Blogging as an Art form

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lawyerliz_IHB

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I was an art major, and it's probably been said somewhere else already, but I think blogging is a new literary form. So this blog as a whole should be looked as, oh, say, analogous to a novel, or better yet, a textbook, written in real time, by a bunch of different people. Rather a pot luck dinner of a textbook.

Also, people generally don't willingly sit down and read a textbook, but apparently loads of people are willing to lurk and read the posts.

Remember Marshal McLuhan? The media is the message.

The type of writing is different; the style is different. The whole thing is rather stream of consciousness, and yet it all hangs together.

Jokes, put ons, off the cuff remarks alternate with and are part of real scholarship. Anybody truly stupid or obnoxious is rapidly put down. Anybody too pompous will be ignored.

You guys seem to like my posts, (or so I hope) but I've never even managed to get a letter to the editor published, because I tend to be all over the place in thought, and the editors want the equivalent of a sound-bite. And I don't have the discipline or the inclination to organize a novel, or even a long essay, but have always felt I had something to say.

A literary form satisfying the urges of people with a little bit of ADD.
 
Liz...this is what happens when one starts to see the WWW as a matrix of minds...not documents, you're not alone, I do exactly the same...along with millions of others.

Seeing as you're asking, I enjoy reading your Posts, along with many others on here...

And BTW, one of my Cycling Buddies is an Editor at the Washington Post, so I may have an inroad for you...;-)
 
Gosh, thanks, PeterUK.

Irvine Renter is not an editor in this art form; he is more like a conductor waving his baton. With a bunch of first chair violins, ready to step in.

You are from the United Kingdom?
 
You're right Liz, and Hats off to Him IR) and the other Guys who run the show, it must be very time consuming and I for one really appreciate it.....I like the annalogy by the way.

Yes, I'm from the UK where the Housing Market is going through tough times too, have you ever been there?
 
Nope, been to Europe a couple of times and would like to see Ireland and Scotland as well as England, as I am mostly Irish and Scotch-Irish descent, plus German and a lot of other odds and ends. Too expensive now, and, I suppose, for the foreseeable future.

Yeah, I saw you had a bank run. My grandmother was one of those people pictured standing outside banks in the great depression.

Heard the guys who invented the mtg backed security moved to London. Lucky you.
 
The Day after the run my Mum emailed me and told me to tell everyone to pay their Mortgages on time every month ;-)

BTW...Scotch is an alcoholic beverage..a Scot is a person ;-) I wouldn't want you to make some big hairy scotsman mad when you go over on Vacation....
 
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Get in my belly...
 
And here I thought we were going to have a discussion about blogging as an art form.

Hahahaha, hehehehe, anyway, Tantette, er. . .Prophette
 
I never really thought about the blog as an artform. It is certainly a creative outlet for me and the others who post and make comments here.

What I find interesting about blogs is how a common interest can create a vibrant community. It is like a social club, but you don't have to go anywhere, and you can interact at your leisure. To my knowledge this is a unique social phenomenon.
 
I would agree that blogs are an outlet for artistry and creativity of all kinds, but I also think of blogs as “public journalism.” They give more Americans a voice in public affairs. Blogs allow anyone with an internet connection to post their thoughts, insights, criticism, gossip or news for all to see. This is a low-cost alternative to the mainstream media. And traditional media outlets find it hard to resist reporting on blogs. Indeed, bloggers can relentlessly pursue a story or a topic from the housing market to celebrity gossip and politics, keeping the “story” alive until it becomes widely reported in the mainstream media. For example, some controversial remarks made by the Senate majority leader, Republican Trent Lott, at a 100[SUP]th[/SUP] birthday party for fellow Republican Senator Strom Thurmond, landed him in hot water. Lott said, “I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either.” Strom Thurmond’s 1948 presidential campaign had rested on his support of segregation. Bloggers pointed out that Lott appeared to be endorsing the racist position of Thurmond’s campaign. Soon, the story made the leap from the web to the mainstream press. Lott resigned as a result of the controversy. Similarly, blogs like IHB have a real impact through educating the public and preventing people from buying into the kool-aid culture. Friends don’t let friends make offers…you don’t here that in the MSM.
 
New art forms are often not recognized for what they are for quite a long line. Look at comics.

Also, they are usually scoffed at at first and somehow not up to whatever classical standards are in place, depending on the time period of the new form.

When music videos started, I said, ah, a new art form and people looked at me strangely. Rap is an OLD art form--chanting. Pardon me but I think Gregorian chant is about a 100,000 times better. But maybe rap will improve. I doubt it, but maybe.

Nobody thought Shakespeare was Shakespeare at the time. The players were always fighting to even keep the theaters open.

The satyre (sp?) plays of the ancient Greeks were light relief to the trajedies (sp?), but the 7 extant plays of Aristophanes are unbelievably precious now. If you has told Aristophanes that his plays would still be performed 25 centuries lates, he problably would have rolled around on the floor laughing and using language appropriate to rap. (He is absolutely filthy, but the way.)

Somebody suggested that IR should write a book and make money so he could buy his dream house. Well, maybe he should. But for the moment this blog is the masterwork of IR and all of the rest of the creators and master posters, with IR as analagous to an editor or conductor, but with less control than that. I'm not sure the word to describe it even exists.

It might be an ephemeral art form, but it is an art form. If you guys print it all out on parchment and keep it in a climate controlled area, it will last as long as an Egyptian papyrus. But at that point, it will be dead art.

Also, it is different from previous art forms in that it is not clear when or how it will end, or if it will have an ending at all.

Aristotle said that art was the right making of the thing to be made.
 
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