Three years of Blogging at Writing Words
October 19th 2010 21:13
My Three Years at Writing Words - The good, the bad and the ugly
I first joined Orble (on September 30, 2007) because I wanted to find out if I could actually make some money on the side by doing what I love. I created a profile, started writing and hoped for encouraging signs. I quickly learnt that I wasn't going to get rich from AdSense revenue. I also found out that I enjoyed writing about the writing process and that while it would have been nice to make money from it, money wasn't my main motivation for doing it.
I took over Writing Words because the title seemed fitting. If nothing else, I was writing words. Some of these words formed coherent entities which could one day turn into published prose, some of these words became travel articles I actually sold, some of these words were utter rubbish. But they were words I had written, and writing words was what I did almost every day, so I thought I might just as well go with the title.
Good:
It's kept me writing about writing. Which, in turn, kept me thinking about writing. Every time I wrote a blog post when I'd not written much else at the time, it made me aware that I was neglecting my fiction. And often, that was enough for me to continue work on an existing project or write something new.
Many writers don't spend much time on analysing their particular writing process. Since I started writing about mine here, I have become much more aware of mine. It made me more conscious of myself as a writer, if you will. I'm looking at my process, what inspires me, how I develop ideas. I've not sold any of my fiction, but that doesn't mean I'm not a writer. It's reassuring to see that I have worked on my writing for the last three years, despite full-time jobs and sometimes busy freelancing times on top of it. I enjoy travel writing and don't think I'll ever give it up, but my real writing passion is fiction. Blogging about writing fiction means I have to evolve as a fiction writer and keep on discovering more of my writing process, because otherwise I don't have much to tell you.
I'm keeping my eyes open for fiction writing contests and magazine submissions. There are a lot of opportunities out there for fiction writers. Looking for short story competitions gave me an incentive to write short fiction. I like short stories but always thought I wasn't good at writing them. The truth is, I never tried hard to write short fiction (apart from flash fiction, but even my flash pieces where often part of a bigger story). Of course I wasn't good at it, my short story muscles weren't developed. Now that I've begun to take writing short stories seriously, I'm getting better at it. I'm still far from being a short story pro but I'm willing to work on it.
Bad:
I wish Orble offered more flexibility with the design. Writing Words has looked the way it looks since I took over three years ago and it shows. It would also be nice to have a more mobile-friendly version, more options to share the blog, etc. I'm not a big friend of the facebook "Like" button, but I'd quite like to have a "Tweet this post" button.
Ugly:
I don't think there's anything downright ugly. The platform has its flaws - none of which have driven me away, though. I thought about taking all my content and taking it somewhere else. I decided against it, though. So while a few things could be better, they could be a lot worse, too.
I don't think I'll abandon the blog in the coming three years. This year has shown that whenever I put a bit of effort into blogging, the number of visits goes up. I get a comment here and there, too. It's always good to get feedback, to see that something I wrote helped or inspired somebody else. It's also good to hear other opinions, there's nothing wrong with criticism as long as it's constructive.
So don't be shy, let me know what you think about Writing Words.
I first joined Orble (on September 30, 2007) because I wanted to find out if I could actually make some money on the side by doing what I love. I created a profile, started writing and hoped for encouraging signs. I quickly learnt that I wasn't going to get rich from AdSense revenue. I also found out that I enjoyed writing about the writing process and that while it would have been nice to make money from it, money wasn't my main motivation for doing it.
I took over Writing Words because the title seemed fitting. If nothing else, I was writing words. Some of these words formed coherent entities which could one day turn into published prose, some of these words became travel articles I actually sold, some of these words were utter rubbish. But they were words I had written, and writing words was what I did almost every day, so I thought I might just as well go with the title.
Good:
It's kept me writing about writing. Which, in turn, kept me thinking about writing. Every time I wrote a blog post when I'd not written much else at the time, it made me aware that I was neglecting my fiction. And often, that was enough for me to continue work on an existing project or write something new.
Many writers don't spend much time on analysing their particular writing process. Since I started writing about mine here, I have become much more aware of mine. It made me more conscious of myself as a writer, if you will. I'm looking at my process, what inspires me, how I develop ideas. I've not sold any of my fiction, but that doesn't mean I'm not a writer. It's reassuring to see that I have worked on my writing for the last three years, despite full-time jobs and sometimes busy freelancing times on top of it. I enjoy travel writing and don't think I'll ever give it up, but my real writing passion is fiction. Blogging about writing fiction means I have to evolve as a fiction writer and keep on discovering more of my writing process, because otherwise I don't have much to tell you.
I'm keeping my eyes open for fiction writing contests and magazine submissions. There are a lot of opportunities out there for fiction writers. Looking for short story competitions gave me an incentive to write short fiction. I like short stories but always thought I wasn't good at writing them. The truth is, I never tried hard to write short fiction (apart from flash fiction, but even my flash pieces where often part of a bigger story). Of course I wasn't good at it, my short story muscles weren't developed. Now that I've begun to take writing short stories seriously, I'm getting better at it. I'm still far from being a short story pro but I'm willing to work on it.
Bad:
I wish Orble offered more flexibility with the design. Writing Words has looked the way it looks since I took over three years ago and it shows. It would also be nice to have a more mobile-friendly version, more options to share the blog, etc. I'm not a big friend of the facebook "Like" button, but I'd quite like to have a "Tweet this post" button.
Ugly:
I don't think there's anything downright ugly. The platform has its flaws - none of which have driven me away, though. I thought about taking all my content and taking it somewhere else. I decided against it, though. So while a few things could be better, they could be a lot worse, too.
I don't think I'll abandon the blog in the coming three years. This year has shown that whenever I put a bit of effort into blogging, the number of visits goes up. I get a comment here and there, too. It's always good to get feedback, to see that something I wrote helped or inspired somebody else. It's also good to hear other opinions, there's nothing wrong with criticism as long as it's constructive.
So don't be shy, let me know what you think about Writing Words.
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Comment by Jeanne Dininni
Writer's Notes
Blogging definitely helps us develop as writers, and I'm sure that over the past three years your "writing words" have helped many other writers and bloggers develop their own skills, as well.
Best wishes for the next three years!
Jeanne