A Bad Case Of Blogger-itis

I appear to have come down with a bad case of blogger-itis over the past week.

For the uninitiated, Blogger-itis is the exact opposite of writers block. Whereas with writers block you can’t write anything to save your life, blogger-itis is the literary equivalent of a mind-enema. You just can’t stop writing.

This week, I’ve found myself writing and publishing a post, and then starting a new post mere minutes later. Then, I’ll finish and save that one…and find myself wanting to start yet another.

In the past week, I’ve published ten posts, and I’ve got another 9 sitting on my computer, just itching to be set free on an unsuspecting world.

That’s 19 posts in a week. An average of almost three per day…and these aren’t quick posts…they’re 1500 word jobbies.

This is a bad thing. Let me tell you why.

First of all, I have the attention span of a kitten who lives on a diet of chocolate, amphetamines and raw, unprocessed sugar.

So while I might be incredibly interested in a subject while I’m writing about it, if I don’t publish it there and then, I get so bored of the idea that it will never see the light of day. Even if I actually like the post I’ve written, when I get up the next day, my mental kitten has leapt upon a new ball of narrative yarn and whatever screwed up tangent I’m currently riding like a crazed bull-rider, instantly takes precedence over what I wrote yesterday.

Also, when I’m in the middle of a bad case of blogger-itis, my interest-filter goes completely off-line. I’m hammering away at the keyboard, all excited and interested…then just as I finish the post, I realize that what I’m writing about is of almost no interests to anyone but me.

Honestly, is anyone interested in the ins and outs of Oblivion’s ‘Radiant AI’ system? Or maybe maybe how far I think home-entertainment technology will advance in our lifetime? ...because I’ve got over 2000 words on the subject sitting on my hard-drive.

(That’s another blogging disease I suffer from. ‘Delusions of Grandeur-itis’. While many people might care what some big technology giant like Microsoft of Sony thinks will happen to entertainment technology within our lifetime…does anyone honestly even care what some random guy with a blog thinks?)

So, one or two of you might be asking: “Why don’t you just publish these posts one after another? It’s not like it costs you anything!”

Well, here’s the problem with that.

People seem very unwilling to backtrack. If they miss one or two posts, they’ll probably backtrack to give them a read…but let’s do the math.

I’ve written 19 blog posts in the past week. At roughly 1500 – 2000 words each, that comes to roughly…

(Start…programs…accessories…calculator)

…holy shit…

thirty-eight thousand words.

If you’re having a hard time getting that into context, that’s roughly the first hundred and ten pages of a novel.

(Actually, that’s kinda depressing. I’ve written more on here in a week, than I put into my latest book attempt in six months.)

In short, while most of you are willing to spend 10-15 minutes here, not many of you are willing to waste a couple hours reading 38,000 words of my drivel in a single sitting.

Basically, sometimes I write a post that I really like. If it’s at the top of the list for a day or so, I know it’s going to get read. If it’s 12 down on the list…no one’s going to backtrack through miles of literary effluent to read it.

So why not save these posts to publish at a later date when I can’t think of anything to write?

Well, the problem here is a lot of posts are time-sensitive. They may be (arguably) interesting and relevant the day I write them, but in a week? Hardly.

Hell, there not even that interesting to begin with.

Note:

(Since upgrading to the beta version of blogger, I’ve heard from a lot of you that are still on the old version that you’re unable to post comments. Firstly, if you can, upgrade to the beta (Click the ‘learn more’ link on the blogger homepage). If you’re unable to upgrade right now, just comment as an anonymous user instead of using your blogger credentials…that should solve the problem until the new blogger officially goes live)