Why We Love Blogs

"Put yourself into your writing. Let your voice speak through. Speak to the readers."  – Leo Babauta on what makes good blogwriting 

photo courtesy of www.udemy.com

This week we were instructed to choose a blog and analyze it as a form of writing and information delivery. I read several blogs each week. Interestingly enough I don't have a dedicated blog that I visit all the time because I'm constantly finding new ones based on whatever topics I have on my mind during that time. For this assignment I chose a blog titled 

What About Our Daughters.

Here is a blog excerpt:

"What About Our Daughters was founded on April 18, 2007 in response to an Oprah Winfrey show entitled “After Imus:Now What” . The original purpose of the blog was to encourage Black women to organize to “Stop Funding Foolishness.” In other words, to use economic power to  to impose economic sanctions on those who are producing destructive images of Black women and girls. We’ve evolved since then. Gotten some media attention, founded Blogging While Brown, Michelle Obama Watch, and proven over and over again that when men and women of character come together, we can change the world.

Unapologetic, Uncompromising, and Unbowed in defense of Black women and girls."

What About Our Girls is a blog that keeps readers abreast of issues affecting African and African American women and girls, particularly issues that do not receive prolonged mainstream news media attention, such as kidnappings, and political and social injustices. My mother sent me the link to this blog a few years ago, I forget the reason why, but she liked the premise and the information she'd read. So I started checking it out periodically and found that the blogger discussed topics I didn't even know about such as the controversial casting of Zoe Zaldana (of Avatar fame), a black latina actress with a light complexion as the dark complexioned famous singer Nina Simone in a biopic of the singer's life. There was quite a uproar on social media I learned due Zoe needed to wear a kinky wig and blackface to make her resemble Nina Simone. Why couldn't the director cast a woman who looked like Nina, people asked. 

What About Our Girls created a forum for intellectual debate on the topic and read the different opinions, some I agreed with, others I did not. The commenters debated with each other in a respectful manner and enlightened me on other subjects I was unaware of. . 

I revisited this blog this week and searched the blog's post history found that the blogger has been blogging less frequently over the past few years. This could be due to her having written a book and also running the What About Our Girls Facebook page, which could be bringing in more traffic than the blog. But I don't feel she should be decreasing her posts after having such a strong start and engaging her audience who need a forum like this to have dialogue with others of the same mind and passion.

In my opinion, a best practice to create and maintain a blog to ensure appropriate substance and function the content must be consistent to the blog’s theme, or stated purpose. The content must also be replenished on a frequent basis to keep your followers engaged. As I mentioned about the What About Our Daughters blog, the comments from readers were plentiful. This is important because not only does it mean that folks are visiting her blog, they care enough to leave a comment, to add validation to the post's content and message.

“People who leave comments build the community aspect that really helps a site become more than just one blogger writing into space. Comments let you know what’s working and what’s not, and inspire you to keep at it," according to William Kraska, author of This Is Not a Blog, in a post titled What Makes a Good Blog.

I agree with this. A blog is only as good as its readers and the comments they leave, which attract other readers and help the blogger build a brand and following. Blogs need people to care, and people care when the blog is providing relevant information tailored to their interests.