questions my mother asks me is "Are you going to continue with your PhD?"
I can't believe I'm hearing this! I try writing a novel, and suddenly people ask if I'm continuing with my PhD program? Nobody ever asked that in relation to any of the other hobbies I pick up. When I started blogging, no one ever asked if I would continue with university. When I picked up guitar, no one ever asked me if I was planning to switch to being a rock star. When I picked up origami (and even made a small profit from it), no one ever asked if this meant I was giving up physics.
Let's put this in perspective. I wrote about 7k words of my novel, and there were about 10k words in the novel I scrapped. This is less than 20k words over the course of 8 months. How many words did I write for my blog in the same amount of time? I estimate 50k words. But somehow, writing a book signals a greater time commitment.
Another thing that happened this month was National Novel Writing Month. Every November, hundreds of thousands of people attempt to write a complete novel with at least 50k words. This is quite an undertaking, and most people don't succeed. I've heard that the resulting novels are usually terrible and require a lot of editing.
But still, this isn't something people quit their jobs for, not for just one month. Writing fiction can be a career for some people, but for most people it isn't. More often, it's just a weighty hobby. For me, it's not even that, it's a light hobby. There was no way I'd write 50k words in a month. I wrote about ten times less than that, mostly while riding the bus to and from work.
Here's another kind of writing that people do: fanfiction. Personally, I can't stand fanfiction. The quality is just too low. The only fanfic I ever really read was HPMOR, and even there I feel like I'm struggling with Yudkowski's awful prose and peculiar plot obsessions.
But I don't begrudge people writing for the pure love of writing and stories. On the contrary, I admire it. And who is to say my writing is any better? Test reader feedback isn't positive enough to justify such a view.
And that's fine with me. I would love to be a great author and get published, but that's not the real goal here. If the small amount of time I commit isn't enough to get to the finish line, it's not a big loss. The goal is to enjoy myself, and I am already accomplishing that.
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
The LGBTQA+ group blog
Earlier I talked about the main failure mode of group blogs. On a
tangential note, I'd like to talk a bit about a particular kind of group
blog, the LGBTQA+ group blog. I feel like this idea... usually just
doesn't work. If you enjoy reading a blog of that sort, or even
contribute to one, I'm not telling you to stop, I'm just trying to
identify problems with the model as a whole.
It
sounds like a good idea on paper. Inclusiveness is a strong value
among queer people, and it sounds great to have a place where we include
all kinds of queer voices. Maybe we'll all learn a bit more about each
other. The problem is, that this requires multiple different voices, and it requires them to contribute roughly equal amounts. As I explained earlier, it's very difficult to form a group blog where everyone contributes equally, and the pressure to contribute equally may just kill the will to write.
The second problem is that the topic is too broad. This is fine for an individual blog, because it is the individual's voice that ties everything together. For a group blog, the voice is less distinctive. It lacks cohesiveness. Who is the target audience?
The second problem is that the topic is too broad. This is fine for an individual blog, because it is the individual's voice that ties everything together. For a group blog, the voice is less distinctive. It lacks cohesiveness. Who is the target audience?
Lastly, I've seen a number of blogs which
include asexuality as one of their topics, and this has particularly
strange consequences. The asexual audience behaves very differently
from the gay/lesbian audience, because there is relatively little
asexual material out there, and lots of demand for it. A queer blog
that includes asexual voices really stands out--to the asexual audience.
Gay/lesbian people don't get nearly so excited about yet another
gay/lesbian blog. So we have this weird thing where asexuality is the
most invisible identity, but occasionally dominates an LGBTQA+ group
blog.
I think one exception to this trend is Queereka. I don't know what they're doing differently, but it seems to work. Queereka is a skepticism blog, so perhaps skepticism provides a focus for the blog, giving it the cohesiveness it needs.
I think one exception to this trend is Queereka. I don't know what they're doing differently, but it seems to work. Queereka is a skepticism blog, so perhaps skepticism provides a focus for the blog, giving it the cohesiveness it needs.
I'm a long-time advocate
of asexual inclusion in queer spaces. However, I do not argue for ace inclusion on
a priori grounds; it is not, in general, true that
whenever we talk about X, we should also talk about Y. It is not
necessarily the case that asexuality goes well with GLB, or for that
matter, that GLB goes well with T. Rather, I believe it is the correct
choice given our current cultural context. There may be more specific contexts where putting the different letters of the alphabet soup together is not the correct choice. Queer group blogs is one
particular context where maybe it doesn't work, or it's at least difficult to work.
Sunday, September 14, 2014
The group blog failure mode
The other day I learned that Skepticblog, a group blog I used to
read, is no longer updating. This made me reflect on group
blogs, and blogging in general.
Over many years
of reading blogs, I've seen a number of group blogs*, including Cosmic
Variance, Queereka, Skepchick, Friendly Atheist, Rationally
Speaking, and of course I run a group blog, The Asexual Agenda.
Sometimes group blogs work well, providing a stronger update schedule,
and allowing for dialogue within a single site. Sometimes, they do not
work very well.
*Specifically, I'm thinking of
"closed" group blogs where the contributors are handpicked, not an
"open" group blog where anyone can contribute a piece.
Group
blogs have a particular failure mode where one blogger dominates the
updates, and the others only periodically offer updates. In my
subjective opinion, the less prolific writers are usually worse,
probably because they have less practice. It becomes a bit of a death
spiral, where the dominant blogger feels like they're being too
dominant, and the infrequent bloggers feel like their writing doesn't
match the quality or tone of the rest of the blog, and everyone ends up
blogging less than they would otherwise. In this failure mode, it seems
like the group blog would be better off just being an individual's
blog. But it also seems inappropriate to say so, because it would
discourage the infrequent bloggers, further contributing to the death
spiral.
I think what's going on here, is there
are multiple blogging "types", which we see reflected both in group
blogs and individual blogs. Some very small fraction of people blog
frequently, obsessively, and for long periods of time. I fall into this
category, and so do most long-term bloggers. Other people are
initially excited, but quickly lose that excitement. You basically
can't tell what type you are without actually trying it.
If
a bunch of people start individual blogs, most of those people will
lose interest, and let their blogs die. A smaller number will continue
writing for a long period of time. The prolific bloggers are the only
ones we tend to see or remember, but I have reason to believe they are
in the minority, because I know what often happens with group blogs. If
the same group of people gets together and start a group blog, usually
only one or two people dominate, and the rest become infrequent
contributors.
Crucial to the success of a group blog is a way of finding multiple prolific contributors.
One
possible model, like we do on The Asexual Agenda, is to periodically
call for new contributors. Out of every batch of new contributors,
there are some who are prolific, and we slowly accumulate those kinds of
writers (or at least replenish them, since most people do eventually slow
down). Some people are less prolific, but still good because we screen
for writing ability. And since we have multiple prolific bloggers with
different writing styles, hopefully these people never feel discouraged
for having a different style. Some people never contribute anything,
which is also fine. This model requires some level of popularity to
maintain. (It also helps that we draw from a lot of pre-existing
bloggers.)
Since I opened this topic by talking
about Skepticblog, I'm implying that Skepticblog was falling into
this group blog death spiral. Skepticblog is an odd case because all of
its contributors are credentialed in some way. It originally consisted
of the full cast of a Mythbusters-like TV show pitch (which never
succeeded). Of course, credentials don't necessarily guarantee that
someone becomes a frequent blogger, so Skepticblog has, throughout its
history, been dominated by one blogger or another. That's not why I
stopped reading it though. I just lost interest for more mundane
reasons.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Tumblr is terrible
One of the biggest developments in the ace community over the past year is the growth of the ace tumblverse, which has been accompanied by the death of the blogosphere. I'm one of the last blogging holdouts. Growth is great, but tumblr is terrible and blogger is better. Here's why:
Tumblr has no comments. This is what makes me the most angry. I can't comment on tumblrs without getting my own tumblr. And not just a tumblr account, I have to start an actual tumblr. That's such monopolizing bullshit.
In case you're not familiar with tumblr, the comment system is replaced by a reblogging system. People comment by reposting quotes on their own tumblr, with added comments. At the bottom of the original post or any rebloggings, you can see all the people who have reblogged the post, with a one-line excerpt of anything they added.
Reblogging is a terrible substitute for comments. For one thing, you have to visit many many tumblrs just to see what people are saying. Most people say nothing of importance, and you just wasted a click! Other people engage in these long comment threads full of nested quotes, and it's a real pain to root the whole thing out.
If you follow any tumblr user that wishes to comment on other tumblrs, it brings their tumblr down to commenting quality or worse. I comment on a lot of blogs, but you should be happy that the comments don't appear here because it would just be a lot of noise.
There is no comment moderation. It's said that tumblr is a drama machine, and this is why. The "comments" do not belong to any particular tumblr, so there is no moderation. Additionally, if anyone from a far-flung community makes a comment, their whole community sees it as well, leading to these huge community clashes.
There is some value in having diverse perspectives, but when uncontrolled (as is always the case on tumblr), it can also just lead to a lot of unproductive flame wars. I say this as someone who takes a laissez-faire approach to comments. Blogs are often derided as "echo chambers", but at least they have relatively controlled conversations. (And ironically, since reblogging is uncommon, they have less echoing.)
There is a culture of no citations. Last year I talked about how it is good to cite your opponents. Because for all we know you're making up opponents, or mischaracterizing your opponents. Also, some of us may want to respond to your opponents as well? But on tumblr, I've been shocked at all the blatant omitting of citations.
Since then, I've come to understand why tumblr people don't do citations. People don't cite because they're afraid they'll attract unwanted attention and start more drama. Also, tumblr lacks effective search and archive functions and contains a lot of reblogging noise, so it's really hard to find a post that you recall.
There is a culture of memes. This is obviously a personal preference, but I really hate memes. I will stop reading a blog if there is too high a density of captioned animals, I am not even kidding.
Blogger is better. Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer the way blogs connect to each other. If someone leaves a comment, you can choose to go to their blog if you like what they say. If you think you have an important response to a blog, you can choose to respond on your own blog.
I suppose one of the major advantages of tumblr is that you can follow a particular tag, while with blogs you basically have to find bloggers who'll track that stuff for you. But I think the greater effort is worth it to eliminate the noise.
In other news, I was considering starting a tumblr so I can comment on tumblrs. Good idea, bad idea?
Tumblr has no comments. This is what makes me the most angry. I can't comment on tumblrs without getting my own tumblr. And not just a tumblr account, I have to start an actual tumblr. That's such monopolizing bullshit.
In case you're not familiar with tumblr, the comment system is replaced by a reblogging system. People comment by reposting quotes on their own tumblr, with added comments. At the bottom of the original post or any rebloggings, you can see all the people who have reblogged the post, with a one-line excerpt of anything they added.
Reblogging is a terrible substitute for comments. For one thing, you have to visit many many tumblrs just to see what people are saying. Most people say nothing of importance, and you just wasted a click! Other people engage in these long comment threads full of nested quotes, and it's a real pain to root the whole thing out.
If you follow any tumblr user that wishes to comment on other tumblrs, it brings their tumblr down to commenting quality or worse. I comment on a lot of blogs, but you should be happy that the comments don't appear here because it would just be a lot of noise.
There is no comment moderation. It's said that tumblr is a drama machine, and this is why. The "comments" do not belong to any particular tumblr, so there is no moderation. Additionally, if anyone from a far-flung community makes a comment, their whole community sees it as well, leading to these huge community clashes.
There is some value in having diverse perspectives, but when uncontrolled (as is always the case on tumblr), it can also just lead to a lot of unproductive flame wars. I say this as someone who takes a laissez-faire approach to comments. Blogs are often derided as "echo chambers", but at least they have relatively controlled conversations. (And ironically, since reblogging is uncommon, they have less echoing.)
There is a culture of no citations. Last year I talked about how it is good to cite your opponents. Because for all we know you're making up opponents, or mischaracterizing your opponents. Also, some of us may want to respond to your opponents as well? But on tumblr, I've been shocked at all the blatant omitting of citations.
Since then, I've come to understand why tumblr people don't do citations. People don't cite because they're afraid they'll attract unwanted attention and start more drama. Also, tumblr lacks effective search and archive functions and contains a lot of reblogging noise, so it's really hard to find a post that you recall.
There is a culture of memes. This is obviously a personal preference, but I really hate memes. I will stop reading a blog if there is too high a density of captioned animals, I am not even kidding.
Blogger is better. Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer the way blogs connect to each other. If someone leaves a comment, you can choose to go to their blog if you like what they say. If you think you have an important response to a blog, you can choose to respond on your own blog.
I suppose one of the major advantages of tumblr is that you can follow a particular tag, while with blogs you basically have to find bloggers who'll track that stuff for you. But I think the greater effort is worth it to eliminate the noise.
In other news, I was considering starting a tumblr so I can comment on tumblrs. Good idea, bad idea?
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