Are blogs still important?

Are blogs still important?  As I mull this over, let me tell you I started my first blog in 2010, some 14 years ago.  Since then it has been incredibly rewarding in a number of ways but are blogs still important in 2024 and beyond?

Highlights from my blogging hobby

In telling you about the highlights from my blogging hobby, I have in mind each of my three blogs.

1. You can interact with other people, from all around the world.  Just take a look at the map above – this is the reach of this blog over the last 12 months.  The darker the colour, the higher the numbers of people reading my blog.  In general I think it is speakers of English who read my blog but not completely.  Besides the UK which generates the highest number of visitors, the US is always a close second.  Beyond that it’s hard to ascertain much of a pattern but right now I’m attracting readers from Finland, Denmark and Canada.
2. Personal connections: I’ve met a couple of my blog readers in person!  These were complete strangers and we have connected through my blog.  Amazing.  Also an old friend, who I knew 40 years ago, found me and we chatted by phone quite a lot.
3. People have paid me to write for them.  This was when my writing style got spotted and when I was more active with product reviews, which is the next highlight.
4. Product reviews.  I have reviewed everything from upmarket coffee, snack bars, cycle maintenance stuff, sporty clothing, the Halfbike, energy drinks, protein bars and so on.  This has range from start-ups, through to Wiggle and Aldi.
5. Expressing myself, having a good rant: this is when I have a moan about something, perhaps the blummin Council or the latest wacky idea from the Government.  Must do this again sometime, I’ve been too quiet!
6. Being accountable.  While this is something I often kick against in my mind, however there is something serious about it.  I have never set out to be an “influencer” but nevertheless I have to be accountable to you, the reader, for anything I say publicly.  I do not wish to mislead anyone, or be dishonest in anyway (although is some “artistic licence” allowed?).   However, as a Christian, I believe that I am ultimately accountable to God.

Why I think blogs are still important

Here I am talking about personal blogs, like mine.  I am not referring to commercial blogs which serve a different purpose.

Why I hit the ‘publish’ button, people from all around the world can read the blog post.  It allows people to gain a different perspective on life, read the opinions of others and hear what people have to say.  It allows for cross-border communication between ordinary people.  It is a two-way street as I like to read what others have to say.  Surely, in this crazy world on the brink of WW3, we could do with a bit more of that?

However, for me, it’s also a kind of therapy, a way of getting things off my chest and keeping a record of what I’ve been up to.  I get a lot of pleasure to look back on what I was doing ten years ago.

In the longer term, it will become like a little piece of history, a snapshot of an ordinary bloke in the UK who retired early.  We can gain a lot from knowing ~ an understanding ~ our history.

Looking to the future

While blogs, in the wider sense, have evolved over time, there is still a compelling case for them.  With a blog, you’re in control.

Social media is a weird, fickle world out there.  Sometimes it can be cruel and people are be hurt.  It can be quite fast moving and therefore I don’t have much of a presence on Insta, X and so on.  They have their place and sure, some people can really make them work for them and I too have used my tiny presence as a way of driving some traffic towards my blogs.  I am not against social media, it’s just that I see the pitfalls for some.

Blogs, personal ones, have the capacity of reaching people in meaningful ways.  A bit of influencing?  Sure but no more than in any other form of the written word; newspapers, online news apps and so on.  A force for good?  Definitely.  However, if this is true, it follows that they can also be used for less wholesome purposes, so as readers we should always be aware.

And my blog?  In general, the more I blog, the more traffic and the greater number of people interacting in some way.  This could be local friends mentioning something they had read here, or people from further afield leaving comments and people contacting me directly.  It is this kind of interaction that makes it work for me – and hopefully for others as well – right now the world needs more of this.