{"id":259,"date":"2006-02-08T14:34:14","date_gmt":"2006-02-08T22:34:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=259"},"modified":"2006-02-08T14:37:11","modified_gmt":"2006-02-08T22:37:11","slug":"musing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=259","title":{"rendered":"Musing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I often read columns on the <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.poynter.org\/default.asp\"target=\"_blank\">Poynter Institute<\/a><\/strong>  website, among them &#8220;Chip On My Shoulder:  Inspiration &#038; practical advice from Chip Scanlan, other writing coaches &#038; fellow journalists&#8221; <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.poynter.org\/column.asp?id=52&#038;aid=96500\"target=\"_blank\">Chip&#8217;s latest column<\/a><\/strong>  is about blogging and he has enumerated seven reasons why he does it. I, too, like the freedom and diversity. And yes, it is also a great marketing device. But I think one must resist the urge to sell too much, too often, too hard, especially with respect to one&#8217;s own wares. Connecting readers to the wares of others, however, is one of the best things about blogs, at least to me as a blog reader. <\/p>\n<p>The pressure to post daily (at least weekdays) can be a bit intense, and it has proven to be a double-edged sword for me. The downside is the pressure itself, which sometimes seems to freeze my brain. But the upside wins out: I am writing more, composing faster, and seeing some improvement in my own skills. Chip&#8217;s point about lower standards is also well-taken, providing you read the whole paragraph; he&#8217;s not saying that freedom = immunity.<\/p>\n<p>The scariest line in his piece is this:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;Like most writers, I harbor the dream that an agent or publisher may see commercial possibilities in my work.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>If he, who I look up to and believe to be &#8220;successful&#8221; already, is hoping to be discovered, what chance is there for me? I might as well hang it up, pack it in, and move on down the line. Not that I would (hang it up, that is), I&#8217;m way too stubborn.<\/p>\n<p>P.S. Chip&#8217;s blog is called <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/poynter.blogs.com\/the_mechanic_the_muse\"target=\"_blank\">The Mechanic and The Muse<\/a><\/strong>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I often read columns on the Poynter Institute website, among them &#8220;Chip On My Shoulder: Inspiration &#038; practical advice from Chip Scanlan, other writing coaches &#038; fellow journalists&#8221; Chip&#8217;s latest column is about blogging and he has enumerated seven reasons why he does it. I, too, like the freedom and diversity. And yes, it is &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/?p=259\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Musing&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}