A prime example of what not to do

Here is something that I found that has proven that my hypotheses are correct. I found this blog under the “Most Recent Update” menu at the blogger home page. It’s called Thoughts

Here is a list of why this blog has no comments, so for all of you who want to create a blog that is audience friendly, take some notes.

Background color – Pink is a “loud” color and it makes the blog seem childish

One word title – It is a blog about this persons thoughts, but you can tell there is no
creativity, anywhere

Personal Information – “Went grocery shopping. Bought all mother approved food. Tofu,
avocado, rice, beans, potatoes, corn, asparagus & broccoli. Made
some tofu & onion dish that was delish. Mmmm.” No one
really wants to read what exactly you bought at the store today

No Pictures – A couple of pictures would help


There is nothing personally wrong with this blog, it’s basically a diary blog and this person uses it a lot so they must enjoy it. This is a prime example of a blog that will not generate an audience, so if you are a person who wants to welcome strangers to your blog, follow these hints and you will be seeing comments soon.

Scrapatorium- Observation

I decided to follow one of my hypotheses and limited my search to a picture album blog. I came upon Scrapatorium: Collage. This person who made this blog looks like she made a scrapbook and found random pictures and pasted them conveniently on top of each other to make one picture. They titled the pictures but didn’t put any personal comments underneath the photo, and they didn’t enable comments from visitors either. I believe the audience that they have are people interested in the arts, photography or collages. Most of these photos look pretty old maybe set in the 60’s, I can’t tell if they are from various magazines or photos that she randomly picked out.

They also have other blogs that they have been works on also. Snapatorium: Found Photograph and Swapatorium: A Journey through Junkland. Both of these blogs had more content than her Scrapatorium but I wanted to know why. I decided to e-mail them with my questions and see their response.

Scrapatorium- Final

Why did you decide to make a blog?

I actually have three blogs. It started with SNAPATORIUM - found photographs. I collect and also deal in vernacular photographs. I have a group I started on eBay, but wanted a better way to communicate with my customers and a place to share my collection. I had so much fun with that one that I created two others, SWAPATORIUM - A Journey Through Junkland which is about junk shopping & collecting and SCRAPATORIUM which is for my collage work. A blog allows me to share information regarding subjects that I enjoy, but at the same time, remain somewhat anonymous which I like because I am essentially a very private person.

Who do you want to reach out too, who do you want your audience to be? (aka,
male, female, 50 yr olds?)

I have no target audience in mind. I welcome everyone. At the same time, even if I am the only one reading it, then that is ok with me. I have no intention of purposely building an audience. If it happens, it happens. My audience for Scrapatorium grew tremendously because my blog was picked by Blogger as a "Blog of Note." Since I have links to my other blogs, those also get tons of hits now.

Do you know what type of audience you have now?

I would say based on the emails I receive and the reports from my counter, I get people of all ages, both male and female, predominately from the US and England, although I do get hits from all over the world.


What kind of message do you hope to send out to your audience?

Honestly, I don't have a message. I just like having fun with my blogs.

Scrapatorium- Extra

After I wrote her the first e-mail with the 5 questions, I decided to ask what she thought about pictures playing in the roll of gaining more audience.

You have blogs that contain a lot of pictures, do you think that pictures on blogs have a great affect on your audience?

No, I don't think photos would generate a larger audience. If you have a good written blog, people will read it. If you have interesting photos to look at, people will look at them. However, if you have crappy writing and or photos, you won't get readership. So in the end, it all comes down to having something interesting to say or show. Too much competition with blogs to just have a mediocre site these days.

Spirit Infusion- Observation

I have found another great blog that is different from the rest of the other blogs that I have looked at. It is called Spirit Infusion: Where Spirit and Soul Connect and from what I can tell the main audience of this blog is the Garrett family. It is a gathering place for their stories, images and musings. This is an interesting way to stay connected to your family, using a blog. It would save on phone and postage bills, the internet is really taking over our communication, it is easier and less expensive.

It looks like there is one author, who writes about her daily activities from work or spending time in Minnesota. There are a lot of pictures of a baby, what every family member wants to see. It is a great blog for their family to read. The author writes updates of what is going on her life but has time to include pictures. They really don’t have a lot of comments on their posts which surprised me since the majority of the viewers are her family.

Spirit Infusion- Final

Why did you decide to make a blog?

Good question. I actually have several answers:
1. I find it fun
2. It's a great way to share my thoughts, things happening in our lives, and photos without sending mass emails out to people (that is so annoying).
3. My family loves it and if I don't put something up for a few days I start receiving complaint phone calls and emails.
4. I can write about my day once and then anyone can read it and I don't have to email a bunch of people. I can just tell them to look at the website if they want to know what's going on. (Or I'll reference it in a short email to them.)
5. I like to think a lot, read a lot, and I'm just a natural teacher so it allows me to think out loud sometimes and see if I hear feedback from other people. (I haven't done so much of that since school started in August and I'm teaching full time again. I chair a department so I have a lot going on.)


Who do you want to reach out too, who do you want your audience to be? (aka,
male, female, 50 yr olds?)

I don't know that I'm intending to reach out to anyone. I do know that my family reads it - both my family and my husband's family. I also know that several of my students like to log on and see what's going on. I haven't publicized it to all my classes, it's more like I tell a student here or there that I have a personal relationship with and feel like sharing with them.
My husband and I are involved in church and ministry and so we also hope that people we spend time with in church will read our website and interact with us about topics that are of interest. I love to discuss things about church and God - particularly about looking at ways to "do" church that aren't like church. (If that makes any sense.) If you look back at my blog and see some of the links to sites like Doug Pagitt's blog, Jordon Cooper, The Ooze, etc that might explain a little of what I am trying to say. I am growing weary of being in a spiritual place where we all look at the back of each other's heads. I'd rather be in relationship and dialogue in a place where people are real, vulnerable, honest, and authentic.

Do you know what type of audience you have now?

It's mostly my family, friends, and a group of students and graduates from the University I go to. Other than that, I'm not sure.

What kind of message do you hope to send out to your audience?

I think that's addressed above in my answer to who do I want to reach out to

I Was Thinking (Bill) Observation

The content that Bill uses in his blog "I Was Thinking" is similar to most other blogs, his views on current events. The last couple of posts included his view on the elections coming up, targeted at John Kerry. Some included posts about the World Series of baseball and his anger towards the red sox for beating the Yankees.

Bill is pretty opinionated with his posts it makes me wonder if he expects comments to attack his motives and if so is that bad? If people agree with his opinions or even disagree would they return to his blog to read further? I would think so. Those two people who like and dislike his motives would want to come back, maybe bring some of their friends The inside scoop with all of this, is with all of this activity going on, his visitor count will be sky rocketing.

This creates another hypothesis. Do controversial posts create a higher volume of audience? That is something that should be looked into. A prime example of controversial posting is a website that I like to view frequently, a site called The Best Page in the Universe. If you do look at this particular page, it’s just this Maddox person who writes what he damn well pleases. There are some pretty bad posts and not a lot of people like him, but why is this page so popular? One guess, it has controversial posts.

I Was Thinking (Bill) Final

1. Why did you decide to create a blog (if you didn't have a blog before
class, Are you happy that you made one?

I created my blog because I have a love for journalism. Before my illness, I was a professional sports writer for several Midwest newspapers. I covered a couple of Super Bowls, went to the Orange Bowl with Oklahoma

a couple of times, covered the baseball All-Star game when it was in Minnesota, covered the Minnesota North Stars against the Penguins in the Stanley Cup, covered the Vikings and also went to a couple of World Series. Also covered a ton of high school, college, professional, Little League and wrote features, too. I also worked as a news editor, writer, deskman and was a publisher before my illness. It allows me the opportunity to get up close and a little personal to a profession that I was sort of pushed out of. I am happy that I made the decision to do the project I am, and can be able to get a good idea how blogging and journalism will have to work together, not against each other, for them to work hand in hand and make significant contributions to the other's profession.

2. Who do you want to reach out too, who do you want your audience to be?
(aka, male, female, 50 yr olds?)

I am not reaching out to anyone. The blog and project is out there for people to read. if people want to read it fine, if not, that's all right, too.

3. Do you know what type of audience you have now?

Right now, I have noticed a couple of my fellow classmates have written comments. But I haven't seen anyone take a real shine to it. Although, I did receive one hateful message in response to something I wrote. At least I knew people were reading.

4. What kind of message do you hope to send out to your audience?

I just want to show people how blogging and journalism are going up against each other, the differences, the similarities and if there is a chance for a relationship for both of them.

Bill’s response to my questions shocked me. I asked him what type of audience he wants and he wrote that he isn’t trying to reach out to anyone. Everyone else that I wrote too said they had at least an idea of who they want to reach. Does the type of audience really matter in blogs? Or do people want to have a wide variety of audience? Before I had received Bills response, I thought I was starting to see a pattern, but this throws me off a bit.

In my observation I wrote a possible hypothesis about controversial posting. Bill apparently had a controversial post “I did receive one hateful message in response to something I wrote. At least I knew people were reading.” There we go, it was a hateful message, but then someone did read it. Having controversial posting is both positive and negative at the same time, getting negative feedback, while gaining visitors to your blog.

Ditch Walker: Observation

The Ditch Walker is one of the blogs that I’ve visited. Navigating thru hope and heartbreak in the depths of the ditch was the title of this blog. I had a hard time figuring out what this blog was used for. Basically it’s a scrapbook of some pictures that this person took. Each picture had a story behind it, and all of them were extremely interesting.

I can tell this person is a professional photographer because he takes beautiful pictures. He also explains how he messes with the camera to get that perfect image. “After work, I decided to try out a new setting on the camera I'm borrowing. I cranked the sensitivity up to the maximum level. Naturally, I was curious to see how it would take pictures at night, so I made a few stops on my way home”

As for the audience of this blog, it’s hard to tell. I know that the creator is a classmate of mine so I know that the other classmates like to look at his site because of the pictures. I decided to go in further into this blog, and ask the creator.

Ditch Walker: Final

Question 1
Are you happy you made a blog for this class? (why or why not)

I'm happy. This is my first semester taking writing classes, and I think the blog has been a great way to get some practice. I also like the feedback I am able to get. And it's nice to be able to have something I've created after the work is done.

Question 2
Who do you want to reach out too, who do you want your audience to be? (aka, male, female, 50 yr olds?)

I haven't even thought about an audience. Blogging is so much different, for me, than say radio. I don't have any adds on my blog, so it is not really geared toward anyone.

The radio station I work at is geared toward an older audience. We play Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett type music to appease the older folks with money that live in the Brainerd lakes area.

Question 3
Do you know what type of audience you have now?

The age group is actually fairly diverse. I think most of the readers that visit almost everyday are either friends or classmates though. But I have had some old artists visit. I'm talking 60 plus. They have not left comments, but instead send me email, which is even more personal. I've notice people from the U of M are visiting as well.

Question 4
What kind of message do you hope to send out to your audience?

I hope the message is uplifting and motivational. The ditch can be a depressing place, but I hope to find and share the positive as well -- without ignoring reality.

After I received this e-mail, I was shocked to hear that he has 60 year old people viewing his blog, and I love the fact that they e-mail him, I do agree it is more personal that way. Having a wide variety of audience members is more beneficial then having just your friends viewing it. You receive comments from different people which can be an advantage to you. They might comment on things they like about your blog, or dislike, you can then change it to better fit their taste because blogs are not only meant for you, it’s meant for people to look at it.

Berne's World: Observation

Berne’s Blog, Bernes World is quite different then most blogs that I have looked at. I know for a fact that Berne is apart of Student Senate, and you can easily see that in some of his blogs. He seems like a very dedicated person, especially to BSU.

I also notice that some of his posts are random one sentence entries. It’s short and to the point, it invites the audience into his life. He also uses a lot of humor in his posts, which is a plus to grab your audiences attention. I wanted to get deeper under this blog, and get straight to the author. I decided to E-mail Berne with my questions on audience.

Berne's World: Final

I decided to send Berne an e-mail with some similar questions that I asked before, but since he was in my class, I could ask more personal questions. He replied the same day with these answers.

Are you happy you made a blog for this class? (why or why not)

I am very happy to have started a blog. One of my main reasons for taking the class was to learn about blogging and start using one. I see my personal blog as a way to get my thoughts out, and maybe discover something about myself in the process. I'm really intrigued by blogging, and the different forms blogs take.

Who do you want to reach out too, who do you want your audience to be? (aka, male, female, 50 yr olds?)

I don't necessarily write with a given audience in mind. Some of my posts are directed at certain people like friends or classmates, while others are more for myself. I am aware of the fact that I'm "out there", but I'm not too sure who, if anyone, my blog should be geared toward.

Do you know what type of audience you have now?

Right now, I'm aware that I'm being read by classmates, friends, and former Blogs and Wikis students. I know I've also been read by Clancy (Culture Cat) who left me a comment, and I would not be surprised if a few of her students have read my blog too...I occasionally leave comments on their class blog. Also, I've noticed a couple of random readers I don't have left comments, but there haven't been too many yet.

Question 4
What kind of message do you hope to send out to your audience?

I hope that people who read my blog are able to get a picture of who I am. I hope some of the things I post make people think, and want to respond, either through comments or on their own blog. Maybe someone might even learn something.


In Berne's answers, the sentence "I am aware of the fact that I'm "out there"" stuck in my head. Awhile back for another assignment I found this blog of a very young girl who wrote about being a lesbian, and some other personal information. I hope she did realize that what she wrote was being read by hundreds of people, because I felt like I was reading her diary, made me feel very uncomfortable. That's why I'm glad Beren knows he is "out there"

Berne's main audience is classmates and friends, which was different then the last blog I searched. Classmates are perfect examples of open audiences, in a class like Blogs and Wikis, you are forced to blog or comment on others. You get to know your first audience through their posting or comments, just how you would with anyone else in the blog world.

Berne's World: Extra

This extra bit was written on the end of his e-mail he wrote to me.

As you know, I've also started other blogs recently for Student Senate. These blogs are much simpler, less frequently updated, and less personal than my own. These are "business blogs" Each has a unique purpose:

Student Services Committee blog:
A quick, easy way for me to post my notes from committee meetings. I've placed a link to the blog on the committee web page. The blog replaces a Student Services news page I had kept on the web server.

Senate Web Team blog:
We're redoing our website. The web team blog is a quick way to post updates on our progress for interested website visitors. A link has been placed on our home page.

Senate Blog:
This is the newest Senate blog. It is linked on our website but has not really "taken off" yet. It replaces the President and VP page...our president thought she might be more apt to post on the page if it were easily done in blog form,so we're trying it out. Clearly, the primary audience for all three Senate blogs is BSU Students.



Talk about exploring the blog world. Here is a great example of exploring audiences. There are three blogs meant for the Student Senate and BSU students. To think of it, it’s a great way for the community of Bemidji to see what’s happening on campus and even future students and parents. It’s an easy way to connect to college students and professors to ask personal questions about Student Senate and BSU.

Tomorrow Was Such a Better Time: Observation

The first blog of my project, before I clicked on title of this blog Tomorrow Was Such a Better Time I thought to myself “What is beyond this door?” I entered the blog, and went straight to this person’s profile. Someone named James, from Texas is the creator. A 24yr old male who loves U2, he can’t be a bad guy. He created his blog in May of 2004 and he writes about 1 post per week.

I can easily figure out that his blog is a diary blog. Some of his posts are his views on current events and what is going on in his personal life. I checked out the comments on his page, all of them are about 1 sentence long. I checked out their profiles and the ones that I looked at were only male and some anonymous. They are all around the middle 20’s. The oldest is a 27 year old. It seems like the people who have commented on his blog posts, know James. They also like to use this blog to advertise their own blogs, kind of a smart idea.